Responding to “An Interview with Hang Nguyen”
Understanding
“An Interview with Hang Nguyen” was written by Suzanne Stiel in 2002. Stiel writes this paper describing Hang’s experience as being an immigrant from Vietnam to the United States, and how this affects both her and her daughter Thu’s lives. This reading doesn’t have many contextual features to it other than a short introduction and the paragraphs to follow. I appreciated that it was shorter so I could dissect and comprehend the text easier. The reading is quite touching and sad as it focuses on how Thu lost and denied her culture when she came to the United States. At school, Thu was directly and indirectly told to deny her culture. She was treated as incapable as she didn’t speak English. Her teachers had a large contribution to Thu’s refusal of her culture by treating her as “stupid,” “uncivilized,” and a “savage,” as well as telling Thu she wasn’t allowed to speak Vietnamese at home (Stiel, 2002). Although, with time, Thu has had some interest in her Vietnamese culture, she is still not as culturally proud as she could have been.
Analysis
This reading is primarily aimed at individuals in the education system. Hang speaks as she’s quite upset—rightfully so—about how coming to Canada and enrolling Thu in the education system has torn her away from her culture. Hang uses words like “stupid,” “conservative,” “disappointment,” and “difficult” to describe their experience (Stiel, 2002). The denial and loss of Thu’s culture started at a young age when she was told she couldn’t speak her language at home, and how she wasn’t “treated as . . . an entity” overall (Stiel, 2002). Hang describes how this affected Thu’s future: She was only half bilingual as she could not read and write in Vietnamese (Stiel, 2002). This is quite heartbreaking as it is evident that Thu’s cultural understandings, interests, and involvement could have, and should have to an extent, resulted in a lot more relevance in her life today. Children like Thu may also have stared to rebel against their parents and culture, and instead of following its customs and traditions they experimented with what is forbidden like drugs and alcohol (Stiel, 2022). This all roots from the message as a child that their culture is not accepted here and English/our ways must be learned to be accepted and successful. The purpose of the article is to inform us that cultures must be accepted and embraced rather than denied in the education system. Hang shares her story so we can see how cultural oppression in school has effected her daughter for the rest of her life. I think Stiel chose to let Hang tell her story and not interfere with any contextual additions so that we can see her pure and raw story; not changing any of the text is also a metaphorical representation of how students shouldn’t be altered either in any aspect such as how Thu was molded into what society wanted her to be.
Application
This reading is relevant to me as a teacher as I will most definitely have students of different cultures in my class. This reading solidifies that I should not only not discourage students from their culture, but also embrace their cultures and allow them to explore a bit more into who they are. An experience that I have that relates to Hang and Thu’s experience is one that I had in middle school. I had just gotten glasses and I needed them to see the board. One day I heard a few of the boys in my class laughing and pointing at me, and I soon came to the conclusion that they were laughing at how I looked in my glasses. For a few week, I wouldn’t wear my glasses in class as I didn’t want to be made fun of. I would ask my sister and friend what the board would say because I couldn’t read it. It is sad to look back on, but it makes me resonate with how Thu may have felt in her situation. We both had something different about us and we wanted to hide that and just fit in. I struggled as I couldn’t see, and Thu struggled as she lost her culture, and may have even distanced herself from her mom. Although Thu’s experience is a larger issue in society than mine, our stories contain what is apart of us and should be embraced and valued rather than shunned. I now see that just like how Thu should have continued to embrace her culture at home, I should have also embraced my glasses and worn then because I needed them.
Synthesis
This reading reminds me of “The Language of Silence” in Exploring Language. Both Thu and Maxine have encountered oppression of their language and culture as a child. Just like how Hang sees their foreign country negatively, Maxine’s mother also has similar views as she calls the United States a “ghost country” (Kingston, 2015, p. 166). The difference between the two readings are that Thu shuns away from her own culture and is pushed to fit in, whereas Maxine chooses to stay silent and not speak at all as her voice is labeled ugly. The themes, overall, are the same throughout the stories: both girls were forced to adjust to the contrasting cultures and choose to resist and embrace their culture, or give in and most likely lose their culture.
Evaluation
I really liked this reading overall. I liked the length of it and that I was able to closely read and dive into analysis. I also liked the interview style where Stiel let Hang speak and tell her story. I would definitely recommend this reading to all educators as it’s important for us to learn about what we teach and bring to our students impacts their future lives. This also shows us the importance of embracing other cultures in the classroom to make our students feel seen and so they can continue to follow their cultural practices comfortably and without hesitation, in and out of the classroom.
References
Kingston, M. H. (2015). The Language of Silence. In Exploring language (pp. 166–170). essay, Pearson.
Stiel, S. (2002). An Interview with Hang Nguyen. In B. Miller Power & R. Shagoury Hubbard (Eds.), Language development: A reader for teachers (Second ed., pp. 185-188). Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Merrill Prentice Hall.