hung cam thai – Asian American / Asian Research Institute

Blurred Lines: The Pursuit of Superiority in the Vietnamese Diaspora

July 6, 2020November 8, 2019 By Hung Cam Thai

Focusing on microlevel social interactions in the homeland, this lecture explores the projection and achievement of superiority within the context of Vietnamese diasporic and transnational repertoires. As a country undergoing dramatic economic transformation for more than two decades, Vietnam is a site of contradictory new hierarchies with the increasing return of overseas migrants who encounter a growing new monied class. Prof. Hung Cam Thai examines the formation of these hierarchies in situations where individuals seek to establish themselves as “social betters” in determining criteria of worthiness.

2019-2020 CUNY Thomas Tam Visiting Professor

October 30, 2019August 31, 2019 By Hung Cam Thai

Hung Cam Thai is professor of sociology and Asian American studies at Pomona College, where he is former chair of Asian American studies, former director of the Pacific Basin Institute, and former chair of sociology. Prof. Thai is the 2019-2020 CUNY Thomas Tam Visiting Professor at the CUNY Graduate Center and Hunter College/CUNY. He received a sociology Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley.

Prof. Thai’s first book, For Better or for Worse: Vietnamese International Marriages in the New Global Economy (Rutgers, 2008), is a study of international marriages linking women in Vietnam and overseas Vietnamese men living in the diaspora. His second book, Insufficient Funds: The Culture of Money in Low Wage Transnational Families (Stanford, 2014), won the American Sociological Association’s 2015 Best Book Award on Asia from the Asia/Asian America Section, and the 2016 Best Social Sciences Book Award from the Association for Asian American Studies. Insufficient Funds examines how and why transnational families in the Vietnamese diaspora spend, receive, and give money.

Keeping Up with the Nguyens: When Poor Immigrants Return to the Homeland

July 6, 2020March 29, 2019 By Hung Cam Thai

This lecture focuses on the social and personal sides of monetary flows in the Vietnamese diaspora. With few exceptions, the private use of money has been considered too personal and too mysterious for migration scholars to tackle, unless they examine “development issues,” such as daily household expenditures. Prof. Hung Cam Thai will focus on low-wage … Read more