Culture of Vietnam

The culture of Vietnam is one of the oldest in Southeast Asia, with the ancient Bronze age Dong Son culture being widely considered one of its most important progenitors.^[1] Due to 1000 years of Chinese rule, Vietnam was heavily influenced by Chinese culture in terms of politics, government, Confucian social and moral ethics, and art. Vietnam is considered to be part of the East Asian cultural sphere.^[2]

Following independence from China in the 10th century, Vietnam began a southward expansion that saw the annexation of territories formerly belonging to the Champa civilization (now Central Vietnam) and parts of the Khmer empire (modern southern Vietnam), which resulted in minor regional variances in Vietnam's culture due to exposure to these different groups.

During the French colonial period, Vietnamese culture absorbed various influences from the Europeans, including the spread of Catholicism and the adoption of the Latin alphabet. Prior to this, Vietnamese had used both Chinese characters and a script called Chữ nôm which was based on Chinese but included newly invented characters meant to represent native Vietnamese words.

In the socialist era, the cultural life of Vietnam has been deeply influenced by government-controlled media and the cultural influences of socialist programs. For many decades, foreign cultural influences were shunned and emphasis placed on appreciating and sharing the culture of communist nations such as the Soviet Union, China, Cuba and others. Since the 1990s, Vietnam has seen a greater re-exposure to Asian, European and American culture and media.

Some elements generally considered to be characteristic of Vietnamese culture include ancestor veneration, respect for community and family values, handicrafts and manual labour, and devotion to study. Important symbols present in Vietnamese culture include dragons, turtles, lotuses and bamboo.

History

Vietnam celebrates many holidays, including traditional holidays which have been celebrated in Vietnam for thousands of years, along with modern holidays imported predominantly from western countries.

Among the traditional holidays, the two most important and widely celebrated are the Lunar new year (Tết), followed by the Mid-autumn lantern festival (Tết Trung Thu), although the latter has been losing ground in recent years.