Vietnamese Language Program Expands

It's a slow process, but Southeast Asia is beginning to get more attention in the classrooms of Columbia.

In September 2004, Columbia introduced a Vietnamese language program through its Weatherhead East Asian Institute with funding from the National Resource Council and Center for Language Research and Teaching. This year, Intermediate Vietnamese is being offered for the first time, and has two undergraduate students enrolled.

Last summer, Charles Armstrong, associate professor of history and then acting director of the Weatherhead Institute, invited James Lap, a lecturer in Vietnamese at New York University, to teach a class at Columbia.

"I think its about time to have a Vietnamese program because most, if not all, Ivy League schools have one," Lap said. For example, Cornell offers up to four years of Vietnamese instruction.

The sentiment that Columbia could invest more academic resources into the study of Southeast Asia is widely held by both faculty and students. Matthew Nguyen, CC '07, the president of the Vietnamese Students Association, said that when he was a freshman he attended an EALAC open house and was "disappointed to see that there was nothing Vietnamese related in the department."

Both Armstrong and Dr. Stephane Charitos, the director of the Language Resource Center at Columbia, confirmed that Vietnamese was introduced because of student interest in the region.

While most of EALAC's resources are focused on China, Japan, and Korea, Professor Armstrong said that SIPA, the EALAC Department, and the Weatherhead Institute plan to "increase the course offerings in history, culture and politics of Southeast Asia." Armstrong, a specialist in Korean history, is teaching a class on Vietnam this semester.

Charitos said that Armstrong's choice to teach about Vietnam was related to the decision to introduce the language program. "We knew the language wouldn't be studied in a vacuum." He also noted the introduction of Indonesian language classes this year. Armstrong expects that both new language programs will stick around. "We hope to incorporate the two languages into the regular curriculum before long," he wrote in an e-mail.

Since Lap still teaches at NYU, he can only teach one class a semester at Columbia, though students can take classes at either campus as part of an inter-university agreement.

This year Lap is teaching Intermediate Vietnamese, which means that introductory-level classes can only be offered as part of a two year cycle that will begin again next fall.

The first Vietnamese class last fall didn't get off the ground until about two weeks into the semester. According to Lap, "not many students were aware of it." Tiffany Phan, SEAS '07, said there were about eight people in the class.

While Intermediate Vietnamese currently has two undergraduate students officially enrolled, a few medical and SIPA students also attend the class. Advanced language students have been able to receive credit for independent study with Lap.

Both Lap and Charitos think that there will be an increase in enrollment next fall when Elementary Vietnamese will be offered again. "We will see demand creep up," Charitos said.

While appreciative of the new class, Nguyen wished that Columbia would offer more. "I think that having a consistently available introductory course in Vietnamese would be a step in the right direction," he said.

Phan said that information about this year's intermediate class wasn't available until late summer and that the program has been under-publicized. Lap agreed with this concern but said that things seemed to be changing and that "I try to spread the news."

Lap was trained as a literature teacher in Vietnam and came to America in 1975. He received his M.S. in Computer Science from Columbia in 1987 and has been teaching at NYU since 1997. He came to Columbia because "it was good for me to go back to my alma mater to help and serve students," he said.