Vietnamese Studies
Please note: All information given on these pages is for general informational purposes only and is not legally binding. In case of any discrepancies, the information provided by the Studienbüro (Student Services Office) always takes precedence!
Vietnamese Studies is about the language and culture of Vietnam. The Vietnamese language is the official language of Vietnam (around 100 million inhabitants) and the mother tongue of the 84 million Việt (Kinh) in Vietnam as well as of ca. four million Việt living abroad. Vietnamese is the language with the largest number of speakers of the Austroasiatic language family, the second largest being Khmer. About sixty percent of the Vietnamese vocabulary can be written with Chinese characters as it is of Chinese origin. Therefore, the study of Hán Việt, optional in both BA and MA, serves to deepen the knowledge about language and culture.
As Hamburg's BA and MA profiles of Vietnamese Studies are unique in the German speaking area, the range of teaching matters is broad, with a clear focus on language training, literature and history, but selected questions of interior and exterior politics (e.g., Đổi Mới or the Conflict in the South China Sea), of anthropology or religion also have their place in the curriculum.
While Vietnamese is the first language to be learned in Vietnamese Studies, Indonesian-Malay, Thai, or Standard Chinese ("Mandarin") has to be chosen as the second language. (Please ask the student advisor about this in advance!) In specific cases, other secondary languages – like Filipino (Tagalog), Lao, Khmer, or other languages from one of the other specialization branches (Austronesian Studies and Thai Studies) – might be approved upon request.