Author Archives: helenaworthen

I have mentioned stories that can’t be told. These are stories about the generation of the parents of our students and, if they are still alive, stories about the grandparents. Young people have told us these stories but there is no way that I can repeat them. They are, of course, stories of what peopleContinue reading “Stories That Can’t Be Told”

This is a book of poetry that goes from at least 1000 years ago to the near-present. Joe is in the Museum of Ethnography bookstore in Hanoi. The ancient poetry is in Chinese characters, the more recent in the romanized script of contemporary Vietnamese. We did not buy this book; it’s too heavy to carryContinue reading “What Books We Are Reading about Vietnam”

The second wedding took place in Phan Rang-Thap Cham, a coastal city north of Phan Thiet where we went with Nghia, but south of Nha Trang where we went with Vy and Anh. While the first wedding took place at the woman’s hometown, Hue, the second wedding takes place at the husband’s home town. TheContinue reading “Vinh’s Wedding #2”

Although we have written many class handouts specifically for these classes in Vietnam, this is the first one that I think really gets at what we have to teach. When we teach collective bargaining in the US to trade unionists, we do not have to make explicit what the power relationships are behind what isContinue reading “Power Theater”

Kent Wong is bringing a delegation here in January. As preparation, he has sent us a video made by Howard Kling in Minnesota, about the 2007 delegation. also at https://youtu.be/J-MSTu-RcWY Watching this video makes me think about our first question: “What are we supposed to be teaching?” In this video, they talk about the benefits ofContinue reading “What Should We Teach #XXL”

Vinh is from Hue and her family lives there so the first wedding (of three) was held there. Three solid days of ceremonies, family gatherings and meals after meals, all in extraordinary places. At one extreme was the wedding dinner, at least 7 courses served efficiently but unobtrusively to 800 guests seated at round tables inContinue reading “Hue, Vinh’s Wedding #1”

We presented the first 17 of our 33 powerpoint slides on the Borjas book in a session yesterday afternoon with Dean Hoa, Miss La, Mr. Theit and Ms Pem, with Vinh translating. This book has been chosen to be part of the curriculum for the “Top 100” courses, a program at TDTU that is scheduledContinue reading “Teaching George Borjas’ Labor Economics; a real Vietnamese song  “

, Hollis, Leanna and Joe and I cabbed into District 1, followed (or led) by Vinh on her motorbike.  In case I haven’t explained this before, she  is a very pretty young woman at all times, but when she gears up with a face-covering mask, safety glasses, long-sleeved cotton jacket, big gloves and one of those semi-blanketContinue reading “Happy Birthday! I’m 27”

I’ve finished the exam grading for the Cross-Cultural Leadership class and will put them on Mr. Hieu’s desk this morning. I graded them on a rubric like this: 2 points if they actually identified three things that they learned and talked about them. 2 points if they showed that they had done the readings andContinue reading “Exams graded”

Last May when Richard Fincher came though Berkeley while attending a conference of arbitrators in San Francisco, we had dinner and he talked about what teaching in Vietnam was like. I can check that blog posting and confirm what he said. I remember him saying that he taught classes of 75 or more, that theContinue reading “The Fence, and How to Get Over It In Certain Places”