Military Brides and Refugees: Vietnamese American Wives and Shifting Links to the Military, 1980 – 2000

Abstract

Since the immigration legislation of 1965, marriage to American citizens and resident aliens has been one of the primary paths for migration to the United States. Despite the rapid growth of the Asian American population over the course of the late twentieth century, Asian Americans had still reached only 3 per cent of all Americans by 2000, meaning that Asian marriage migration to the United States has been largely through marriage to non‐Asians. In this study, we look at exogamy among Vietnamese Americans using U. S. Census data (1980, 1990, and 2000) from 5 per cent PUMS sets made available through the IPUMS project. We ask: (1) What are the predictors of exogamy among Vietnamese Americans? (2) How do the rates of exogamy of Vietnamese American women compare to those of Vietnamese American men? (3) How have the predictors of exogamy and the apparent characteristics of the exogamously married changed over the decades of refugee movement from Vietnam to North America? We review data from the years 1980, 1990, and 2000. In the assimilationist view of immigration associated with the classic work of Milton M. Gordon, exogamy is the final stage of immigrant incorporation into a host country. Migration through marriage, which has become a major source of immigration to the United States since the Immigration Act of 1965, reverses this assimilationist pattern, placing marriage before immigration and incorporation, or at the earliest stages of immigration and incorporation. Our findings are relevant to understanding the specific Vietnamese experience in the United States. They highlight the continuing but declining importance of the Vietnam War in creating close connections between Vietnamese and other people in the United States, even after the war had ended. The findings also suggest how these connections changed as a result of Vietnamese mass migration to America.

International Marriages Between Eastern European‐Born Women and U.S.‐Born Men

“…The ACS 2008–2009 includes information obtained from spouses who can be paired to create couple‐level analysis. Data from other IPUMS samples have been used by other researchers to study intermarriages (e.g., Crowder & Tolnay, ; Hidalgo & Bankston, ) because the data include important demographic information on immigration, marriage, and other characteristics of immigrants.…”

Historical Perspectives on Diverse Asian American Communities: Immigration, Incorporation, and Education

“…This Act was extended to Laotians in 1976, paving the way for larger waves of Hmong and Laotian refugee arrivals in the years to follow. The Refugee Act of 1980 established policy for continued admission and settlement of refugees from Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia throughout the United States; additionally, the Orderly Departure Program was created to assist Vietnamese relatives of refugees in leaving Vietnam or the camps in which they were located, and settling them in areas across the United States (Hidalgo & Bankston, 2008;Hing, 1997). Another wave of immigrants arrived following passage of the 1987 Amerasian Homecoming Act, which specifically allowed Vietnamese children of American soldiers from the war to enter the United States along with their immediate families.…”

“…Another wave of immigrants arrived following passage of the 1987 Amerasian Homecoming Act, which specifically allowed Vietnamese children of American soldiers from the war to enter the United States along with their immediate families. An estimated 83,000 immigrants had arrived in the United States by 1993 under this provision (Hidalgo & Bankston, 2008).…”

Blurring Racial and Ethnic Boundaries in Asian American Families: Asian American Family Patterns, 1980-2005

“…However, the rapidly rising size of the Asian American population raises the possibility that an increase in potential Asian marriage partners may result in decreasing exogamy, following the logic of the structural determinants of marriage choices discussed above. Hidalgo and Bankston (2008) found that the quick expansion of the Vietnamese American population from 1980 to 2000 was accompanied by a decrease in the rate of out-marriage, although they suggested that this was due to the decline in military brides in the decades following the Vietnam War as well as to the increasing numbers of Vietnamese Americans. In addition, perceptions of Asians as a single group by the larger American population may encourage interethnic associations, and therefore marriages, among people of different Asian groups.…”