DOCIMENT RESUME ED 339 675 SO 030 051 AUTHOR Bache, Ellyn TITLE Culture Clash. Second Edition. REPORT NO ISBN-0-933662-87-4 PUB DATE 89 NOTE 141p. AVAILABLE FROM Intercultural Press, P.O. Box 700, Yarmouth, ME 04096 ($10.95, plus $1.50 shipping and handling). PUB TYPE Viewpoints (Opinion/Position Papers, Essays, etc.) (120) EDRS PRICE MF01 Plus Postage. PC Not Available from EDRS. DESCRIPTORS *Acculturation; Cross Cultural Training; Cultural Background; Cultural Differences; Cultural Influenzes; Cultural Interrelationships; Culture Conflict; *Culture Contact; Ethnic Relations; *Foreign Culture; *Intercultural Communication; Intercultural Programs; *Refugees; *Social Integration IDENTIFIERS Sponsors; *Vietnam ABSTRACT This monograph provides a first-hand account of the experience of a U.S. family who sponsored a Vietnamese refugee family from 1975-1979. The book, which is comprised of journal entries, proposes to show what it is like to deal with people from an entirely difference culture and to suggest an approach to handling the problems before the refugee/sponsor relationship breaks down. One of the main themes of the book is that the sponsors' and refugees' expectations of one another often proved to be wildly misconceived and unrealistic. Learning to overcome these expectations was a most difficult task for all of the concerned parties. Major conflicts occur that lead to a series of cr.tical questions. What differences exist in basic value systNns? What is the right balance between charity and self-sufficiency for refugees? How can old and new cultures be integrated within the refugee family? And what are the welfare and financial considerations in refugee sponsorship? (DB) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. *********************************************************************** Ws. serAinstwy OR nutimoos Office of Educalsonal Rematch am itnanymunt EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (EM) documeni Ras been reproduced U maimed from 14 moon w organisation originatingtL 0 Minor changes have been made to impiety* ,. tiopioeuction quality Points of vet* or opinions slated in thisdocw mem do no I nacesaarliy newsmen! official OERI position ot policy "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS ' MATERIAL IN MICROFICHE ONLY HAS SEEN GRANTED BY ATTU 0111.s TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)." ELLYN BACHE 17" 0-dr-1 cn BEST COPY AVAILABLE SECOND EDITION ELLYN BACHE CUITURE CLASH SECOND EDITION INTERCULTURAL PRESS INC 3 Published by: / Intercultural Press, Inc. P.O. Box 700 Yarmouth, ME 04096 (207) 846-5168 ISBN: 0-933662-87-4 Library of Congress No.: 89-082119 Copyright: 1989 Ell! n Bache This publication may not be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in whole or in part, in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical. photoLopying. recording or otherwise without prior written permission. Printed in the U.S.A. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Bache, Ellyn. Culture clash / Ellyn Bache. P. cm. ISBN 0-933662-87-4 I. Vietnamese AniericansCultural assimilation.2. Refugees--United States. 3. United States--Emigration and immigration. I. Title E184.V53B331990 89-26943 303.48'2597'073--dc20 C1P To Ben... who held us all together. 5 FOREWORD Misunderstandings between refugees and the Americans who wel- come them to the United States have occurred everyday since 1975. Ellyn Bache has captured the essence of these misunderstandings in this tale of sponsors coming to terms with people of another culture and with their own internal barriers to understanding. Bache brings to life the challenges faced by the sponsors, teachers, refugee workers,volun- teers, tutors, health and human service providers,employers, cowork- ers, neighbors, classmates, and acquaintancesof the tens of thousands of refugees arriving here annually. Those refugees must deal with a new culture as well as their own cultural baggage. They carry hurts, emotional and sometimes physical, that are unfathomable to most of us, which resulted from the ravages of genocide in Cambodia, the destruction of Afghanistan, chaotic up- heaval in southern Africa, the disastrous effects of war and famine in Ethiopia, and deadly upheaval in Latin America. They may havesuf- fered through imprisonment, torture, loss of family , the hardshipsof Peeing their homeland and of life in refugee camps, and the trauma of awaiting acceptance into the United States. Our limited awareness not only of their experience but of our own cultural and personal biases suggests that the resettlement of refugees is doomed topainful failure. And yet the hope, goodwill, strength, and courage of both therefugees and their friends in the U.S. overcome the barriers and make the pro- cess work, albeit with some difficulty.Everyone is changed by the experience. Ellyn Bache shares with remarkable candor het experience of com- ing to terms with herself, her family, and her community whileassist- ing a Vietnamese family to resettle. Her story of the events of adecade ago is still relevant today for anyone engagedin refugee resettlement. Though some circumstances and approaches have changed, manyis- fi Culture Clash sues persist: providing charity vs. promoting refugee self-sufficiency (or how to balance them in a clear way); understanding differences in basic value systems and disparate expectations of those coming and those welcoming; integrating the old and the new cultures in the refu- gee family; managing intergenerational conflicts; making welfare pro- cedures and regulations comprehensible; and confronting the irrational system for financing health care that plagues American society. Some of these issues are inherent in the task being undertaken; some can be remedied. Since 1975, the United States has welcomed over one and a quarter million refugees. Close to a million have come from Southeast Asia (Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos), 150,000 from the Soviet Union, nearly 100,000 from Eastern Europe (Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia), about 50,000 from the Near East (Afghani- stan and Iran), over 30,000 from Latin America, and 20,000 from Africa. Currently, tens of thousands of Amerasians (the children of' American men and Vietnamese women born in Vietnam between 1962 and 1975) and their families are coming to cities around the U.S. Long held hostage by differences between the Vietnamese and U.S. govern- ments, they are finally being welcomed to the homeland of' their fathers under the Amerasian Homecoming Act of 1987. This refocusing of attention on the culture of Vietnam and on refugees from that land makes this new edition ofCulture Clashparticularly significant. The opportunity to bridge the differences between Amerasians, Vietnam- ese-Americans, American Vietnam veterans, and the people of the local communities calls for an awareness of the issues the book ad- dresses with clarity and courage. There is, however, an even greater reason why this book is so rele- vant now. Refugees have become a global issue. United Nations re- search shows that the number of refugees in need of protection and/or assistance worldwide has risen from 4.5 million in 1979 to 14.5 million in 1988. The experience that Ellyn Bache relates is one small example of the collective distress of humanity and the consequent encounters between people of different cultures who must struggle to comprehend each other. Wars, oppression, and other events that force people to migrate are a matter of concern for everyone. These events require that people on all parts of the planet focus attention on finding ways to understand and respect those who are very different and who are diffi- cult to accept at first. Ellyn Bache's example of self-questioning and reassessment is one step each of us can take toward eliminating the vi 7 Foreword hatred and persecution that contributes to creating new generations of refugees. Finally, I wish to echo the author's plea to "leave the doors" open to the United States. It is clear to me that there is a resonant truth in the declaration of Norman and Naomi Zucker inThe Guarded Gate: The Reality of American Refugee Policy(Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1987) that "we ought not to lose sight of the fact that materially, culturally, intellectually and spiritually, refugees in the end enrich us more fully than we do them." In peace, David Agan, Director Diocesan Human Relations Services' Refugee Resettlement Program Portland, Maine October 1989 vii PROLOGUE The events of the book took place between 1975-1979, during which time my husband, Ben, and I sponsored a Vietnamese refugee family who had escaped from their country as the U.S. military was pulling out of Saigon. Fourteen years have passed since our story began and though Kim and Quang had some problems unique to that first wave of arrivals, time as shown that in most ways they were typical of the refugees who continue to come to the United States from Southeast Asia and elsewhere. Like other refugees since, Kim and Quang arrived with unrealistic expectations of what life in the U.S. would be like expectations that we, their sponsors, were not prepared for. And like other later refugees from a myriad of countries, they were at first confused and disillusioned by some the things they found here. As sponsors, we were also typical in our frustration with Kim andQuang's inability to behave as we expected them to. The purpose of this first- hand account wasand isto show what it is like to