Abstract
There are currently almost 4000 Vietnamese students all around Taiwan. Taiwan as their destination for overseas education also is the destination for a large amount of labor/marriage migrants from Vietnamese in the past few decades. Based on the data collected through in-depth interview, participant observation, textual and policy analysis, this thesis aims to elaborate on the daily lives of Vietnamese students, and explore their changing identities. Viewing migration and identification as dynamic processes, this thesis emphasizes that the Vietnamese students are not only defined as Vietnamese students in official migrant categories but also "becoming" Vietnamese students. The recruiting channels for Vietnamese students are structured in the specific context of internationalization of higher education and Vietnam-Taiwan relations. However, Vietnamese students embracing imagined modernities who desire to achieve upward social mobility through academic mobility may actually experience downward class mobility, due to the inequality between Vietnam and Taiwan in the global system. Besides, Vietnamese labor/marriage migrants in Taiwan are labeled as inferior others. Vietnamese students probably fall into stigmatized categories of Vietnamese migrants, experiencing the process of "othering", which is especially a gendered situation. Maintaining favored images of international elites, Vietnamese students may demonstrate and perform differences such as lifestyles to highlight the boundaries between other categories of Vietnamese migrants and them. "Passing" as a non-Vietnamese migrant is also a frequently used technique to prevent from discrimination. However, students who draw boundaries may downplay each other’s differences while communicating more with other Vietnamese migrants in Taiwan. In their transnational lives, Vietnamese students live in a variety of positions more than simply the category of "international students" can describe. When they cross the boundary of nations, the invisible boundaries of nation, class, and gender are appearing and even strengthening. The daily life of a Vietnamese student is such an ongoing process - he/she walking across complicated boundaries in transnational fields, identifying and being identified (as) others while interacting with Taiwanese, Vietnamese, and other agents in a foreign society. In this process, they confirm, resist, or negotiate their national identification. They are not just being categorized as Vietnamese students but also "becoming" Vietnamese and Vietnamese students.