Kelly La

Integration of Vietnamese Culture

Through a research-driven approach, Integration of Vietnamese Culture explores Vietnamese typography and lettering system with a curated textual archive of online articles, books, films, and podcasts. Focusing on the history and evolution of Vietnamese scripts from Chữ Nho and Chữ Nôm to the modern Latin-based Chữ Quốc Ngữ. Vietnamese typography shares structural similarities with the French script, but its use of diacritics distinguishes it and marks that shift in tone and meaning. As someone who grew up in a Vietnamese-Chinese household, the script is familiar. Despite this cultural closeness, I still experience moments of difficulty when reading Vietnamese type.The work invites viewers to see typography not as a tool for communication but as a cultural artifact that reflects Vietnamese typography and lettering systems' history, language, and identity.