Recent census estimates the population of Vietnam at beyond 84 million. Vietnamese people, also called "Viet" or "Kinh", account for 86.2 percent of the population. Their population is concentrated in the alluvial deltas and coastal plains of the country. A homogeneous social and ethnic majority group, the Kinh exert political and economic control. There are more than 54 ethnic minorities throughout the country, but the Kinh are purveyors of the dominant culture. Most ethnic minorities, such as the Muong, a closely related ethnic of the Kinh, are found mostly in the highlands covering two-thirds of the territory . The Hoa (ethnic Chinese) and Khmer Krom are mainly lowlanders. The largest ethnic minority groups include the Hmong, Dao, Tay, Thai, Nung.

The people of Vietnam speak Vietnamese as a native language. Various other languages are spoken by several minority groups in Vietnam. The most common of these are Tay, Muong, Khmer, Chinese, Nung, and H'Mong. The French language, a legacy of colonial rule, is still spoken by some older Vietnamese as a second language, but is losing its popularity. There are however some French-language newspapers in the country as Le courrier du Vietnam and several French-language immersion programmes and French schools as the ecole francaise Colette in Ho Chi Minh City. Vietnam is also a full member of the Francophonie. Russian - and to a much lesser extent German, Czech, or Polish - is sometimes known among those whose families had ties with the Soviet bloc. In recent years, English is becoming more popular as a second language. English study is obligatory in most schools. Chinese and Japanese have also become more popular.

For much of Vietnamese history, Mahayana Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism have strongly influenced the religious and cultural life of the people. About 86% of Vietnamese identify Buddhism even though they do not practice on a regular basis. About 7% of the population is Roman Catholic. Christianity was introduced by French colonists, and to a lesser extent during the presence of American forces. The largest Protestant churches are the Evangelical Church of Vietnam and the Montagnard Evangelical Church.

Vietnam has great reservation towards Roman Catholicism. This mistrust originated during the French colonial time when some Catholics collaborated with the French colonists as espionage agents to suppress the Vietnamese independence movement. Furthermore, the Church's teaching regarding communism made it an unwelcome counterforce to communist rule. Membership of Sunni and Bashi Islam is usually accredited to the ethnic Cham minority, but there are also a few ethnic Vietnamese adherents of Islam in the southwest. The communist government has been criticized for its religious violations. The vast majority of Vietnamese people, regardless of their religious background (including Catholic or Buddhist), practice Ancestor Worship, although this may not be strictly considered a religion.

09/26/07 by visitEarth
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