Vietnam: People

Vietnam is one of the most homogeneous societies in Southeast Asia. Although more than 60 different ethnic groups live in the country, ethnic Vietnamese constitute nearly 90% of the total population and are in the majority throughout the country except in the mountains. The Vietnamese are descended from peoples who settled in the Yuan delta area more than 3,000 years ago and later moved southward along the central coast into the Mekong delta. They speak Vietnamese, which exhibits …

…significant progress in health care since the reunification of the country in 1976. In the 1990s, fees for some education and health services were reintroduced. For centuries, Vietnamese art and architecture were heavily influenced by Chinese and Indian forms (see Southeast Asian art and architecture). More recently Vietnamese painting borrowed from French styles and techniques. Traditional handicrafts are still practiced, and poetry remains the favorite literary genre. Vietnam's greatest poet was Nguyen Du (1765Ð1820).