Beyond nation-state rhetoric: exploring the transnational mobility narratives of Vietnamese international undergraduate students in the US

Abstract

This paper examines how Vietnamese international undergraduate seniors in the US make sense of their trajectories abroad and, in doing so, challenge the dominant discourses on international education in US-Vietnam relations. While the US frames international students as instruments of soft power, Vietnam regards students abroad as agents of national development who should return to “globalize” the domestic workforce. Drawing from life history interviews with eleven participants, the study identifies six transnational mobility narratives: family trailblazing narrative, mobility optimizing narrative, narrative of idealism, negotiating narrative, homeward strategizing narrative, and narrative of transnational elitism. Findings reveal that transnational mobility is not a linear journey of patriotic return or ideological assimilation but a dynamic process of meaning-making shaped by classed pathways into mobility, uneven institutional opportunities, lived experiences, and aspirations. The paper calls for more human-centered approaches to US-Vietnam educational exchanges, ones that honor the complexity of cross-border belonging and student agency.