ABSTRACT
In historical times Vietnamese speakers have used three main forms of written language: Han, commonly called Classical Chinese; Nom, which transcribes vernacular words with characters based on Han; and the modern alphabet, which transcribes the vernacular with a script based on seventeenth-century Portuguese and later orthographic influences from French. After the end of French colonial rule, from the late 1950s onwards national governments in both Hanoi and Saigon promoted the translation of classical works into the alphabetic vernacular, whether historical annals, collections of tales, literary anthologies, compilations of edicts and proclamations, or early encyclopedias. Translation that takes its starting point from the Vietnamese alphabet can go in either of two directions: either toward the languages of so-called ethnic minorities inside the Vietnamese state or toward non-Vietnamese languages outside the boundaries of the state. Language, being in a constant state of change, must be translated across generations, social classes, and even genders.
