Hmong Culture

Hmong Culture

The Hmong people are an ethnic group whose origins go back about 3,000 years in China. Most Hmong, about eight million, still live in southwestern China. Another four million live in the Southeast Asian countries of Thailand, Burma, Laos and Vietnam, where they immigrated during the 19th century following centuries of persecution in China. There, they existed mostly as farmers living in rural areas.
The first Hmong migration of notable size to the United States began with the fall of Saigon and Laos to Communist forces in 1975. Many Hmong had worked with pro-American anti-Communist forces during the conflicts in Vietnam and Laos. As a result, they were subject to violence and retribution in Laos. Many Hmong escaped Laos to Thailand where they were incarcerated in refugee camps.
The 2000 Census counted 186,310 Hmong Americans across the U.S., representing a nearly 90 percent increase in the population from 1990. During the 1990s, the Hmong moved to the Midwest and the South. This shift was epitomized by the emergence of Minneapolis and St. Paul as the unofficial capitals of Hmong America, taking over from Fresno, CA. About half of Hmong today live in the Midwest, mostly in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan.
Why did Minneapolis-St. Paul emerge as the new Hmong American capital? The opportunity to make a better life seems to be at the heart of things. "The cost of living is cheaper here than in California," Lee Pao Xiong, president of the Urban Coalition in St. Paul, told the Associated Press. "The quality of education is better here, and jobs are available here." Xiong said he's recruited 10 families from his own extended family to come here from California in recent years. "They came here and they found jobs within a month or two and are making ten, eleven, twelve dollars an hour," he said.
A 2002 community directory provides listings of 13 Hmong community organizations and 39 Hmong religious congregations in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. Whereas many Hmong...