VNUHCM Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities

Training and developing programs for middle administrative managers at Viet Nam National University Ho Chi Minh City: An evaluation using the Kirkpatrick model

2025-12-19T09:11:48+07:00

In the context of university autonomy and increasingly intense competition, middle administrative managers play a pivotal role in advising, supporting leadership, and administering the operations of higher education institutions. Training and developing have therefore become a key strategy to enhance their capacity. This study evaluates the effectiveness of training and developing programs for middle administrative managers at seven member universities of Viet Nam National University Ho Chi Minh City, employing Kirkpatrick’s Four-Level Model. A mixed-methods approach was adopted, combining a survey of 168 middle administrative managers with in-depth interviews with leaders, lecturers, and staff members. The findings indicate that the training and development programs generally yielded positive outcomes across all four levels: reaction, learning, behavior, and results with mean scores of 4/5 or higher. However, several limitations were identified: the programs remain generic, lacking tailored design to meet the specific tasks of middle administrative managers, while staff in charge of training and developing have limited capacity for advising and designing appropriate programs. Based on these findings, the article proposes solutions to improve the training and developing quality for middle administrative managers, including the development of a competency framework, specialized training modules, a professional unit for career development, and the establishment of periodic evaluation mechanisms. This study contributes empirical evidence to the field of higher education management in Vietnam and provides useful policy recommendations for universities in the current governance reform context.

Some comparisons on goddess worship in Vietnamese - Korean folk culture

2025-12-19T23:10:54+07:00

In the spiritual life of Asian agricultural residents, especially residents of monsoon Asian ethnic groups who grow wet rice (including the Vietnamese and Koreans), worshiping goddesses is a quite common phenomenon and has existed for a long time. Over thousands of years of history forming and developing the cultures of the two ethnic groups, Vietnam and Korea, the custom of worshiping goddesses (of natural or human origin - they can be historical figures or historical myths) has become one of the typical cultural features. Along with many other types of folk beliefs, goddess worship has been playing a certain role in the spiritual life of Vietnamese and Korean residents, contributing to molding the traditional cultural values of each country, while creating common denominators in the cultures of the two nations. Through the issue of comparative research on a number of aspects such as origin, role, function, number of goddesses along with offerings, worship rituals, objects of worship practice, etc., as well as a few other characteristics of this type of worship between the two peoples, this article will point out some similarities and differences in goddess worship among Vietnamese and Koreans. Besides, the research results also initially explain the causes of those similarities and differences.

The classification of discourse markers in Vietnamese language

2025-12-26T13:23:40+07:00

Discourse markers play a crucial role in organizing information and maintaining coherence in discourse; however, their classification system in Vietnamese language has not yet been thoroughly and systematically explored. This paper aims to classify the Vietnamese discourse markers based on three main criteria: pragmatic function, sentence position, and morphological structure. The research data is drawn from literary works to ensure the accuracy, representativeness, and expressive richness of the linguistic units under investigation. The findings reveal that the Vietnamese discourse markers exhibit functional diversity, including information linkage, discourse navigation, and the expression of speaker attitudes, emotions, and stances. In terms of position, discourse markers may appear at the beginning, middle, or end of a sentence, with the initial position being the most common, often used for initiating, drawing attention, or shifting topics. Morphologically, they can take the form of single words, phrases, or even dependent clauses, demonstrating considerable flexibility in form and use. The study also highlights the multifunctionality and context-dependent variability of many discourse markers, which complicates the classification and calls for a flexible analytical approach. These insights help to clarify the features of Vietnamese discourse markers and provide a foundation for further research in pragmatics, Vietnamese language teaching, and translation studies.

The Role of Livelihood Capitals in Agricultural Production in Thanh Phu District, Ben Tre Province

2025-12-26T15:53:05+07:00

This study aims to analyze the role and contribution of livelihood capitals in agricultural production in Thanh Phu district, Ben Tre province, a coastal area of the Mekong Delta characterized by distinct ecological conditions and diverse farming models. A quantitative approach was employed using a household survey of 200 respondents across five communes representing three different ecological subregions. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and frequency distribution to evaluate the current status and effectiveness of the five livelihood capitals based on the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework.

The findings indicate that the human capital plays a pivotal role, with personal farming experience (95.5 percent) and internet access (92 percent) identified as the most effective information channels, and the agricultural extension system achieving a 94 percent satisfaction rate. The natural capital faces serious challenges, with only 21.5 percent of households reporting positive groundwater conditions, and 61.5 percent perceiving poor surface water quality due to climate change impacts. The physical capital remains relatively stable, as 73 percent of households own permanent housing and 95 percent have private land ownership. In contrast, the financial capital exhibits a notable disparity, with 52 percent of households operating at small to medium scales. The social capital demonstrates stratified effectiveness: agricultural extension (95 percent) and farmers unions (90 percent) receive high satisfaction, whereas cooperatives are rated satisfactory by only 50 percent of households.

The study recommends strengthening investment in the agricultural extension system and the application of information technology; prioritizing water resources protection measures against the impacts of climate change; facilitating access to preferential loans and developing community credit funds, and simultaneously enhancing the operational quality of cooperatives and other social organizations to ensure sustainable agricultural livelihood development.

The reason on its way of Becoming - Reading The Brothers Karamazov by F. M. Dostoevsky from Hegelian philosophy

2025-12-26T11:33:03+07:00

What can reason be if not precisely the becoming of reason from its own sentient, irrational past? This seems an unfamiliar argument in current research trends approaching Dostoevsky as a critic against reason. Negating such dualistic perception, Hegel’s The Phenomenology of Spirit reveals to us the temporal character of reason, or reason on its way of becoming, a journey of knowing evolving from observing reason, actualizing reason to real reason. The observing reason enters the world with friendly admiration and hopes to grasp the Notion through pure curiosity in doing scientific research; whereas the actualizing reason must struggle to survive in harsh and impoverished reality, fight for virtue over greed, and search for a way out of great misery through fervent faith. At last, the real reason determines ethical laws and proceeds to construct society and the state. At this point, the reason will transform into the moment of spirit - a new chapter of becoming opens, followed by moments of religion and absolute knowledge. From a Hegelian point of view, Dostoevsky is a phenomenologist who describes the activity of reason to us. Each character in The Brothers Karamazov appears not as a detached existence but entails the weight and the floating sphere of Spirit, meanwhile, their will and emotion represent the reason on its way of becoming.

Vietnamese idioms from the perspective of Appraisal Theory

2025-12-26T21:12:09+07:00

The research of Vietnamese idioms in use is not novelty in Vietnam. This paper uses the Appraisal Theory developed by Martin, J. R., & White, P. R. (2005), which is considered as a part of realizing Interpersonal metafunction in of Systemic Functional Linguistics, to determine evaluation factors in Vietnamese idioms. Accordingly, we investigated 50 Vietnamese idioms that were listed in the Dictionary of Vietnamese Idioms and Proverbs in Use compiled by Do Thi Kim Lien & et al (2015) to identify and then classify their Attitude, Graduation hidden in use. Idioms were randomly selected from the dictionary. From a qualitative approach, the methods of linguistic description and discourse analysis were used to achieve the two purposes. Besides, the statistical classification method was also used to count and classify idioms in terms of the Appraisal Theory. The survey results show that all idioms carry evaluation in performance. The Attitude hidden in idioms was mainly realized in the type of Judgment and Appreciation. The level of evaluation in the idiom was mostly high and realized by Sharpen and Raise. This classification result may be a new approach in compiling a Vietnamese idiom dictionary. Furthermore, the classification of Vietnamese idioms based on the Appraisal Theory may support the critical discourse analysis to become more effective when approaching Vietnamese texts (spoken or written discourses).