The Origin of Vietnamese American Nail Salons

Asian American History 101

Welcome to Season 4, Episode 31! Have you ever wondered why Vietnamese Americans seem to dominate the nail salon industry in America? Although not all Vietnamese Americans are nail technicians, there are enough to make up approximately 50% of the nail technicians in the $8 billion per year American nail industry.

It all started with the celebrity activist, Tippi Hedren, an actress known for being in The Birds, Marnie, and many more features. She has made an effort to work on a variety of causes throughout her life, and that includes helping the Vietnamese American refugees starting in 1975. In this episode, we share the origin of the Vietnamese American Nail Salons. To learn more, check out the documentary by Adele Pham called Nailed It!

We open the episode by talking a little about AAPI athletes in the Olympics, API Emmy nominees, and other current events. In our recurring segment we introduce “So Annoying” where we take a topic that annoys us and talk about it. Today we’re talking about people who question the meat in Asian restaurants.

If you like what we do, please share, follow, and like us in your podcast directory of choice or on Instagram @AAHistory101. For previous episodes and resources, please visit our site at https://asianamericanhistory101.libsyn.com or social media links at http://castpie.com/AAHistory101. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, email us at [e-mail].

Segments

• 00:25 Intro, current events, catching up
• 09:09 The Origin of Vietnamese Nail Salons
• 19:55 So Annoying, Accusations of Dog Meat in Asian Food