There has been abundant research on marriage migration from the perspective of the receiving side, but research from the perspective of sending countries is limited. This paper investigates transformations in the sending community of Tan Loc, Vietnam, an island greatly affected by international marriage migration over the last three decades. The results of an analysis of empirical data collected from field surveys in 2019, 2020, and 2022 reveal transformations in Tan Loc, such as economic improvement, changes in social values, new pathways of labor migration, and issues related to returned marriage migrants. The mechanism of marriage migration in Tan Loc today is different from the way it was from the 1980s to the 2000s. This may be the case in other sending communities as well. Thus, such transformations on both sending and receiving sides need to be addressed in scientific research.

This paper investigates the 350-year-old Tai Zawti Theravada tradition and its distinct lay practice of keeping Buddhist texts, rather than Buddha images, on a dhamma altar inside the home. Drawing on Zawti-authored texts as well as interviews with Tai Zawti monks and laity, it examines the rationale for the altar, its function and position in the home, the nature of the texts kept on the altar, and how this marker of distinction is blurred by new challenges. While the Zawti tradition offers important insights into the nature of pre-reform Burmese Buddhism and premodern Theravada more broadly, by focusing on the nature of the lik long texts kept on the Zawti dhamma altar, the paper demonstrates how the Tai Zawti are firmly situated within the wider Tai cultural context.