Tai Dam People

Tai Dam People

The Tai Dam, Tai Dum or Black Tai (Thai: ไทดำ) are an ethnic group of Vietnam (Thái Đen), Laos, China, and Thailand.

Tai Dam speakers in China are classified as part of the Dai nationality along with almost all the other Tai peoples. But in Vietnam they are given their own nationality (with the White Tai) where they are classified (confusingly for English speakers) as the Thái nationality (Tai people).

The Tai Dam originate from the vicinity of Dien Bien Phu, in Vietnam, the original area of occupation of the Tai people in the early history of the Tai settlement of Southeast Asia according to the legend of Khun Borom, the legendary progenitor of the Tai-speaking peoples. They called this area Muang Then, the land of God, a name that still applies to the valley around Dien Bien Phu.

The Tai Dam are known as "the people without a country." In the 1950s during the Vietnam-French War, many of the Tai Dam moved from Vietnam to Laos. In Laos, they worked as farmers, soldiers, and service workers. The Tai Dam language became infused with Lao. In the 1970s, Laos was undergoing a civil war and many of the Tai Dam became refugees and escaped into Thailand. After thousands of years of political oppression, the Tai Dam vowed they would stay together as a group. Iowa Governor Robert Ray and U.S. Cambodian Ambassador Dr. Kennith Quinn decided the state of Iowa would open its doors to the Tai Dam, after receiving a letter from Art Crisfield, an American living in Southeast Asia. In order for this to happen, Governor Robert Ray had to convince the National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger and President Gerald Ford to grant an exception to a State Department policy that refugees cannot be relocated in a group to any one community. Nearly 90 percent of the Tai Dam refugees immigrated to the U.S. state of Iowa. The other 10 percent went to places like Australia and France. Organizations and church groups sponsored families, and a task force was developed to provide jobs for the refugees.