Vietnamese Nôm Preservation Foundation

announces the 2011 Balaban Award

Hue, 16^th October 2010. Today at 9:00 am at Thua Thien Hue center of Information and Technology (No.6 Le Loi street, Hue city, Thua Thien Hue province)

The 2011 Balaban Award is given to Mr. Phan Anh Dũng for his contribution to Nôm scholarship through his work with Huesoft and the creation of the Việt Hán Nôm software bundle, an input method for working Nôm characters on computers, which is vitally important to bringing the ancient script into the modern age. He is also a main contributor for developing an online dictionary of Hán-Nôm-Việt on the website : www.huesoft.com.vn, the software Viet-Han-Nom on PDA (Dictionary Software for Han-Viet, Nôm-Viet). He has also made instrumental contributions in developing software for Cham and Thai scripts (two ethnic groups Vietnam), including keyboards, fonts, web sites, and electronic dictionaries.

The Vietnamese Nôm Preservation Foundation will also be presenting “Young Nôm Scholar Award” to Mr. Nguyễn Hoàng Thân for his promising scholarship in Nôm studies, education, and computer systems.

The Balaban Award is given annually by the Vietnamese Nôm Preservation Foundation (VNPF) to an individual or group of individuals who have contributed significantly to furthering the vision of the Foundation, that of preserving and propagating the 1000-year heritage of writings in the Nôm and Hán-Nôm ancient scripts used before the advent of the current Quốc-Ngữ “national script.”

Endowment for this Award comes from the Vietnamese American Scholarship Fund established by a Vietnamese scientist, Dr. Phùng Liên Đoàn. The Award is named after John Balaban, poet and professor of English at the North Carolina State University, founder and former president of the Nôm Foundation, who spent many years advancing awareness of ancient writing in Vietnam. In addition, John Balaban is also a translator of Vietnamese poetry in such books as Ca Dao Vietnam and Spring Essence: the poetry of Ho Xuan Huong.

Honorees are selected annually by the Board of Directors of the VNPF through nomination from within and outside of the Foundation.