The election took place during the AIBL’s plenary session on October 17, according to the Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences (VASS). Cuong has become the second Vietnamese scholar to receive this honour, following the late Professor Phan Huy Le.

Founded in 1663, the AIBL is one of the five academies under the Institut de France and is among the world’s most prestigious scholarly institutions in the humanities, specialising in archaeology, history, philology, and classical culture.

Born in 1980 in the northern province of Thai Binh (now Hung Yen province), Cuong is a senior researcher who earned his PhD in 2012 and was conferred the title of Associate Professor in 2019. He served as Director of the Institute of Sino-Nom Studies from 2015 to 2025 and previously lectured at Vietnam National University, Hanoi. Cuong was also a Harvard–Yenching Institute visiting scholar and participated in a Japan Foundation academic programme in Osaka from 2011–2012.

Author of more than 20 books and 100 studies in Vietnamese, English, Chinese, Japanese, French, and Korean, Cuong is regarded as a leading expert on Sino-Nom texts, textual scholarship, and Vietnam’s intellectual heritage. He has led major research collections such as the Sino-Nom Cultural Series and the Vietnamese Inscriptions Series, contributing significantly to the preservation and dissemination of the nation’s classical heritage.

Vietnamese scholars win US scientific research awards

Vietnam has earned three awards in the latest round of the Partnerships for Enhanced Engagement in Research (PEER), an international programme that funds scientists and engineers in developing countries who partner with US government-funded researchers to address global development challenges.