Malay and Arabic are also learnt by many especially for Koranic studies. In the realm of religion however, the Chams of the Delta regard themselves as practicing a “purer form” of Islam as compared to the Cham Banis in the north who also worship ancestors and whose religious practices are seen to have Bramanic influences. The Chams have been depicted in state cultural narratives as part of the cultural mosaic of ethnic minorities that constitute the state of Vietnam, and have resisted such monolithic views of their culture. In the views of the Cham Muslims of the Mekong Delta, the state is seen to regard the Central Cham culture as encompassing of all Chams and tend to highlight it as the minority ethnic Cham culture with little regard of diversity within the Cham groups such as theirs, thus raising tensions among the Cham Muslims. The state’s reach to this southern delta region has been limited and contested, and where the state’s portrayal of Cham culture as matrilineal and unchanging, does not conform with the fluid social and ideological exchanges that take place within the Cham Muslim communities of the Delta. In this regard, a view that supports the notion of self-identification among the Chams and challenges the dominant narrative of the Chams as a minority bounded by nation-state frameworks is to be noted. Photographic portrayals of Chams residing in Vietnam, Malaysia, and Hainan, China, not only in traditional settings performing cultural rituals or as modern professionals performing daily duties in their everyday lives, have been depicted as being themselves in their home environments. This portrays an aspect of the Chams differing from the common “folkloric depictions” of them as a “colourful and timeless” ethnic minority of a nation state. As such, “an alternative approach to belonging” is seen among the Chams where modern representations of the Cham reject ethnic objectification associated with the notion of backwardness. It is seen as such that “self-identification” as the best unifier of Chams across Vietnam, resisting common categorizations and portrayals of Cham ethnicity, where besides the common Cham language, little unites the Chams, especially given that not all Chams relate to ancestral origin narratives associated with the ancient Champa kingdom. Cham Potency Beliefs among the non-Cham Vietnamese population prevail of Cham potency through spiritual and occult powers, drawing continuity from the ancient Champa animistic and local spirit worship. The belief in Cham spiritual potency