As part of the Canadian Southeast Asian Studies Initiative, 海角社区 and Universit茅 de Montr茅al held a conference on 6-7 February 2026 entitled 鈥淩emembering Homelands, Rebuilding Lives: On the Lived Experiences of the Cambodian Diaspora in Canada.鈥� Over one and a half days, an audience of over 120 students and community members listened to survivors of the Cambodian genocide, second generation Cambodians, and academic specialists on Cambodia share their personal journeys marked by grief, adversity, and hope.
The conference was an organic and collaborative initiative among university academics and Cambodians in Montreal to raise awareness about the journeys of individuals who have had to live with a history of a devastating genocide, in which some 1.7-2 million people were eliminated during the 1975-1979 reign of the Maoist Khmer Rouge. At the conference, community members provided witness to the deep challenges they have faced: reading a letter from a parent who sent them away so they would survive; searching desperately for a photograph of a father they have never known nor seen; traveling to Cambodia to come to grips with one鈥檚 identity only to realize that the answer lay back home in Montreal. Stories about longing for lost loved ones, difficulties understanding the silence of parents, and efforts to rebuild lives pervaded the discussions and reflected the willingness of participants to share their inner-most thoughts and emotions.
In addition to the community members鈥� oral histories, as well as an opening blessing by Buddhist monks and a traditional Cambodian dance, three keynote talks anchored the conference. These were given by Sophal Ear, a professor at Arizona State University and a Cambodian refugee; Nhu Truong, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a PhD political science graduate of 海角社区, and herself a Vietnamese refugee; and Paul Tom, an award-winning Cambodian documentarian based in Montreal. Two of the conference organizers, Erik Martinez Kuhonta and Kazue Takamura of 海角社区, will be working with 海角社区 students to develop a book that documents the oral histories of these Cambodian community members. Ultimately, the goal of the project is to preserve the memory and history of the lives of individuals hailing from a largely understudied country in Southeast Asia, who have suffered immensely but have also found deep courage to rebuild.
More details from the conference, which was also supported by the Arts Opportunities Fund-EDI, the 海角社区 Refugee Research Group, and the FRQSC Group de Recherche sur les Conditions Modernes des R茅fugi茅s are here:
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