Khatharya Um

Job title:

Associate Dean, Associate Professor

Department:

Ethnic Studies

Bio/CV:

Programs: Asian American and Asian Diaspora Studies

Degree/Education:

Chancellor's Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, Berkeley
Ph.D. (Political Science), University of California, Berkeley
M.A. (Political Science), University of California, San Diego
B.A. (Political Science), University of California, San Diego

Research interests:

Politics of memory and commemoration in post conflict communities
Transnationalism and diaspora
Asia, Asian American histories and communities, and Asian diasporas
Colonial and postcolonial studies
Community Studies and Oral History
Southeast Asia and Southeast American communities
Youth and second generation issues
Human rights, human security, and social justice
Genocide studies
Wars, empires and refugees
Education

CURRENT RESEARCH PROJECTS

Critical Refugee Studies (UC multi-campus)
Memory Project
Comparative Asian diaspora
Southeast Asian American second generation issues

COURSES

UNDERGRADUATE COURSES

– Introduction to Asian American histories (AAADS 20A)

– Critical issues in Southeast Asian American communities (AAADS 125)

– Southeast Asian migration, US refugee policies and international human rights regime (AAADS 126)

– US-Asia: History and Politics (AAADS 130)

-Diasporic Imaginaries: Narrating war, exile and longing by and in the Southeast Asian diaspora” (AAADS 131)

-Asian Diasporas: Narrating displacement, home, and belonging (AAADS 131)

-Asian Diaspora in Comparative Contexts (AAADS 190)

– Honors Seminar (ES/AAADS/NAS/CS H195)

GRADUATE COURSES

– Critical Concepts, Theories And Approaches in Social Sciences (ES 203)

– Bodies in Motion:Theories, Concepts, and Issues in Critical Refugee, Diaspora and Transnational Studies (ES 240)

– Critical Pedagogy (ES 375)

GRANTS AND AWARDS:

Institute For The Study of Societal Issues Research Grant
UC MultiCampus Collaborative Grant for Critical Refugee Studies
Social Sciences Matrix Collaborative Research chGrant
UCI Humanities Research Institute Fellowship
Chancellor’s Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellowship
MacArthur Fellowship- Social Sciences
Freeman Foundation Grant
Luce Foundation Fellowship
National Science Foundation, Chancellor’s Grant
Humanities Research Grant
Abigail Reynolds Hodgen Publication Fund

AWARDS AND RECOGNITIONS:

Berkeley Chancellor’s Award for Advancing Institutional Excellence
Chancellor’s Public Scholar
Distinguished Achievement Award- University of Massachusetts- Boston
Special Recognition – Congresswoman Anna Eshoo
Special Recognition- Congresswoman Barbara Lee
Notable Cambodian Americans: Award for outstanding service and special contribution to the education and advancement of Southeast Asian Americans
Nominated for the Refugee Honor Roll of the UNHCR
Special Recognition- Southeast Asian Student Coalition

RECENT AWARD

2019 Recipient – Chancellor’s Award for Advancing Institutional Excellence and Equity

AFFILIATIONS:

Critical Refugee Studies Collective
Global Studies Program
Center for Southeast Asian Studies
Institute for European Studies
Berkeley Interdisciplinary Migration Initiative
UCSD Center for Comparative Immigration Studies
UC Berkeley-UC San Francisco Joint Medical Program/ Berkeley Public Health
Berkeley Human Rights Center

SELECT PUBLICATIONS

Books

Departures: In Introduction to Critical Refugee Studies (UC Press 2022)
From the Land of Shadows: War, Revolution and the Making of The Cambodian Diaspora, (NYU 2015)
Southeast Asian Migration: People On the Move in Search of Work, Refuge and Belonging (Sussex Academic Press, November 2015)

Select Articles

Um, K. “Landscaped Memory Loss, Longing, and Reinvention in the Diasporic Imaginary,” in Patrick Nardin and Soko Phay, Le Paysage Après Coup (Landscaped After/War), Editions Naima, Paris 2022
Um, K. “The Wounds Of Memory: Poetics, Pain, and Possibilities in Rithy Panh’s Exile and Que la barque se brise ” in Joseph Mai and Leslie Barnes eds. The Cinema of Rithy Panh: Everything Has a Soul, Rutgers, 2021.
Um K. “Kambodscha: Turbulenzen und Kontinuitäten” in Welt trends: Das außenpolitische Journal, June 2021
Um, K. “Documenter la douleur des autres:Souvenirs, identités et appartenance dans les imaginaires diasporiques de Teochew », DeFacto, No 23, Paris, November 2020.
Um, K. “Diasporas and the Politics of Memory and Commemoration,” in Robin Cohen and Carolin Fischer, Handbook on Diasporas Studies, Routledge, August 2018.
Um, K. “Crossing Borders: Citizenship, Identity and Transnational Activism in the Cambodian Diaspora” in Um and Gaspar Southeast Asian Migration: People On the Move in Search of Work, Refuge and Belonging (Sussex Academic Press, November 2015)
Um, K. “Genocide”, in Key Words in Asian American Studies, edited by Linda Trinh Vo, K. Scott Wong and Cathy Schlund-Vials (under contract with NYU Press)
Um, K. “Education in Colonial and Post-Colonial Cambodia: Technology of Dominance, Technology of Liberation” submitted for Equity, Opportunity and Education in postcolonial Southeast Asia, edited by Cynthia Joseph (forthcoming Routledge, Critical Studies in Asian Education Series, 2014)
Um, K. “Southeast Asian American Health and Mental health”, in Handbook on Asian American Health Edited by Grace Yoo, Mai Nhung Le, Alan Oda, Springer, 2013.
Um, K. “Exiled Memory: History, Identity and Remembering in the South East Asian Diaspora” in Southeast Asians in the Diaspora, edited by Mimi Nguyen, Fiona Ngo, and Miriam Lam, Positions, 2012.
Um, K. Wisdom For The Ages, Native Hawaiian Education, NEA, 2011
Um, K. “Cambodia 2010: Trials, Tribulations and Tribunals”, in Southeast Asian Affairs, Spring 2011.
“Cambodia 2007: A Decade After the Coup,” Southeast Asian Affairs Spring 2008
“Diasporic Nationalism and Citizenship,” Refuge, 23:2, 2006
“Political Remittances: Diasporas In Conflict and Post-conflict Situations” in Hazel Smith and Paul Stares (eds), Diasporas in Conflict: Peace-makers or peace wreckers?Washington DC: United Nations University Press, 2006
“Refractions of Home: Exile, Memory and Diasporic Longing” in Leakthina Tollier and Timothy Winter Expressions of Cambodia: The Politics of Tradition, Identity and Change (Routledge, 2006)
“The ‘Vietnam War’: What’s In a Name.” Amerasia, 31:2, 2005, Museum of California, 2005
“Locating the ‘Vietnam War’: A Critical Re-Examination of US History,” online curriculum, Museum of California, 2005