While war and conflict bring devastation, education stands as a beacon of hope and a pathway to future prosperity. In post-conflict settings, it provides a foundation for rebuilding possibilities in the wake of profound loss and violence. At the same time, education functions as a contested arena where diverse stakeholders, including youth, states, and international actors, negotiate influence and change. By examining the intersections of educational development with national and geopolitical dynamics in post-conflict contexts, this presentation explores the key factors shaping higher education reconstruction in Cambodia after the period of mass atrocity between 1975 and 1979. It aims to offer a fresh perspective on the multifaceted dynamics of post-conflict education, highlighting the roles of public protest, state intervention, transnational disputes, and inter-state relations.

Join us for this lunch time talk with Lee Kong Chian NUS-Stanford Fellow Theara Thun

Speaker

Theara Thun is the Lee Kong Chian NUS-Stanford Fellow at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center for Fall Quarter 2025. Also an associate member of the Comparative Education Research Centre at the University of Hong Kong, where he previously served as a postdoctoral research fellow under the Hong Kong Research Grants Council. He has also held fellowship positions at the International Institute for Asian Studies and the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at Kyoto University. Thun’s research interests encompass intellectual history, ethnic politics, and education reconstruction, with a particular focus on Cambodia and Southeast Asia. His first book, Epistemology of the Past: Texts, History, and Intellectuals of Cambodia, 1855–1970 (University of Hawai‘i Press, 2024), offers a systematic examination of indigenous history-making traditions in dialogue with Western historical practices. His second book, co-authored with Duong Keo and published by the Royal University of Phnom Penh Press in September 2025, is written in Khmer and traces the history of Cambodia’s ethnic nationalism, politics, and violence from the 19th to the 20th centuries. Thun has also published articles in journals such as Critical Asian Studies, Asian Studies Review, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, and Studies in Higher Education.