“CKS programs today continue their initial purpose: promoting Khmer Studies, fostering scholarly exchanges, and supporting Cambodian higher education.”
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“CKS programs today continue their initial purpose: promoting Khmer Studies, fostering scholarly exchanges, and supporting Cambodian higher education.”
CKS recognized early on that a diversified fellowship program was essential to rebuilding the academic field both in Cambodia and in the US. Through its programs, CKS has worked to bridge the gap between Cambodians and their international counterparts, while also affording opportunities for established international scholars to pursue their research. Over the past quarter century, CKS has provided senior fellowships to hundreds of doctoral and postdoctoral scholars from the US, France and Cambodia. CKS has also provided undergraduate students the opportunity to become immersed in the study of Khmer history and Cambodia through its Junior Resident Fellows Program. With the help of government grants, support from major foundations and most importantly donor generosity, CKS has made extraordinary strides in its mission.
“This is one of the magical things about CKS: seeing its extraordinary educational impact in real-time, all the time.”
The CKS library is one of our organization’s main features. Known for its rich collection focusing on the social sciences and humanities of Southeast Asia, the CKS library began collecting from scratch in 2001. From the start, the library offered free wi-fi and computers in its reading room and posted its digital catalogue online. CKS digitized its library collection and taught other Cambodian archives and emerging libraries how to do the same in order to ensure access to information for anyone with a smartphone or internet connection. In 2008, CKS partnered with the National Library of Cambodia, in a project to digitize endangered rare documents housed in the National Library. The digitized materials were made available on computers in the CKS Library, enabling users to access these historical documents with a stroke of the keyboard. CKS’ library is at the forefront of research with over 20,000 catalogue listings, including both physical and online resources.
From its inception, a mainstay of CKS’ mission has been to foster a reading culture among Cambodian youth. CKS Library regularly organizes and participates in outreach events, providing a lively children’s library, a reading contest, a book fair and many other events, including the CKS-organized Siem Reap Mini Book Fair.
Early on in its mission, CKS recognized a structural deficiency in the almost total absence of quality published material in the Cambodian language, Khmer. With almost all material in foreign languages such as English and French, students have no access to reference material in Khmer. Over the past 25 years, CKS has worked with numerous foundations and institutions in Cambodia to increase the publication of texts directly in Khmer and to engage in translation into Khmer of both works on Cambodia and basic reference materials for students. With the help of grants and individual donations, CKS has contributed to the publication of 28 works in Khmer and the translation of five books, including David Chandler’s classic A History of Cambodia and Benny Widyono’s Dancing in the Shadows and Milton Osborne’s Southeast Asia: An Introductory History.
Together with CKS Trustee Michel Antelme (INALCO), CKS created Siksacakr: The Journal of Cambodia Research, a peer-reviewed journal which aims to bridge the worlds of Khmer, Francophone and Anglophone scholarship on Cambodia. Siksacakr stands for the “Wheel of Knowledge”, reflecting the journal’s role in both circulating new scholarship and turning the wheels of access and scholarly communication. Central to Michel Antelme’s vision in founding Siksacakr was the need to promote new scholarship in Khmer, English and French across linguistic, national and disciplinary boundaries.
Over the years CKS has established institutional collaborations with Cambodian and other regional Southeast Asian universities. These partnerships have extended CKS’ commitment to collaboration among scholars in the region and worked to strengthen Cambodian higher education through programs such as the Junior Faculty Training Program.
CKS has also established numerous partnerships with institutions across the US and France that have provide incalculable benefits for Cambodia’s future educational landscape. These collaborations have provided fellowships to Cambodian scholars at world-class universities of their choice. These partnerships have also provided opportunities for US and non-US faculty, post-graduate researchers, and undergraduates to study Cambodia such as through the Khmer Language and Culture Program administered in collaboration with the University of Hawaii, Mānoa.
International institutions collaborating with CKS’ research activities and related academic initiatives include, University of Chicago’s Committee on Southern Asian Studies, Cornell University, University of Hawaii’s Advanced Studies in Khmer, the Royal University of Phnom Penh, the Royal University of Fine Arts, the Royal Academy of Cambodia, Pannasastra University and many others.
PO Box 9380
Wat Damnak
Siem Reap, Cambodia
Tel: (855) 063 964 385
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