Over the years, faculty, staff and students have been building bridges between The Beach and Long Beach’s Cambodian community, between students and their parents, all the while promoting healing and advancement for a group that has survived one of the most brutal and deadly regimes of the 20th century.Ĭambodians have been living in Long Beach and attending Cal State Long Beach since the 1950s, according to “Cambodians in Long Beach” (Arcadia Publishing) by Quintiliani and Susan Needham. Census Bureau estimated about 18,000 Cambodians living in Long Beach, while more recent estimates put the number between 19,440 and 20,000, or about 4% of Long Beach’s total population of 486,000. Long Beach is home to the largest Cambodian community outside of Southeast Asia. “They learn about what makes this parade happen.” “Volunteering for the parade really makes them think about the narrative and gives them a ground-up perspective,” said Seng (pictured above). She obtained a master’s degree from CSULB in Asian American Studies a decade ago, studying with anthropology professor Karen Quintiliani, considered by Seng and others to be one of the foremost scholars over the past 30 years on Cambodians in Long Beach. “It was good to be able to meet people in the community who were putting the parade together,” said Seng, who began teaching full-time at CSULB in fall 2021 and is the second tenure-track Cambodian professor in the Beach’s history. Two of the students dressed in traditional attire and participated in the parade. In April, most of her class volunteered with the annual Cambodian New Year’s parade in Cambodia Town, a specially designated district of Long Beach with a high Cambodian population. The assistant professor in Asian and Asian American Studies teaches the Cambodian American Experience.
Sophea Seng and her students are taking their studies to the streets.
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