Lisa Arensen
Biographic Data
| ID | 199025 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Lisa Arensen |
| GIVEN NAMES | Lisa |
| FAMILY NAME | Arensen |
| SIGNATURE | ARENSEN L |
| AFFILIATIONS | Universiti Brunei Darussalam |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6461-3792 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 7 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 14 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 7 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2015 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2024 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Ungoverned landscapes
Purpose When Cambodia's long civil war ended in the late 1990s, land on the former frontlines in the northwest was officially closed for resettlement. However, spontaneous resettlement occurred as land was informally claimed by demobilized soldiers, returnees from refugee camps and the landless poor. These areas were often heavily littered with the explosive remnants of war, and landmines and unexploded ordnance (UXO) wounded and killed numerous …
Province of Thieves
To understand another human being, sometimes vividly imagining another person's lifeworld is better than analysis. I seek a kind of writing that allows both modes of understanding. This mostly nonfiction essay is based on events of nearly two decades ago, when I lived in Cambodia as a young white female development worker, before I formally studied anthropology. I describe several months of work and travel in a rural village by myself and my Khme…
Living with landmines
Mined land in Cambodia possesses hazardous potential for those willing to risk its inhabitation, but this potentiality is commingled with threat and uncertainty. Mined terrain creates sites where the affordances of place clash with its dangerous materialities. Village residents in this study were engaged in ongoing efforts to physically alter the place they inhabited, but these tectonic processes were not always successful. The presence of milita…
Courtney Work. Tides of Empire
After a long hiatus, there is a welcome resurgence of ethnographic research emerging from Cambodia
The Things that Remain
This paper explores place-making in a landscape materially altered by three decades of conflict. In Reaksmei Songha village, postwar settlers’ future aspirations and present needs drive the process of reconfiguring the physical environment. Artifacts of the past are selectively enlisted in this place-making project—those that index the agricultural fertility of the past are preserved; the remnants of pre-war houses are discarded; war debris is re…
The Dead in the Land
This article explores one Cambodian village's engagement with the remains of the dead encountered during postwar resettlement. For Khmer Buddhists, the correct material transformation of the bodies of the dead is critical, but these processes were often disrupted in Cambodia's recent troubled past. This article describes the subsequent ramifications of these interrupted processes for both the living and the dead in Reaksmei Songha village in nort…
All newcomers now
This article examines one Cambodian village's efforts to resettle a war-altered landscape and reconstruct a sense of belonging in the aftermath of war. The resettlement of Reaksmei Songha village entailed physically settling over the sediments and traces of a fractured and violent past, as settlers cleared a landscape of foliage and the explosive remnants of war. Settlers living side by side had often fought on different sides of the war, yet div…
The Dead in the Land
This article explores one Cambodian village's engagement with the remains of the dead encountered during postwar resettlement. For Khmer Buddhists, the correct material transformation of the bodies of the dead is critical, but these processes were often disrupted in Cambodia's recent troubled past. This article describes the subsequent ramifications of these interrupted processes for both the living and the dead in Reaksmei Songha village in nort…
Living with landmines
Mined land in Cambodia possesses hazardous potential for those willing to risk its inhabitation, but this potentiality is commingled with threat and uncertainty. Mined terrain creates sites where the affordances of place clash with its dangerous materialities. Village residents in this study were engaged in ongoing efforts to physically alter the place they inhabited, but these tectonic processes were not always successful. The presence of milita…
All newcomers now
This article examines one Cambodian village's efforts to resettle a war-altered landscape and reconstruct a sense of belonging in the aftermath of war. The resettlement of Reaksmei Songha village entailed physically settling over the sediments and traces of a fractured and violent past, as settlers cleared a landscape of foliage and the explosive remnants of war. Settlers living side by side had often fought on different sides of the war, yet div…
The Things that Remain
This paper explores place-making in a landscape materially altered by three decades of conflict. In Reaksmei Songha village, postwar settlers’ future aspirations and present needs drive the process of reconfiguring the physical environment. Artifacts of the past are selectively enlisted in this place-making project—those that index the agricultural fertility of the past are preserved; the remnants of pre-war houses are discarded; war debris is re…
All newcomers now
This article examines one Cambodian village's efforts to resettle a war-altered landscape and reconstruct a sense of belonging in the aftermath of war. The resettlement of Reaksmei Songha village entailed physically settling over the sediments and traces of a fractured and violent past, as settlers cleared a landscape of foliage and the explosive remnants of war. Settlers living side by side had often fought on different sides of the war, yet div…
The Dead in the Land
This article explores one Cambodian village's engagement with the remains of the dead encountered during postwar resettlement. For Khmer Buddhists, the correct material transformation of the bodies of the dead is critical, but these processes were often disrupted in Cambodia's recent troubled past. This article describes the subsequent ramifications of these interrupted processes for both the living and the dead in Reaksmei Songha village in nort…
The Things that Remain
This paper explores place-making in a landscape materially altered by three decades of conflict. In Reaksmei Songha village, postwar settlers’ future aspirations and present needs drive the process of reconfiguring the physical environment. Artifacts of the past are selectively enlisted in this place-making project—those that index the agricultural fertility of the past are preserved; the remnants of pre-war houses are discarded; war debris is re…
Courtney Work. Tides of Empire
After a long hiatus, there is a welcome resurgence of ethnographic research emerging from Cambodia
Province of Thieves
To understand another human being, sometimes vividly imagining another person's lifeworld is better than analysis. I seek a kind of writing that allows both modes of understanding. This mostly nonfiction essay is based on events of nearly two decades ago, when I lived in Cambodia as a young white female development worker, before I formally studied anthropology. I describe several months of work and travel in a rural village by myself and my Khme…
Living with landmines
Mined land in Cambodia possesses hazardous potential for those willing to risk its inhabitation, but this potentiality is commingled with threat and uncertainty. Mined terrain creates sites where the affordances of place clash with its dangerous materialities. Village residents in this study were engaged in ongoing efforts to physically alter the place they inhabited, but these tectonic processes were not always successful. The presence of milita…
Ungoverned landscapes
Purpose When Cambodia's long civil war ended in the late 1990s, land on the former frontlines in the northwest was officially closed for resettlement. However, spontaneous resettlement occurred as land was informally claimed by demobilized soldiers, returnees from refugee camps and the landless poor. These areas were often heavily littered with the explosive remnants of war, and landmines and unexploded ordnance (UXO) wounded and killed numerous …
Cambodian History and Society (7 works) · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies (4 works) · Archaeology (3 works) · Asian Geopolitics and Ethnography (3 works) · Geography (3 works) · Sociology (3 works) · Clearance (2 works) · Environmental planning (2 works) · Ethnography (2 works) · History (2 works)