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Main Teaching Areas:

Medical Sociology, Sociology of Human Rights & Social Justice, Social Psychology, Sociology of Southeast Asian Health, Global Health, Sociology of Gender

Primary Research Focus: 

Dr. Nou is deeply committed to applied research and activism. Her primary research interests focus on the epidemiology of social stress and its relationship to health and illness, political sociology, the sociology of women, and issues related to human rights, humanitarian efforts, transitional justice, and international justice. She is especially interested in the health and mental health of adult Cambodian refugees and the post-Khmer Rouge generation, particularly concerning the long-term impacts of traumatic stress

Main Teaching and Research Areas:

• Global Health
• Medical Sociology
• Sociology of Human Rights & Social Justice
• Social Psychology
• Sociology of Southeast Asian Health
• Sociology of Gender

Education:

• BA, Sociology, CSU Fullerton (1991)
• MSW, Columbia University, New York, NY (1993)
• MA, Sociology, University of Hawai‘i at Manoa, Honolulu (1997)
• PhD, Sociology, University of Hawai‘i at Manoa, Honolulu (2002)

Selected Lectures and Presentations:

• November 21, 2024. Keynote speaker at Columbia University Law School (New York City) hosted by Columbia International Law, “Empowering survivors of the Khmer Rouge in International Justice Mechanisms,” followed by a film screening of the documentary film Daze of Justice and Q&A.
• November 20, 2024. Keynote speaker at Downstate Health Sciences University, SUNY (Brooklyn, NY) on “Piecing a broken Identity: Multigenerational health effects from crimes against humanity and social injustice,” followed by a film screening of the documentary film Daze of Justice and Q&A.
• July 9, 2024. Invited speaker at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC, Phnom Penh, Cambodia). I conducted a discourse and training workshop for local and international human rights law students, focusing on the use of public- and medical-sociological pedagogy on victim participation, justice, healing, and recovery in post-Khmer Rouge Cambodia.
• November 21-22, 2023. Keynote speaker at the National Resource Center’s Southeast Asian Studies Project, Center for Southeast Asian Studies Colloquium, and Film Screenings (University of Hawai’i at Mānoa). Presented a lecture on working with the Cambodian diaspora in the ECCC, facilitated discussion at a community screening of the documentary Daze of Justice, lectured on Cambodian traumatic stress and recovery, and held an interactive workshop on conducting sociological research with graduate students in the university’s Southeast Asian Studies program.
• September 14, 2023. Panel co-facilitator, “Transitional Justice and Peacebuilding in Cambodia,” United States Institute of Peace (USIP) second annual Dialogue on War Legacies and Peace in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, at the USIP Headquarters in Washington, D.C.
• September 10-11, 2022. Invited speaker, “Social stress, structural symbolic interactionism, and healing in post-conflict Cambodia: Can we achieve restorative justice?” Virtual conference organized by Harvard University and the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) for scholars and practitioners in the field of mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) from Cambodia, Vietnam, Burma, Thailand, and their diaspora communities.
• March 28-30, 2022. Keynote speaker, Purdue University’s themed programming “Democracy, Civility, and Freedom of Expression.” Keynote address, “Decolonizing hegemonic narratives of justice: Chasing after the participatory rights of Cambodian diaspora in the UN/Khmer Rouge Tribunal.” Additional activities include discussion of human rights work with the Cambodian diaspora in the ECCC at a screening of the documentary Daze of Justice, a lecture on Cambodian traumatic stress and recovery, and an interactive Sociological Imagination Workshop focused on purposeful research objectives and the interconnected social, political, and historical contexts that define contemporary Cambodians.

Selected Publications:

• Nou, L. (2024). “Violence and traumatic stress among Cambodian survivors and perpetrators of the Khmer Rouge genocide.” Social Science Medicine - Mental Health, 6, 100341, .
• Nou, L. (2023). “Pupil Instruction: Model Curricula: Vietnamese American Refugee Experience: Cambodian American History and Heritage.” California Senate Bill 369. Summary: An act to amend Sections 33540.2 [Vietnamese section] and 33540.4 [Cambodian section] of the Education Code, relating to pupil instruction. Authored the amended Section 33540.4; passed into law as Chapter 711, Statutes of 2023. October 10, 2023.
• Nou, L. (2018). “Cambodian women.” In Susan M. Shaw, Nancy Barbour, Patti Duncan, Kryn Freehling-Burton, and Jane Nichols (Eds.). Women’s Lives around the World: A Global Encyclopedia (Vol. 3, Asia and the Pacific, pp. 37-66). Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO.
• Nou, L. (2015). Elusive retributive justice in post-Khmer Rouge Cambodia: Challenges of using ECCC Victim Information Forms to analyze survivors’ experiences. TORTURE Journal. 25(2), 61-84.
• Nou, L. (2014). Cambodian Americans. In Asian Americans: An Encyclopedia of Social, Cultural, Economic, and Political History (Vol. 1, pp. 161–167).
• Nou, L. (2013). Beyond silent suffering and trauma half a world away: Participation of Cambodian diaspora genocide survivors in the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. Journal of Asia Pacific World, 4(1), 56–79.
• Nou, L. (2013). Living in his father’s shadow: Exploring healing justice and reconciliation in Cambodia with Duch’s son. Asian Journal of Social Science, 41, 25–62.
• Nou, L., Rashid, J., Muhammad, H., Estuar, R. E., Jones, J., Reif, M., et al. (2013). Perspectives on apology and forgiveness in South and Southeast Asia. In Kathleen Malley-Morrison, Mercurio Andrea, and Twose Gabriel (Eds.), International handbook of peace and reconciliation (pp. 395-409). New York, NY: Springer Publishing

Selected Media Coverage: