Emiko Stock
Anthropologist At Large

I define myself as an anthropologist at large who embraces a critically engaged practice of multimodal anthropology that prioritizes openness and reciprocity. Reclaiming this “at large” bit of a title—one traditionally reserved for academics in elite institutions—reflects my deep commitment to research as a boundless, generous exploration of life and worlds, while humorously acknowledging the constraints of conventional and elite academia. I currently work as a freelance academic: I self-fund my research, collaborations and publications through the paid services I offer as a writer, consultant and simultaneous interpreter.

Education

2013-2019 | PhD, Sociocultural Anthropology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY

Dissertation title: Touching Image of History: Cham Practices of Looking across Cambodia & Iran

2005-2007 | PhD coursework, Social Anthropology, Nanterre Université, France.

2005 | M. A. - with honors, Social Anthropology, Nanterre Université, France.

2004 | M. A. - with honors, Cambodian Language & Civilization, INALCO (National Institute of Oriental Languages and Civilizations), Paris, France.

2003 | B. A. coursework | Society & Anthropology, U. Paris V Descartes – Sorbonne, Paris, France.

2001 | B. A. | Cambodian Language & Civilization, INALCO, Paris, France.

2001 | License coursework | Royal University of Fine Arts, Archaeology, Phnom Penh.

Publications

Peer Reviewed Journal Articles

2022 | "Yours, Im-Precisely", Otherwise Mag, Vice-Versa issue

2019 | “Archiving the Difficult to Picture”, Southeast Of Now: Directions in Contemporary and Modern Art in Asia, 3(2), National University of Singapore, Singapore, 131-148.

2016 | “Two Rituals, a Bit of Dualism and Possibly Some Inseparability: ‘And so that’s how we say that Chams and Khmers are one and the same’ ’’, Sojourn Journal, ISEAS – Institute for Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore.

2012 | « Au delà des ethnonymes. A propos de quelques exonymes et endonymes chez les musulmans du Cambodge », (Beyond Ethnonyms. Notes on some Exonyms and Endonyms Used Among Muslims in Cambodia), Moussons, 20, IRSEA, Aix-en-Provence, 141-160.

2009 | « Parce que Champa et Cambodge ne faisaient qu’un… Quand les esprits s’emmêlent pour tisser la trame d’une histoire passée sur le métier d’une intégration présente », (Inviting Champa, Welcoming Cambodia: Performing Ancient Spirits to Commemorate Past History and Present Integration), Udaya, Phnom Penh, 243-275.

Book Chapters

2023 | "Of Manuscripts That Can’t Be Read and Roads That Can’t Be Seen: Historical Matters among Chams in Cambodia", The Routledge Handbook of Material Religion P.Tamimi Arab & S. B. Rodriguez-Plate eds., Routledge.

2020 | “ ‘For ‘Ali Is Our Ancestor’: Cham Sayyids’ Shi’a Trajectories from Cambodia to Iran”, in Shi’a Minorities in the Contemporary World: Migration, Transnationalism and Multilocality, O. Scharbrodt & Y. Shanneik, eds., Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 227-256.

2016 | ‘’La société civile cambodgienne: ruptures, incertitudes et ingérences étrangeres’’, (Cambodian Civil Society: Ruptures, Uncertainties, Foreign Interferences), co-written with B. Formoso, in Sociétés Civiles en Asie du Sud Est. Entre pilotage d’Etat et initiatives citoyennes, B. Formoso ed., ENS Eds, Lyon.

2010 | « Les communautés musulmanes du Cambodge: un aperçu », (Muslim Communities in Cambodia: An Overview) in Atlas des minorités musulmanes en Asie, Michel Gilquin ed., Paris CNRS - Bangkok IRASEC 183-216.

Trans-Media Talks

2024 | Sound Politics | Co-Organizer & Co-Moderator | CoMMPCT Event, online

2023 | A Wedding (15’) | Royal Anthropological Institute Film Festival & Conference, online

2023 | A Wedding (15’) | University of North Florida, invited online screening

2022 | A Wedding (15’) | Society for Visual Anthropology Film Festival, American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Seattle, WA, Nov. 2022

2021 | A Wedding (15’), nominated in the Transmedia Documentaries category, Muestra de Antropología Audiovisual de Madrid

2021 | Commute (35mm, 3’), experimental film published on eikon, positions: asia critique

2019 | Imagi(in)ing Marriages (2016, 75’, 3 episodes), Visual Anthropology Workshop, Cornell, March 26th.

2018 | In Correspondence: Images As Ethnographic Displacement, Displacements, Digital Conference, Society for Cultural Anthropology & Society for Visual Anthropology, April 19th-21st.

2018 | Still | Moving: Image and Ethnographic Displacement, visual commentary in concert with Sama Alshaibi’s exhibit Silsila, Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Silsila: A Panel Discussion on Environmentalism, Migration, and Displacement, November 9th.

2017 | Touching History: An Anthropology of Image-Thought (Chams | Sayyids | Cambodia | Iran), still and moving pictures presentation, Annual Visual Research Conference, American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Washington, D.C., November 27-29, 2017. 

2013 – 2017 | Various short ethnographic films from Cham weddings in Cambodia, shot and edited during fieldwork as a video ethnographer.

2015 | The Wedding Picture, short film, Cornell Anthropology Film Symposium Animating Anthropology: Audiovisual Experiment in Ethnographic Practice, in Honor of Robert Ascher.

2015 | Commute: Still(s) in (e)motions, Installation using film loops of 35mm B&W footage of 3-5 frames per second, collaborative exhibition Flux & Navigations, Mellon Expanded Practice Seminar, Cornell University College of Architecture, Art and Planning.

2009 | Ethnic groups in Cambodia, co-editor & photographer for the section about Cambodian Muslims, CAS Nokorwat Publishing, Phnom Penh, 635p. (In Khmer and English).

2008 | Clichés Chams column, writer & photographer, Ka-Set e-magazine (Khmer, English, French).

Invited Talks 

2024 | To Those, Still, Only Left Alive: Archival Blanks & Speculative Fabulation | Cimatheque, Alternative Film Centre, Cairo

2024 | To Those, Still, Only Left Alive: Archival Blanks & Speculative Fabulation | Dr. David Chu Program in Asia-Pacific Studies, University Of Toronto

2024 | Visual Thinking [tentative] Paths Toward [also tentative] Research: A [tentative] Attempt | Writing & Drawing Workshop | Dr. David Chu Program in Asia-Pacific Studies, University Of Toronto

2022 | Keynote Speaker | Seeing ‘Something Like Iran’ from Cambodia: Multimodal Interventions in the Anthropology of Inter-Asia, Visual Methods and Practices in Research: New Work, Ideas & Approaches, Centre for East & South-East Asian Studies, Lund University, Sweden

2020 | Going to the Pictures: Presencing History Beyond The Archive | Asian & Middle Eastern Studies Department, University of Minnesota, MN

2019 | Seeing ‘Something Like Iran’ from Cambodia: Multimodal Interventions in the Anthropology of Inter-Asia | Asian Studies Program | Hamilton College, NY

2015 | Multiple Exposures: Towards a Visual Anthropology with Cham Muslims in Cambodia, Anthropological Society of Iran, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Tehran, September 22nd.

2015 | The Making Of ‘Airwaves’: Acting Islam & Enacting Modernity in a Cambodian TV Drama, Department of Southeast Asian Studies, National University of Singapore, January 14th.

2010 | Visualizing Cham Diversity in Cambodia: Oscillating between Photography and Ethnography, Nalanda-Sriwijaya Centre Lectures, ISEAS – Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, National University of Singapore, April 14th.

2009 | From Photography to Ethnography: Back & Forth. Visualizing Cham Diversity in Cambodia’’, Reyum Research Institute & Gallery, Phnom Penh, Cambodia (in Khmer).

2008 | Chams & Khmers Relations: Two Photo-Ethnographic Case Studies, Reyum (in Khmer).

Conferences

2023 | Roundtable Co-Organizer & Presenter | The Soundscape as Feminist Homework, CoMMPCT event, American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Toronto, November.

2023 | Roundtable Organizer & Presenter | Shadowing Meanings: the things we do (or not) with subtitles | Royal Anthropological Institute Film Festival & Conference, virtual conference, March.

2022 | Roundtable Organizer & Speaker | Unsettling the Landscape of Ethnographic Film: Perspectives from Film Festivals | American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Seattle, WA, November

2022 | Presenter | How it feels to come back | Flash Ethnography Salon | American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Seattle, WA, November

2022 | Presenter | Un-ambiguously Yours: Fostering Relatedness In Southeast Asia’s Islamization | European Association for Southeast Asian Studies Conference, Paris, France

2022 | Roundtable Organizer & Speaker | Unsettling the Landscape of Ethnographic Film: Perspectives from Film Festivals, American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Seattle, WA, Nov. 2022

2021 | Roundtable Organizer & Speaker | Shadowing Meanings: the things we do (or not) with subtitles, American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, virtual conference.

2021 | Presenter | Pending Passage: How I am [very] tentatively attempting to possibly try to draft my potential future book, Global Publishing and the Making of Literary Worlds: Translation, Media, and Mobility, Princeton University, virtual conference.

2021 | Presenter | In Resonance with History: Engendering Images, Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, virtual conference.

2020 [Canceled] | Roundtable Organizer | Shadowing Meanings: the things we do (or not) with subtitles, American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Washington DC, St. Louis MO [Conference canceled due to Covid19].

2020 [Canceled] | Presenter | In Resonance with History: Engendering Images, Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, Boston MA [Conference canceled due to Covid19].

2020 [Canceled] | Panel Chair | New Perspectives on Cambodia, Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, Boston MA, [Conference canceled due to Covid19]

2018 | Presenter | In Correspondence: Images As Ethnographic Displacement, Displacements, Digital Conference, Society for Cultural Anthropology & Society for Visual Anthropology

2018 | Panel Organizer | Multimodal ethnographic displacement as mode, method and object, Displacements, Digital Conference, the Society for Cultural Anthropology

2018 | Presenter | Hoping TimeSpace: Iran As An Image Of (Cambodian | Cham | Sayyid) History, Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, Washington DC

2017 | Presenter | Moving Images: History’s unconscious Optics Within Family Photo Albums, American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Washington DC

2017 | Presenter | Moving Images: Archiving The “Difficult to Picture, Symposium Reframing the Archive: The Reuse of Film and Photographic Images in Postcolonial Southeast Asia, SOAS, London, UK

2017 | Presenter | Do Hajji Babas' portraits sign toward an in-between? Some fieldnotes from Qom, Biennial Symposia Iranica, University of Cambridge, UK

2017 | Presenter | Moving Images: History’s Unconscious Optics within Family Photo Albums, Southeast Asia Program 19th Annual Graduate Students Conference, Cornell University

2016 | Presenter | Comfortably sitting in between: elements of Cambodian ‘Alid piety rethinking the Shi‘a / Sunni divide, conference “Shi’a Minorities in the Contemporary World: Migration, Transnationalism and Multilocality, Chester Center for Islamic Studies, University of Chester, UK

2016 | Presenter | Comfortably sitting in between: elements of Cambodian ‘Alid piety rethinking the Shi‘a / Sunni divide, 2nd International Conference on Shi’i Studies, Islamic College, London, UK

2015 | Presenter | For Ali is our ancestor’’: Cham Sayyids going (back) to Shi’a, from Cambodia to Iran, panel “Bridging Southeast Asia and the Dar al-Islam: Fields Across Disciplinary and Regional Boundaries’’, Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, Chicago

2014 | Presenter | The Making Of ‘Airwaves’: Acting Islam & Enacting Modernity in a Cambodian TV Drama, American Anthropological Association Annual Meetings, Washington DC

2013 | Presenter | Traveling Luck: Past Journeys & Present Mobility of Cham & Muslim Talismans, Canadian Council for Southeast Asian Studies Conference, University of Montréal

2011 | Presenter | Notes from the field: A preliminary ethnographic overview of Cham blacksmiths in Cambodia, Conference Archaeometallurgy in Cambodia, EFEO / CKS, Siem Reap

2009 | Presenter | Showing Culture, Displaying Tradition. When a ‘global’ exhibition raises ‘local’ stakes among Chams in Cambodia, Symposium Chams : Syncretic Islamic Communities in Vietnam and Cambodia, East West Center, University of Hawai’i at Manoa

2009 | Presenter | Calling On Parents’ Genealogies, Calling Off Cambodian Muslim Uniformity: a few examples of kinship segments, International Seminar on Historical Relations between the Malay World & Indochina, History Department, Malaya University & EFEO, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

2008 | Presenter | Beyond ‘Ethnie’, Religion and Nation: about the Elasticity of the Social Borders among Chams, brown bag lecture, Human Sciences Encounters, Phnom Penh

2007 | Presenter | Inviting Champa, Welcoming Cambodia: Performing both Ancient Spirits to Commemorate Past History and Present Integration, Conference Socio-cultural Issues of Champa, 175 Years After its Disappearance, International Office of Champa, San Jose, CA.

On Campus Talks

2022 | Seeing ‘Something Like Iran’ from Cambodia: Multimodal Interventions in the Anthropology of Inter-Asia, SOAN (SOciology & ANthropology Conversations, American University in Cairo)

2020 | Iran: A Few Grams vs Quite a Number of Myths, Iran, Iraq, and the US: An Open Panel Discussion, Hamilton College

2018 | Iran, this Image of History (among some Cambodian Muslim Cham Sayyids), Cornell Southeast Asia Program Gatty Lectures

2016 | while Visiting Researcher at University of Religions & Denominations, Qom, Iran:

Fieldwork Methodologies: Some Thoughts Inspired by Feminist Anthropologies, intervention in the graduate seminar ‘’Women and Penal Islam’’

Comfortably sitting in between: elements of Cambodian ‘Alid piety rethinking the Shi‘a / Sunni divide, presentation to the Shia Studies Department faculty & graduate students

2014 | Inviting Champa, Welcoming Cambodia: Ritual articulations of contested historical memories, Cornell Southeast Asian Studies Annual Graduate Student Conference

2013 | ‘Coke, With or Without Whiskey?’ A Tentative Un-Definition of Cham Muslims in Cambodia, Global Islam: Borders, Boundaries and Belonging(s). A Workshop for Community College Faculty at Cornell University. Einaudi / SEAP / CERIS

2016 | Shi’a Studies Course, University of Religions & Denominations, Qom, Iran

2015 | Religious Minorities in Asia, Southeast Asia Research Center, City University of Hong Kong

2015 | Critical Asia: Cinema & The Urban Condition, Cornell University

Awards & Fellowships

Languages

English | fluent (speaking / reading / writing)

French | fluent (speaking / reading / writing)

Khmer | fluent (speaking / reading / writing)

Persian | conversational, basic writing & reading

Cham (Western) | elementary

Japanese | conversational, basic writing & reading

Arabic (Egyptian) | beginner

Service

2020-2022 | Virtual Otherwise conference (co-organizer) and film festival (co-curator), Society for Cultural Anthropology / Society for Visual Anthropology

2020-2023 | Elected member to the board for the Society for Visual Anthropology

2020-2021 | Coordinator, “Asia Research Forum”, speaker series, Hamilton College, Asian Studies

2018 – 2019 | Graduate Student Member, Search Committee for Visual Anthropology Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, Cornell University

2014 – 2015 | Co-chair, SEAP student committee, Cornell University

2015 | Co-organizer, SEAP Annual Graduate Student Conference, Cornell University

2006 | Research Advisor, Sociology Master Program, Royal University of Phnom Penh

2005 – 2007 | Co-founder, “Human Sciences Encounters”, Cambodian Studies scholars network

2003 – 2004 | Conferences Coordinator, CKS (Center for Khmer Studies), Phnom Penh