Publication

AIF Insights No. 24 (2026) | Towards Developing Digital Humanities as a Discipline in Cambodia

Abstract

Digital Humanities (DH) has matured into a well-established, collaborative discipline in Western contexts, yet its development remains uneven globally, particularly in non-Western areas like Southeast Asia. This article examines the distinct institutional, data-related, and technological constraints that shape DH scholarship in Cambodia. Institutional progress is hindered by limited academic support and a lack of sustained interdisciplinary collaboration between computer science and humanities departments. Data constraints are exacerbated by historical disruptions, such as civil war and genocide, which resulted in a severe scarcity of digitized materials and a reliance on foreign archives. Furthermore, technological barriers exist because Natural Language Processing (NLP) tools and datasets remain underdeveloped for the Khmer language, which lacks explicit word delimiters and possesses unique syntactic and orthographic structures that limit the efficacy of cross-lingual transfer methods. To overcome these challenges and cultivate a sustainable, locally grounded DH discipline, the article recommends enhancing digital infrastructure, promoting interdisciplinary university education, strengthening targeted research initiatives, and encouraging regional partnerships with leading Asian DH centers.