A very honorable congratulations to Dr. Helen Jarvis, for receiving the 2021 LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD for scholarly excellence in the field of Genocide Studies by The International Association of Genocide Scholars. Though the award was conferred in July 2021 at the IAGS virtual biennial conference, the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at the American University of Phnom Penh (AUPP) hosted a gathering of friends and colleagues from across the globe, by Zoom and in person, to present Dr. Jarvis with the physical certificate on November 11, 2021. It was an opportunity to recognize her many contributions to Cambodia and the world across decades of engagement in a myriad of sectors.
Dr. Jarvis completed her degree in Political Science and Indonesia Language and Literature at the Australian National University, earning her Ph.D. from the University of Sydney. She has worked on issues relating to crimes against humanity and genocide with a focus on Cambodia, including with Yale University’s Cambodia Genocide Program. Dr. Jarvis was instrumental in the advocacy to establish the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (also known as the Khmer Rouge Tribunal) and served as its Chief Public Affairs Officer and later head of the Victim’s Support Section before retiring in 2010. Dr. Jarvis is a Vice-President of the Permanent People’s Tribunal and on the Advisory Board of the Center for the Study of Genocide and Justice in Dhaka, Bangladesh. She served as a member of the International Advisory Committee of UNESCO’s Memory of the World program (2013-2018) and helped to spearhead the designation of the archives of the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum as a Memory of the World memorial site. In her decades of scholarship, Helen has contributed significantly to research and publications related to genocide, including Getting away with genocide? Elusive justice and the Khmer Rouge Trials, co-authored with Tom Fawthrop. She has been a long-time supporter of AUPP and its Center for Southeast Asian Studies and was a central member of the international organizing committee of the 2019 IAGS biennial conference, hosted at AUPP. Dr. Jarvis holds both Australian and Cambodian nationality and is currently living in Phnom Penh.
AUPP extends its appreciation to Dr. Helen for her deep commitment to understanding and seeking to prevent genocide, and we congratulate her on this prestigious and well-deserved recognition.
