ABSTRACT
The Chinese diplomat and Ming dynasty emissary Zhou Daguan documented in detail his visit to the Angor kingdom in 1296, where he reported a Chinese community in what is Siem Reap. The Cambodia Chinese diaspora has its origins primarily in the province of Guangdong and Hainan Island. Although the Cambodian Chinese populations originate in south China, they came by varying routes, though largely by sea and most coming through the Vietnamese port of Cholon. Historical events of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries have significantly impacted Sino-Cambodian schools. From early times, the ethnic Chinese have played vital economic roles and have dominated the business and education sectors of Cambodia and elsewhere in Southeast Asia. By the time Chinese education resumed in Cambodia, the global Chinese language context had changed dramatically, in several ways. In addition to the flow from the southern China mainland, Chinese also arrived in Cambodia after the Koxinga collapse in Formosa around 1683.
