Orientation Book and Fall 2024 ID1 Workshop Series

Orientation Book 2024

"Seamlessly transitioning between the absurd and the tenderhearted, balancing acerbic humor with sharp emotional depth, offers an expansive portrait of the lives of Cambodian-Americans. As the children of refugees carve out radical new paths for themselves in California, they shoulder the inherited weight of the Khmer Rouge genocide and grapple with race, sexuality, friendship, and family." ~Good Reads

Summer Online Book Club Meet-Ups led by current 6V��Ӱ�� students

To encourage dialogue and connection around "Afterparties" before the official seminar-style discussion on campus during Orientation Week (led by faculty and staff from across the college), the 6V��Ӱ�� (the CSWIM--6V��Ӱ��'s writing center) gathered together a team of Orientation Book Partners. During the first two weeks of August 2024, these current students kicked off the year's orientation book events with a series of casual book club meet-ups over Zoom in which more than 10% of the incoming class participated! Each conversation featured a different short story from the book.

Thursday, August 1 at 1 pm (Pacific). Story 3: "Maly, Maly, Maly" led by Hlib Olhovskyi '27, Undeclared (considering English, History or Media Studies), Sebastian Amador '27, Philosophy and Linguistics, and Serena Li '26, Asian Studies and Asian American Studies. ()
Sunday, August 4 at 2 pm (Pacific). Story 4: "The Shop" led by Jake Chang '26, Public Policy Analysis and History and Eli Protas '25, English and Math. ()
Monday, August 5 at 6 pm (Pacific): Story 2: "Superking Son Strikes Again" led by Jessie Zhang '26, Media Studies and Ameya Teli '27, Undeclared, considering English/Environmental Analysis. ()
Sunday, August 11th at 12 noon and 7 pm (Pacific). The times for the remaining two summer book club series meet-ups were selected with international students in Europe, Asia, and Africa in mind, but anyone and everyone was welcome, even if they had already participated in one of the other sessions. (; )
- The noon conversation focused on Story 8: "" (led by Hlib '27 and Sebastian '27) and the 7 pm meet-up centered around Story 1: " (led by Jessie '26 and Ameya '27.)
- Any students who haven't received their physical copy of the book can read "Three Women of Chuck's Donuts" online via and "Somaly Serey, Serey Somaly" at .

After a relatively civil divorce, Cambodian-American mother, Sothy, finds herself the owner of “Chucks Doughnuts” in suburban Stockton, Central California. Pushing pastries all day, Sothy wonders how it is possible that her hands are as worn as her mother’s, who suffered under a genocidal regime. When an unknown man comes into the store several nights in a row to sit at a booth, staring out the window and leaving apple fritters uneaten, Sothy’s two teenage daughters, who work late night shifts with their mom during their summer break, take notice; especially when Sothy remarks, “of course he's Khmer [Cambodian].” Just what is being Khmer and why do they recognize him as such with only a few cursory words spoken between them? The question preoccupies Tevy, 16 years old, and working on a paper about identity for a philosophy course at the local community college. She makes a plan to interview him while her mom is away from the shop, confident his answers will earn her an A. Alarmingly, the man bears a striking resemblance to Sothy’s ex-husband. She agonizes about whether they're related, acutely aware of a debt hanging over their heads from her mobster brother-in-law, who was involved with the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime back in Cambodia. The women of Chuck’s Donuts may not know this somber man's backstory, but they “know this man. We’ve carried him our whole lives.”

Superking Son Strikes Again: Superking Son, a once-lauded local and state athletic star, is now overshadowed by the mundane responsibilities of running his family’s Superking grocery store in a Cambodian immigrant community in the Central Valley of California. Sinking into depression as he deals with exotic fruit imports and the stench of raw meats day in and day out, he still manages to command the respect of the neighborhood residents, despite his harsh demeanor, menial job, and rapidly-aging body. Superking son remains a revered badminton coach for the local Cambo boys, that is until a young, hotshot rival enters the picture and complicates the scene, bringing out intergenerational tensions and traumas and challenging the bit of glory to which he has desperately been clinging. Who will win a high-stakes badminton game that pits old and new sports heroes against each other and what does the outcome mean for the younger generation of Cambos sorting out their identities in their multicultural community?

Maly, Maly, Maly: Maly, the high school-aged daughter of “an immigrant woman who just couldn’t beat her memories of the genocide”, has a complicated relationship with Ma Eng, the great aunt who raised her from a young age after her mother’s death. As Ma Eng and other community elders prepare for a ceremony honoring Maly’s mom’s reincarnation in a recently-born family member, Maly and her cousin and confidant, Ves, escape the confusing family and cultural dynamics for a bit, hiding out and getting high in their uncle’s video rental store. Musing about the ways media has helped raise and enculturate them while also violating their minds and reminiscing about a Thai horror film about a vengeful ghost mother that they watched together as kids, Ves hallucinates, beginning to reconcile his struggles with his hometown, his queerness, and the cousins’ relationship to tradition and trauma as he gets ready to leave for a solitary college life in LA. Maly, who will be left behind in Central California, suddenly feels compelled to meet this baby who supposedly bears her mom’s soul (a character who will return in a later chapter as a nurse caring for Ma Eng on her deathbed in a nursing home.)

The Shop: After graduating from college, a directionless narrator returns home to his dad's struggling car repair shop to pass the time as he waits for the next thing in life. He both admires and finds himself frustrated by the sacrificial way his father tries to support and employ so many Cambodian community members and refuses to charge customers full price for the work, despite the toll it takes on him and the family. As everyone is making expensive preparations to welcome a monk whose blessing is hoped could turn around the shop’s financial prospects, we meet a colorful range of community members similarly caught in stasis around the store, juggling family and relationship priorities and strains while feeling pressure to figure out what comes next.

Serey, a second-generation Cambodian-American, works as a nurse in a hospice for terminally ill elders. She has been assigned to the care of her great-aunt, Ma Eng, who lost her neice, Somaly, to death by suicide, prompted by inescapable memories of the Cambodian genocide. As a newborn, Serey was determined by the local monks to possess the reincarnated soul of her relative, leading to a complicated relationship with Somaly’s adult daughter, Maly. Haunted by her family’s beliefs and a conflicted sense of identity, Serey considers passing along a pendant that she inherited from Ma Eng, which belonged to Somaly and seems filled with her trauma, causing recurring nightmares. All she hopes for is liberation, and with Ma Eng on her deathbed, she sees a chance to seize it. When Maly comes to visit the bedside with her own children, Serey considers passing along the pendant with its heavy memories of the ghost to one of Maly's kids. Can she escape the generational curse of her family’s trauma?

Email cswim@pomona.edu if you did not receive your copy of the book.

Follow for updates about on campus orientation book tie-in events throughout the fall and spring semesters.

Also, be sure to check out the background resources for "Afterparties" gathered by the Orientation Book Partners, this year's selection committee, Director of College Writing, Jenny Thomas, and other staff and faculty (following the information below.) Learn more about the history of the Cambodian genocide that undergirds the book; learn from the field of psychology about the impact of parents' trauma on their kids; dive into Cambodian poetry, dance, and music; check out interviews and articles from the late author and his friends and colleagues; and view documentaries and films related to the book, including the story of the "Donut King", Ted Ngoc--the reason why 90% of privately-owned donut shops in California are under Cambodian ownership.

Fall ID1 Workshop Series for Incoming First-Years

The Center for Speaking, Writing, and the Image (the 6V��Ӱ��'s writing center) offers an acclaimed series of interactive workshops in the fall led by current sophomores, juniors, and seniors to level the playing field and support first-year students' transition from high school to the varied rhetorical contexts of college, from speaking to writing to visual communication.

Fall 2024's features the topics listed below and more. Students may also contact the to be matched with a Regular Writing or Speaking Partner for weekly or bi-monthly appointments, which may include one-on-one support for writing your first research paper in college. Reach out to us at any time at cswim@pomona.edu for more information about this series and other special events related to writing, oral communication, and visual rhetoric.

Follow @ to learn about on:

adjusting to the reading load of college courses (do they really expect me to read 400 pages in a week?! And what exactly am I reading for??)
finding your voice in fast-moving seminar-style class discussions
reading like a writer and noticing the moves that authors make in academic texts
getting started with assignments – from unpacking prompts to sussing out your professor
narrowing from a general topic of interest to a compelling, researchable question
using powerful research tools like the citation manager, , and more (we promise, it’s worlds better than EasyBib!)
and motivating your writing to connect with real audiences

Background Resources for Afterparties

We've compiled these resources to provide context for and extend the book. Follow and check back on this page for updates about tie-in events on campus during Fall and Spring 2024.

History and political context

Learn about the Cambodian genocide and the history behind the wave of Cambodian immigration to the US

(10 min)
(6 min)

Legacy of trauma

Cambodian poetry, dance, and music

Read (more once you have library.claremont.edu access)

of the Longbeach, CA Cambodian Performing Arts Center

Khmer Classical Dance: YouTube videos

: “The Khmer word for art means ‘magic’... the artist, then, is nothing short of a magician!”

Khmer Original Music movement

Cambodian-American artist
""

Interviews with the author’s family and friends, podcast clips, and other articles

“”: National Public Radio tribute to Anthony Veasna So

"": BuzzFeed piece by Alex Torrez, Anthony's partner

"" So reading an excerpt from his new book

of Afterparties (Stockton-San Joaquin Public Library, includes an overview of each chapter of the book)

Host: Nick Mitchell. Samantha So Lamb, Anthony’s sister. Alex Torres, and the moderator. , novelist, memoirist, and So's former professor. , Stanford grad and friend of Anthony’s, who taught poetry to SE Asian refugee youth together with him. , creative writer and multi-award winner whom Anthony admired.

Documentaries and films

Links to the films below will work for any 5Cs student with a Claremont Colleges library login.

documentary: Of the 5,000 independent donut shops in California, 90% are owned by Cambodian Americans. This compelling documentary explores why and tells the immigrant story (with a glazed twist!) of , a pioneer of Cambodian American entrepreneurship who sponsored hundreds of Cambodian refugee families and built a donut empire.

YouTube
Inside Edition (3.5 min ):
BBC article

film (): 3-time Academy Award-winning film

More about the book from the '23-'24 first-year class president

Dear Incoming Sagehens

My name is Diane Nguyen from Hanoi, Vietnam. As the current first-year Class President, I am thrilled to welcome you to 6V��Ӱ�� and I am excited to introduce you to the Orientation Book Program, which was a memorable part of my own first year experience.

This year, after much deliberation and review of many worthy contenders, we have selected Afterparties: stories (2021) by Anthony Veasna So. This brilliant collection delves into the lives of Cambodian Americans, offering a vivid exploration of their experiences. The stories adeptly mix light-hearted moments with significant reflections on themes such as race, sexuality, friendship, and family—each narrative underlined by the historical echoes of the Khmer Rouge past. George Saunders captured it best, noting that the stories in Afterparties, “powered by So’s skill with the telling detail, are like beams of wry, affectionate light, falling from different directions on a complicated, struggling, beloved American community."

Our goal with the Orientation Book Program is not only to select a book that we feel will resonate with you but also to cultivate a special culture of reading. By placing a single book at the center of our collective attention, we are eager to facilitate community conversations and immerse students in the intellectual life of the college—one in which books and discussions transcend the classroom. You will discuss Afterparties in a variety of contexts: with your sponsor groups, on OA trips, during orientation seminars, at community events throughout the Fall semester, and at our campus writing center, now known as the Center for Speaking, Writing, and the Image (CSWIM). At the CSWIM, you will meet with trained academic partners who are not only eager to delve with you into this year's book but also to help you develop your own voice as you transition to writing, reading, and speaking, throughout your broader journey at 6V��Ӱ��.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, even though I admittedly squeezed it in during finals week! The narrative style deeply immersed me and allowed me to connect with the emotions, situations, and thoughts of characters across various stories. I was particularly moved by how themes like friendship, family, love, individuality, and sexuality are intricately woven into beautiful and evocative narratives. One of my favorite stories, "Superking Son Scores Again," revisits the past glories of a badminton coach's youth. I found each story in the collection compelling, and I hope you do too!

Enjoy your reading, and I look forward to meeting you soon!

Warmest regards,

Diane Nguyen ‘27

All incoming students with a permanent U.S. address should have received a copy of the book in the mail. Students living abroad will receive access to a digital copy but can claim a physical book when they arrive on campus in August.

2023-2024 Orientation Book Committee

Colleen Rosenfeld, associate professor of English, committee chair

Malte Dold, assistant professor of economics

Thomas Flaherty, John P. and Magdalena R. Dexter Professor of Music

M. Bilal Nasir, assistant professor of Asian American studies

Sara K. Olson, associate professor of biology

Frederike von Schwerin-High, professor of German and Russian

Josh Eisenberg, associate dean of students/dean of campus life

Diane Nguyen '27

6V��Ӱ��

Orientation Book 2024

Summer Online Book Club Meet-Ups led by current 6V��Ӱ�� students

Story 1: Three Women of Chuck's Donuts

Story 2: Superking Son Strikes Again

Story 3: Maly, Maly, Maly

Story 4: The Shop

Story 8: Somaly Serey, Serey Somaly

Fall ID1 Workshop Series for Incoming First-Years