Trying to Explain Genocide to a Six-Year-Old

Davina Sambath is writing a memoir in essays exploring themes of immigration, the desire to belong, and her complicated relationship with Cambodia. Born in England to Cambodian parents, Sambath draws on her experience as a member of a rare demographic of fewer than a thousand documented British Cambodians. She is featured on Alyson Shelton’s Where I’m From poetry-reading series (YouTube). Sambath’s narrative essay, a tribute to her Cambodian grandmother, was selected by Roxane Gay as a Love Letter Contest finalist, for publication in The Audacity. “Trying to Explain Genocide to a Six-Year-Old” is Sambath’s first submission and her first published work.