David Oliveira is a native of California's San Joaquin Valley, born in Hanford and raised in Armona-Kings County towns thirty-five miles south of Fresno. He is a graduate of California State University, Fresno, where he studied poetry writing with Philip Levine. After a career as a grade school teacher in Armona, Oliveira moved to Santa Barbara where he worked in data processing. He was publisher and editor of Mille Grazie Press in Santa Barbara, which published poetry by writers primarily from California's central coast. He was a founding editor of Solo, an award winning national journal of poetry, and he founded, with poet Phil Taggart, the long-running Santa Barbara Poetry Series at the Contemporary Arts Forum. In addition, Oliveira is a recipient of an Individual Artist Award from the Santa Barbara Arts Commission, and in 2000, he was named Santa Barbara's poet laureate. In 2002, Oliveira moved to Phnom Penh, where he makes his home on the bank of the Mekong River with his partner, Vic Thong, and is professor of English at Pannasastra University of Cambodia.
