Cambodian Schools Reopen History's Wounds

A girl sits in a history class at the local high school in Kampong Trach, Cambodia (Photo: VOA photo - A. Belford)

High schools in Cambodia have begun rolling out the first textbook dealing with the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime. It's part of an effort to teach a dark past long left out of the classroom.

Aubrey Belford, VOA
Kampong Trach, Cambodia 19 April 2010

Between 1975 and 1979, as many as two million Cambodians were murdered, starved, or worked to death as the ultra-communist Khmer Rouge tried to build a rural utopia. Many older Cambodians are haunted by vivid memories of this time.

But for the young who make up most of the population, learning this history has been hard to do - schools have up to now just not taught it.

A high school in the southern town of Kampong Trach is at the front of efforts to teach - for the first time - the history of the Khmer Rouge. The school is using a new textbook called "A History of Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979)".

History teacher Bin Cheat says his students only know a little about the Khmer Rouge from their parents, many of whom suffered under the regime.

Bin Cheat says students have been enthusiastic about the new classes.

As a boy, he was stuffed in a sack and nearly beaten to death by Khmer Rouge soldiers simply for letting air out of a car tire. He says it is important students learn about the Khmer Rouge era - and stories like his own - before it is all forgotten.

The new textbook book was put together by the Documentation Center of Cambodia, a non-profit group tasked with recording the years of mass killing under the Khmer Rouge.

The center's director, Youk Chhang, says older history books simply ignored the Khmer Rouge era, with the exception of a brief mention in one book.

"They learned from '45 through '75 and they jumped to 1990, they jumped that period," he said. "After a long public debate they had a photograph of Pol Pot and exactly two lines in Khmer saying that Pol Pot is responsible for the death of 3.3 million Cambodian people. That's it."

Youk Chhang says it took 13 years from the new book's conception in 1996 to get it into schools. Distribution began late last year and the plan is to have one million books in schools and 3,200 teachers trained to use it by the end of this year.

He says getting the book approved was hindered by the fact that most former Khmer Rouge went unpunished and are now found at all levels of Cambodian society and politics.

"In the classroom I can assure you that at least 30 percent are the children of former Khmer Rouge, another 70 percent are the children of the victims," he said. "Among these three thousand teachers I can assure you almost 25 to 30 percent are former Khmer Rouge themselves. This is a broken society, it is a fragile society, so I think you have to live for the future, commit for the future, teach for the future."

At the school, 17-year-old Ny Pagnavuth says he never knew much about the Khmer Rouge. He says he was shocked to learn that when the Khmer Rouge took power, they emptied out the capital Phnom Penh at gun point and sent millions of people, including the old and sick, to toil in the countryside.

The story of that forced march has long been taught around the world as a brutal prelude to the Khmer Rouge's terror. Now, Cambodian students can finally learn the full story of their country.

Cambodia learns lessons of its bloody history

March 13, 2010
Aubrey Belford, Kampong Trach, Cambodia
The Australian

SCHOOLTEACHER Bin Cheat has already had his lesson on the Khmer Rouge.

As a six-year-old, he saw Pol Pot's army roll into his village in Cambodia's scrappy southern countryside. Fascinated by the rare sight of a car, he trundled up to a tyre as the men stood distracted, unscrewed the cap and let out a hiss of air. Moments later he was dragged and bound, set, like many others, for death by bludgeoning.

"They tied my arms behind my back and stuffed me in a sack. I'm lucky that one of the neighbourhood women begged with them for so long that they let me go," Bin Cheat says with a laugh.

Many older Cambodians remember the brutality of the Khmer Rouge. Up to two million people were killed through executions, starvation and forced labour as the ultra-communist regime attempted to create an agrarian utopia, while erasing the history and memory of a people.

For younger generations of children, that forgetting has continued, with the four years of the Khmer Rouge regime left off the school curriculum.

Only now, after years of debate, are teachers like Bin Cheat tentatively beginning to explain Cambodia's full history. The process is delicate and painful, as former Khmer Rouge are spread throughout society, from Prime Minister Hun Sen downwards.

Key to that process is a new textbook for high school students, A History of Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979), produced by the Documentation Centre of Cambodia (DC-CAM), a non-profit organisation given the task of recording the history of the genocide.

Other books teach the history up until the Khmer Rouge's rise in 1975 and then fall silent, only to pick up the thread long after the overthrow of the Khmer Rouge in a Vietnamese invasion, explains DC-CAM director Youk Chhang. The one concession granted over the years was a single photo of a seated Pol Pot, accompanied by a brief description of his regime and its genocide.

"I believe in prosecution to reach full forgiveness. But at the same time, for the future, to move beyond the Khmer Rouge, one way to prevent (such things from recurring) is to teach the children," Youk Chhang says.

Conceived in 1996, the idea for the book received only limited in-principle support from the government in 2004 and began being taught in a small number of schools at the end of last year. The plan is to have a million Khmer-language editions of the books in schools by the end of the year, being taught by 3200 teachers.

Re-engaging with the issue is proving a challenge. Of the country's 14 million people, only five million were alive during Khmer Rouge rule. The government of Hun Sen, a former Khmer Rouge cadre who defected to Vietnam and rose to the country's leadership after the regime's 1979 fall, has been at best a reluctant participant in efforts to bring former regime leaders to justice. "The Khmer Rouge aren't just in the government, trust me. They are in the opposition, the NGOs, the private sector, everywhere," he says.

"In the classroom I can assure you that at least 30 per cent are the children of former Khmer Rouge, another 70 per cent are the children of the victims.

"Among these 3000 teachers I can assure you almost 25 to 30 per cent are former Khmer Rouge themselves.

"This is a broken society, it is a fragile society, so I think you have to live for the future, commit for the future, teach for the future."

At Bin Cheat's school in Kampong Trach near the southern border with Vietnam, amid a landscape of red earth and lonely palm trees and sheer hills, the Khmer Rouge's shadow stretches longer than in most places.

Throughout the 1990s, Khmer Rouge rebels fighting the government in Phnom Penh lingered in the nearby hills, periodically sweeping down to abduct officials, including local teachers, and holding them for ransoms of rice, food and fuel. Those who were not ransomed were killed.

The students here respond blankly to questions of this recent history.

Ny Pagnavuth, 17, says he heard stories of the Khmer Rouge when he was growing up, including vague tales of an uncle and aunt killed. But he knew little of how the Khmer Rouge came to power or why they did what they did, and was shocked to hear the broader story in class.

"I was surprised and I felt it was strange. Why did the regime empty out Phnom Penh? Cities are where industry and the economy grows," he says.

Clearing the Fog from Khmer Rouge History

By Soeung Sophat, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
03 March 2010

While many Americans are familiar with the idea of genocide through education in schools, they may be less familiar with the Cambodian tragedy. Even so, they likely know more about it than everyday Cambodian students. A young Cambodian-American would like to change all that.

“One reason why they are probably the most informed about this issue is because in 30 out of 50 states in the United States, there is a mandate in public schools to teach about to have some kind of genocide or Holocaust education,” said filmmaker Poeuv Socheata, 29, whose “New Year Baby” follows the effect of the Khmer Rouge on her family. “And so almost every American student learns about the Holocaust at some point in their education and some of them will also learn about other genocides.”

An estimated 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust, one of the worst atrocities of the 20th Centuries. As many as 2 million Cambodians died under the Khmer Rouge, just 30 years later, though their story is less known. Poeuv Socheata, who leads an oral history project at Yale University, says this is because of inadequate education, a problem she is trying to address.

Educational efforts by her and other Cambodian-Americans have paid off, and some American schools are starting to teach of Khmer Rouge atrocities using books like “First They Killed My Father,” by Ung Loung, or Poeuv Socheata’s own 2006 documentary.

Meanwhile, Poeuv Socheata has been invited by the US Embassy to be a cultural ambassador for Cambodia and to screen her film in July.

Poeuv Socheata recently discussed the Cambodian tragedy in videoconferencing with three North American high schools, whose students she said have a good understanding of the concept of genocide.

Cambodian-Americans have only a “vague” understanding of what happened during the Khmer Rouge, she told VOA Khmer, because their parents only talk about it in the educational context of hardship. Students in their native Cambodia should know more, she said.

“For me the idea that in Cambodia now there is a generation of young people who are probably the most educated people in the country [but] who don’t have a full knowledge about what happened during the Khmer Rouge seems crazy,” she said.

The so-called negative transmission of Khmer Rouge history in a family setting is also the case in Cambodia, according to Chhang Youk, director of the Documentation Center of Cambodia.

“One negative aspect of parents telling their children about this period is that they tend to use it as a punitive action, like blaming their children for demanding bicycles, motorcycles, and music players when none of that was available during the Khmer Rouge period,” he said. “So this is a mistake we have often overlooked.”

However, he said that informal oral history of an event like the Cambodian tragedy can be important, and is often overlooked. Cambodian youth are everywhere exposed to Khmer Rouge history, he said.

“These stories are all around us,” he said. “So once our youth grow up, they will learn more questions than factual events. Many questions are beyond what students should know or ask about, and they are possibly also beyond a teacher’s ability to answer.”

Questions remain unanswered for many Cambodian youth, who, according to surveys, say they have an inadequate understanding of the Khmer Rouge and want to learn more.

That lack of understanding may soon change. In 2009, the government, with the help of the Documentation Center, mandated the inclusion of Khmer Rouge history in the national high school curriculum—for an estimated 1 million students.

“This teaching will transform us from being a victim to being an educator,” Chhang Youk said, adding that Cambodian seemed more open than other countries to the national education of a national tragedy.

Chhang Youk believes post-conflict countries must learn their history, or they will repeat it, and Poeuv Socheata agrees.

“I also think that as a society, in order to rebuild the country and to create a stronger democracy, it’s very important to implement the lessons that were learned during the Khmer Rouge,” she said.

Sacrava's Political Cartoon: A Text Book

Cartoon by Sacrava (on the web at http://sacrava.blogspot.com)

Do young Cambodians know that they are still ruled by the former KR?

Hun Xen, Chea Xim and Heng Xamrin were former Khmer Rouge cadres

Cambodia sets right painful history in school texts

Mon, 3 Aug 2009
ABC Radio Australia

Cambodia's government is including a 100 page text on the Khmer Rouge period in its 2009 high school curriculum.

The Documentation Centre of Cambodia says half a million copies of the text, "A History of Democratic Kampuchea" are being distributed to more than 13 hundred schools across the country.

The Centre's Director says it's hoped that students studying the Khmer Rouge past will help build a reconciled society in Cambodia.

However, Oppositon Member of the Cambodian Parliament Son Chhay says the text doesn't go far enough.

Cambodians begin to learn of bloody past [... some of the former KR are still in power]

Monday, August 3rd, 2009
AFP

ANG SNUOL (Cambodia): It plunged their country into a communist “Year Zero” in the late 1970s and killed about a third of the population, but most young Cambodians shrug when asked about the Khmer Rouge.

“I never learned about the regime and my parents never told me about it either,” says 15-year-old Si Phana. Her schoolmate Ang Pheaktra, 17, knows only a little more about that bleak time which traumatised a generation.

“My parents only told me that the Khmer Rouge were very cruel,” Ang Pheaktra says.

Even though there’s a war crimes tribunal for senior leaders of the movement, most here are unaware the regime killed up to two million people and enslaving the population on collective farms.

Brutal Khmer Rouge history comes to school curriculum

August 3, 2009
ABC Radio Australia

It was one of the most brutal periods of recent history and saw up to 2 million Cambodians killed by overwork and paranoid purges. And yet the rule of the Khmer Rouge from 1975 to 1979 was completely left out of the official history of Cambodia for a generation of schoolchildren.

Now, with a UN-backed tribunal underway for five top Khmer Rouge leaders, Cambodia's government will include a text on the Khmer Rouge in its 2009 high school curriculum. Half a million copies of A History of Democratic Kampuchea are being distributed to more than 1,300 schools across the country for grades nine through 12.

Presenter: Sonja Heydeman
Speaker: Youk Chhang, Director of the Documentation Centre of Cambodia; Son Chhay, Opposition Member of Cambodia's Parliament

Click here to listen to the audio program (Windows Media)

Learning to Teach About the Khmer Rouge

By Men Kimseng, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
29 June 2009

Education officials this week are learning how to teach more history about the Khmer Rouge regime, as a course from the Documentation Center of Cambodia gets underway.

In a one-week course that began this weekend, 24 officials from the Ministry of Education will hear from genocide experts and receive training from a new manual designed specifically for teaching about the regime.

Cambodian students have until recently learned very little about the traumatic period in their country’s history, and studies indicate they sometimes learn little from their parents about it.

“Our teaching [on the Khmer Rouge regime] is unique compared to teaching on this genocidal topic in other countries 40 years ago or in the last century,” Youk Chhang, director of the Documentation Center, told VOA Khmer. “Our teaching is to teach Cambodian victims to become educators, and we don’t narrowly concentrate on our country.”

Among the trainers are David Chandler, professor of history from Monash University and a well-regarded historian on Cambodia, Ros Chantraboth, a Cambodian historian, George Chigas, associate director of Yale University’s Cambodia Genocide Program, and Dy Kham Boly, the author of “A History of Democratic Kampuchea.”

“In this teacher’s manual we organize the teaching chapter by chapter,” Dy Kham Boly said. “Students are asked to read survivors’ accounts and later role play.”

Tuon Sa Im, secretary of state of the Ministry of Education, said that the 24 officials trained next week will then transfer their knowledge to history teachers at Cambodia’s junior high and high schools. The ministry hopes to finish training teachers by 2010.

Cambodia’s young generation should listen more to survivors of the Khmer Rouge

Researchers End Documentation Study

By Taing Sarada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
08 June 2009

Cambodia’s young generation should listen more to survivors of the Khmer Rouge, if the memory of the regime is to survive, recent students of an oral history project said.

Three researchers for the Documentation Center have finished three months at the Shoah Foundation, a holocaust research center in California, learning techniques about interviewing and video documentary.

Leng Ratanak, Sa Fatily and Chey Bunthy workerd closely with the Shoah Foundation to develop a 43-page questionnaire for genocide survivors based on questions designed by the institute for Holocaust survivors and others.

The Shoah Foundation produced a video documentary by interviewing 52,000 Holocaust survivors.

In recent interviews with VOA Khmer, the researchers said they had discovered the importance of retelling memories of the regime.

Participant Leng Ratanak had dozens of family members killed under the Khmer Rouge, including uncles, aunts and a grandfather.

He learned from his course how to ask detailed questions of Khmer Rouge survivors, to describe their lives before, during and after the genocide. He said after the course he and his group would pursue interviews with survivors for the Document Center of Cambodia within detail and high standards.

Document Center of Cambodia Director Chhang Youk said the bitter experiences and memories of the survivors should never be forgotten.

Sa Fatily, a Cambodian Muslim, had her grandfather, grandmother and an uncle killed under the regime. She said after the training she had more ideas for video production. She has made a 17-minute video about genocide survivors preparing for the UN-backed tribunal. She said in the future she plans to make a one-hour video to make it more detailed.

Chey Bunthy’s father and grandfather were burned alive by the Khmer Rouge. She said she was interested in learning to archive and protect film documentary, such as copying onto a master tape, burning onto a CD or storage on the Internet.

Documentation Center Outlines 2009 Efforts

By Sok Khemara, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
10 September 2008

In an effort to continue national reconciliation, the Documentation Center of Cambodia is planning two projects in 2009: the establishment of a research center in Phnom Penh and continued efforts to teach students more about the history of the Khmer Rouge.

"The teaching of history and the building of this center is a chapter for Cambodia to walk away from hell and walk away from the killing fields, and to step forward toward national reconciliation," said Youk Chhang, director of the Documentation Center.

A team for Columbia University, in New York, will work with Education Ministry officials to build the research center and prepare teaching programs and texts for more than 3,000 teachers.

The new curriculum will be based on the book "A History of Democratic Kampuchea," written by Documentation Center researcher Khamboly Dy.

The research center will be the largest of its kind in Asia.