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Analysis Of First They Killed My Father By Loung Ung

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First they Killed my Father, by Loung Ung, is a story told from the eyes of a young girl who lived through the Khmer Rouge genocide in Cambodia. As you read this book you begin to find yourself learning valuable history, straight from the source. Loung explains how her and her family were forced out of their home town in Cambodia, when Khmer Rouge began to takeover. A few days after Khmer Rouge took control in 1975, the Khmer Rouge forced roughly two million people in Phnom Penh, and other towns/cities into the countryside for agricultural work. Thousands of people died and were executed during the evacuations. They wanted to transform Cambodia into a rural, classless society in which there were no poor, and no rich. To accomplish this,
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The pills dance in my palms, gleaming white and inviting…. Somewhere in Cambodia, I dream that Pa and Ma are sleeping together in the ground. I close my eyes and wait for Pa to come take me with him. In her crib, Tori cries but I ignore her.” (180-181) Loung has a deep need to kill herself not only because of her painful memories of Cambodia but also because of her grieving for Pa, Ma, Keav and Geak.

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Similarly, in ‘First They Killed My Father’, the significance the father had on the narrator can also be examined. On page 47 of ‘First They Killed My Father’, Loung, and her family have reached a checkpoint where they would need to be questioned by the Angkar. Referring to her father, Loung quoted “He reaches down and puts his hand on top of my head. It stays there as if protecting me from the sun and the soldiers. After a few minutes, my head feels cooler and my heartbeat slows''.

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In Baltimore, Maryland 1999, a young lady Hae min lee goes missing. Adnan Syed is a prime suspect in the murder case. He is an 18-year-old Highschool senior at Woodlawn Highschool. Adnan is then convicted of the murder of his girlfriend, Hae. Adnan is innocent.

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Causes of the Cambodian Genocide The Cambodian genocide took place from 1975 to 1979; it is estimated that some two million Cambodians were systematically murdered by the Khmer Rouge and its followers (Power 90). In Alexander Hinton’s article, “A Head for an Eye” he recounts in details the experience of Gen, a survivor of the Cambodian Genocide. After the Lon Nol government was overthrown by the Khmer Rouge, the Communists began their witch-hunt in an attempt to identify and kill anyone who was associated with the former regime, as well as the educated, the Vietnamese, the Muslim Cham, the Buddhist monks, and other “bourgeois elements” (Power 101). During the investigation, it was revealed that Gen’s father was a teacher–this fact alone was

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The Mai Lai massacre took place March 16, 1968 in the Mai Lai village of South Vietnam and is considered to be one of the most traumatic incidents of violence towards civilians of the Vietnam War. In the massacre, and estimated 347 Vietnamese civilians were brutally killed by American soldiers of the Charlie Company. Soldiers were sent to the village to capture and kill members of the Viet Cong, but when they arrived, they could only find villagers. Instead of retreating, they brutally raped, tortured, and murdered hundreds of civilians; mainly women, children and the elderly, all whom were unarmed. In the defense of these soldiers, many say that they were just doing what they thought was right, what they were ordered to do.

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I think that this quote is trying to convey, through metaphor, that reading enables an individual to experience the lives and emotions of the characters or people they are reading about. I necessarily don’t agree with this. I think that the power of reading books, fiction or non fiction, is that it improves your life because you can learn lessons from the experiences of the characters or people in them. The important distinction, to me, is that while words are incredibly powerful, they are not an accurate substitution for the raw emotion and reality of the experiences people have undergone. For instance, in Grade 10 I read “Then They Killed My Father” by Loung Ung for my English culminating project.

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Loung Ung’s First They Killed My Father is a vivid, detailed memoir of a young girl’s experiences in Cambodia throughout the Khmer Rouge era. It records in expressive detail the horrors suffered by the Ung and her family while living under the oppressive rule of the insane Khmer Rouge. Meanwhile, First They Killed Her Sister by Soneath Hor, Sody Lay and Grantham Quinn is a lengthy criticism in direct opposition to the aforementioned memoir. Although the authors of First They Killed Her Sister made some excellent points throughout their assessment of First They Killed my Father such as showing how Ung having misrepresented some aspects of Khmer culture and history, they completely and utterly failed in their attempt to discredit her based on the claims that she perpetuated racial tension and distorted what really happened in 1970s Cambodia, which breaks down the few good points they did have. The critics correctly assert and prove that Ung misrepresented certain aspects of Khmer culture and history, showing that at times, Ung’s description of what had happened was distorted or partially fabricated.

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The Khmer Rouge was a revolutionary group who wanted to reconstruct Cambodian society.   On April 17, 1975 the Khmer Rouge attacked the capitol Phnom Penh. As soon as the Khmer Rouge got to the capitol they started to force the people to leave all their possessions and march to the rural part of Cambodia. “Hospital patients

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The My Lai Massacre was a significant event in the Vietnam War. Hundreds of innocent villagers were murdered by a portion of the Charlie Company. Most of the victims were elderly, 70-80, and children, as young as three. They also raped women, clubbed people, executed them (then most likely dumped into a mass grave), and carved C’s into their chests. A cover-up was created but it was no use, the American people found out.

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Chen Jiashou was born on September 16, 1918, in Nanking, China. When the Imperial Japanese Army invaded her city in 1937, she was living in a small Nanking district with her Uncle, Mother, and Father, two brothers and sister. At that time, she was only 19-years old and working as an apprentice. After the Japanese came, she escaped to a refugee camp where she was temporarily safe.

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The My Lai Massacre, a tragic event during the Vietnam War, which left many people dead. U.S. soldiers in Charlie Company brutally killed the majority of the population of the South Vietnamese village of My Lai in March 1968. Many innocent civilians were killed or violated by soldiers with no consideration whatsoever (Martin). The soldiers in Charlie Company did not report the details to their superiors and left the details up to their Lieutenant Calley. The Charlie Company released to the press that in the My Lai Massacre event only 128 Viet Cong lost their lives.

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Families were also split up. The Khmer Rouge created labor brigades, assigning groups depending on age and gender. This policy resulted in hundreds of thousands of Cambodians starving to death” (“Cambodia”). In the book Night, there is a quote stating “There was still some food left. But we never ate enough to satisfy our hunger.

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“Just the way it was”. That was Anne W. viewpoint of poverty when she was growing up and going to school. Anne and I met working for the same school district. She was born fifth of eleven children and started her schooling in the 1960s.

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In First They KIlled My Father, Loung Ung is only a child when she is taken of everything. She experienced many challenges and difficulties during the war. The impact of this war has led her to experience hunger, insufficient free time, and no privacy whatsoever. While living under the Angkar, Ung has experienced hunger several times. An example is when Ung reveals to the readers that, “As always, no matter how plentiful the crops, there is never enough food for the new people” (Ung 322).

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The theme of First They Killed My Father is to not take family for granted because people never know when a tragedy might occur. Throughout her childhood, Loung Ung, and her family, Geak, Chou, Kim, Keav, Meng, Khouy, Pa, and Ma have to fight to survive through the traumatic experiences of the Cambodian genocide.

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