An Introduction to The Killing Fields

This film was released in 1984 and follows the story of an American journalist, Sydney Schanberg and Dith Pran, his Cambodian interpreter and fellow journalist. They have been working in the Cambodia, reporting the events of the civil war that was going on in the early 1970s. However, in 1975 everything changed.




On April 17, 1975, Cambodia's capital city, Phnom Penh, fell under the control of the Khmer Rouge, the communist guerilla group led by Pol Pot. They forced all city residents into the countryside and to labor camps. During the three years, eight months, and 20 days of Pol Pot’s rule, Cambodia faced its darkest days, an estimated 2 million Cambodians or 30% of the country’s population died by starvation, torture or execution. Almost every Cambodian family lost at least one relative during this gruesome holocaust.

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Pol Pot's Year O

Pol Pot declared 'Year Zero' when Khmer Rouge captured Phnom Penh on April 17, 1975. He immediately directed a ruthless program to "purify" Cambodian society of capitalism, Western culture, religion and all foreign influences. He wanted to create Cambodia into an isolated and totally self-sufficient state. Anyone who opposed was killed. Foreigners were expelled, embassies closed, and the currency abolished. Markets, schools, newspapers, religious practices and private property were forbidden. The police, public servants, military officers, teachers, ethnic Vietnamese, Christian clergy, Muslim leaders, members of the Cham Muslim minority, members of the middle-class and the educated were identified and executed.

The country's entire population was forced to relocate to the agricultural labor camps, the so-called "killing fields". Inmates lived in primitive conditions. Families were separated. Former city residents were subjected to unending political indoctrination and brainwashing. Children were encouraged to spy on adults, including their parents.

An estimated 1.5 - 3 million worked or starved to death, died of disease or exposure, or were executed for committing crimes. These crimes which were punishable by death included: not working hard enough, complaining about living conditions, collecting or stealing food for personal consumption, wearing jewelry, engaging in sexual relations, grieving over the loss of relatives or friends and expressing religious sentiments
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It is at this point we find Sydney Schanberg and Dith Pran. Sydney has been sent back to the United States, but his Cambodia colleague is forced to stay and sent to a work camp in the Killing Fields. Sydney is struggling to understand just who is responsible for these atrocities while his friend is struggling to stay alive.
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An Intro to FTKMF

Watch the following photo story and answer these questions:

What do you see?
What do you know?
What do you feel?
What do you wonder?






The Cambodian Killing Fields lasted 3 years and 8 months and 20 days. But what were they? Who were the victims? And who were the guilty parties that caused them?

All of these questions, as well as many others, will be answered as we follow the journey of Loung Ung in

Raisin in the Sun...Twittered

Introducing a new literary innovation......
TWITTERATURE
....retelling some of the world's greatest stories in 20 "tweets" or less, and the only rule is that a tweet can have no more than 140 characters.


Click below for Twitterature Versions of Dan Brown & JK Rowling's great works-

The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
@CatholicGuilt


OR

Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling
@NotoriousHP


But what are people saying about TWITTERATURE?

"Do you hear that? It’s the sound of Shakespeare, rolling over in his grave." – The Wall Street Journal

"A tool to aid the digestion of great literature" – Guardian

"Fans of the classics will either be delighted or appalled." – Guardian.co.uk/media

Are these guýs brilliant or lazy? Neither? Or both?
One thing is for sure...you must really know a story well to be able to twitter it in a way that the real story is maintained. Let's see how well you can do it.

Writing assignment for A Raisin in the Sun-- TWITTER the PLAY.
Retell me the story of the Younger family in the same way these two 19 year olds retold classics like Hamlet, Pride & Prejudice, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

You must have AT LEAST 15 TWEETS but NO MORE THAN 20 TWEETS.
Each tweet cannot exceed 140 characters.
If you use any abbreviations, you must give an explanation for each at the END of your story.
Your twitterature version of A Raisin in the Sun must take me from the Act 1, Scene 1 to Act 3 and must include the events/scenes/quotes that are critical to the storyline.

Still I Rise

What connections can you make between the Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun and this poem by Maya Angelou?

African Americans get the vote....

Once African Americans were given the right to vote, less than 5% of them actually exercised that right because southern states set up literacy tests that had to be passed in order to vote. For the white man, these tests were not a problem, but for a black man or woman these tests were a huge barrier. After years and years of slavery followed by years of inequity in education and schooling, many blacks did not know how to read or write. This helped the white man ensure that although the black man had the right to vote, he would never be able to act on it.....

Because of these situations throughout the south, many Civil Rights' activists were determined to make a change. They set up voting clinics throughout the south were they worked with African Americans, helping them to pass the literacy tests and become officially registered to vote. Their efforts were met with violent repression from state and local lawmen, White Citizens' Council, and Ku Klux Klan resulting in beatings, hundreds of arrests and the murder of several voting activists as seen in this clip from the film "Mississippi Burning".




After watching this clip, discuss in your groups how it is possible to have laws on paper that are not enforced in practice. What examples of hypocrisy do we see in government and policy in the 1960s and still today? How can this double standard be stopped? Or can it be?