First They Killed My Father Analysis

In 1975, The Khmer Rouge became the ruling political party of Cambodia after overthrowing the Lon Nol government. Following their leader Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge imposed an extreme form of social engineering on Cambodian society. They wanted to form an anti-modern, anti-Western ideal of a restructured “classless agrarian society'', a radical form of agrarian communism where the whole population had to work in collective farms or forced labor projects. The Khmer Rouge revolutionary army enforced this mostly with extreme violence. The book “First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers”, written by Luong Ung, is the author’s story of growing up during this time period. She was five years old when the Khmer Rouge came into power. As stated in the author’s note, “From 1975 to 1979, through execution, starvation, disease,
She lived through the entire period of the Khmer Rouge being in power, which is why she can provide first hand evidence of the war and its effects on the people of Cambodia. She had to live through the harsh conditions and had her innocence stolen by the new government and its brutality and disregard for the people it governed. Yet, she was able to keep her spirit alive, triumph over this tragedy and tell her story. She didn’t have to generalize, seeing as she witnessed every event that occurred in the story. She was able to prove her thesis by telling her story in great detail. From the moment the Khmer Rouge came through Phnom Penh to the moment where she got on the plane headed to Vermont, the details were vivid and very graphic. The evidence was definitely interwoven throughout the story in a way that was consistent with proving the author’s thesis. The author proved her thesis by describing every event that occurred. These events justify her thesis and result in many lessons being learned by reading this