WEBZINE ACC

After its renovation in 2021, the Asia Culture Center (ACC) Library Park hosts a special exhibition on democracy, human rights, and peace. “Cambodian Women: The Traditional Society and Forced Marriages Under Khmer Rouge” is a collaborative exhibition between the Asia Culture Institute (ACI) and Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum in Cambodia. As the title suggests, the exhibition reviews the history of human rights violations in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s.

The issue of women has grown since the emergence of feminism and became one of the key issues across different parts of society since the #MeToo movement in 2017. When we consider the numerous issues involving women and other social minorities, it was an arduous journey until we reached a point where all humans have a say in human rights and equality. However, even now, many issues are far from being resolved. Only recently did their voices become loud enough to matter in the society, which reminds us of those who suffered without making so much as a groan throughout history in each country. The exhibition highlights that exposing and revisiting atrocities in the past are as important as coming up with solutions for the future.

The exhibition consists of three spaces. ROOM1 is an introduction to the history of Cambodia during the French occupation and the country’s traditional marital culture. ROOM2 vividly conveys the suffering of victims under the Khmer Rouge and the voices of survivors. ROOM3 provides a case study of government and social organization projects to rebuild the country and women’s lives after democratization. The exhibition takes a closer look at women’s lives under Khmer Rouge as well as displacement, forced labor, diseases, famine, detention, torture, and massacre under a regime purportedly built on the spirit of socialist revolution, which claimed the lives of between 1.7 and 2.2 million people.

According to the exhibits in ROOM1, women’s roles in the traditional Cambodian society were not that different from those under the patriarchal Joseon society. Men were treated as superiors in many aspects of society, and women were required to submit to social demands, such as getting married in traditional weddings at a certain age and restricting themselves to homemakers. While changes in the education system and industrialization transformed the women’s position in society, traditional marriage remained. ROOM1 explains the numerous rituals consisting of a wedding ceremony. Their meanings and mere scale tell us how important it was for Cambodians.

The Khmer Rouge took power in 1975 after the communist movement in the 1950s. The ensuring atrocities were so severe that Cambodian women dreamt of going back to the days of tired old customs. In the first week after its inauguration, Khmer Rouge forced two million people to relocate to rural areas outside the capital Phnom Penh. There, the regime divided the population into Old People and New People and segregated families into different groups based on wage and sex. These people were forced to work under the regime’s Four-Year Plan. The tragedy did not end there. A total of 196 prisons were built across the country during the regime’s four-year reign. At the headquarters of the security police, around twenty thousand people were tortured or executed for harboring antirevolutionary ideas. During the worst days of the tyranny, forced marriage was implemented under the pretext of population growth. ROOM2 focuses on how forced marriage was plagued by rapes and the government’s surveillance of the sexual lives of forcibly married couples. Particularly impressive were paintings by Sang Nan and Chum Mab that looked back on the situations at that time. The interviews of forced marriage survivors paint a vivid picture of the suffering they endured and the sorrows they faced even to this day. As they recount their lives and past sufferings, these women find themselves regaining control over their lives and seeking meaning in the days that remain.

After the fall of the Khmer Rouge, the lives of Cambodians began to change. After their liberation from the tyranny, Cambodians had to struggle just to survive. Many suffered from health problems, while others looked for their estranged family members. The newly founded Democratic Kampuchea provided women with much-needed support and asked all Cambodians to help them rebuild the society. The women answered the call and enrolled in government-sponsored training programs, served in the military, and took up jobs to support their families. The Kingdom of Cambodia and the United Nations cofounded the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) to bring senior Khmer Rouge officials to justice and provide compensation to the victims of forced marriage. ROOM3 provides a detailed account of how the government and civil society organizations worked toward recovery and gender equality.

Previous archive exhibitions at the ACC Library Park focused more on historical records and academic research as compared to other special exhibitions that featured “new” creative projects. That is why I subconsciously prepared myself against being overwhelmed by immense knowledge. However, the actual exhibition was designed to deliver information in visually familiar ways. The routes are placed to guide visitors through the history of Cambodia from ancient times to modern days. It also offers a harmonious layout of texts, images, sculptures, and sounds about the lives of Cambodians, especially Cambodian women, under the Khmer Rouge.

Gwangju and Cambodia share many things in common: both have been scarred by historical events brought on by radical changes in society, and currently shed light on the underappreciated roles of women. I hope that, someday, both Gwangju and Cambodia will achieve the remaining issues for social recovery and healing.

• Written by Kim Min-jee mingjeek@gmail.com
  Photography courtesy of Hwang In-ho photoneverdie@naver.com
  
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