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Love and dread in Cambodia : weddings, births, and ritual
harm under the Khmer Rouge
Peg LeVine
Singapore : NUS Press, c2010
ISBN: 9789971694722
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Book description
For a decade, the author followed Cambodian men and women to
former wedding and birth sites from the Khmer Rouge period (1975-1979),
filming their return to these locations. In the process, she uncovered
evidence of the way severe dislocation, induced starvation and other
murderous activities paved the way for reconstructed communes. Group
marriages along with prescriptions for sex, pregnancies and births, were a
central feature of the remaking of Cambodia society and contributed to the
dissolution of the country's ritual practices. This 'ritualcide' caused a
mass loss of spirit-protective places, objects, and arbitrators, and had a
traumatic impact on Khmer society. Group marriages did, however, give
spouses a reprieve from further dislocation. Approaching the process as an
ethno-psychologist, LeVine argues that suffering was intensified by ritual
tampering on the part of the Khmer Rouge. Such disruptions did not end in
1979, however, since Euro-American perspectives on trauma and reconciliation
have also failed to accept spirit respect as a normative feature.
About the author
Peg LeVine is Senior Research Fellow/Clinical
Psychologist at the Monash Asia Institute, Monash University.
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