[A Cambodian] Genocide Survivor and Human Rights Activist to Present Carleton Convocation

Arn Chorn-Pond

May 4, 2011
Carleton College News

Arn Chorn-Pond, a survivor of the Cambodian genocide who went on to become an internationally-recognized human rights leader, will deliver Carleton College’s weekly convocation address on Friday, May 6 at 10:50 a.m. in the Skinner Memorial Chapel. Entitled “Child of War, Man of Peace,” Chorn-Pond’s presentation is free and open to the public.

As a child growing up in Cambodia, Arn Chorn-Pond was imprisoned in a labor camp under Pol Pot’s brutal Khmer Rouge regime. In a camp of 500 children, where many starved to death and many others were murdered, the survivors were forced to work 19-hour days. Chorn-Pond was selected to learn the flute to play propaganda songs and entertain the guards, and his skill with the instrument allowed him to be among the 50 survivors of the camp. At age 14, he was forced by the Khmer Rouge to fight the invading Vietnamese, who ultimately overthrew the regime. He fled into the jungle after seeing his friends killed, and made his way to a Thai refugee camp, where he found Peter Pond, an American aid worker who adopted him and brought him to the United States.

Chorn-Pond now divides his time between Cambodia, where he seeks out masters of Cambodian music who survived the genocide which had murdered some 90% of the country’s traditional artists, and the United States, where he runs Children of War, a youth leadership organization for building community, activism, and healing for Cambodian-American teenagers. In 1996, realizing that if the few artists who survived the genocide did not pass on their knowledge, many traditional art forms would be lost forever, he founded the organization Cambodian Living Arts, which seeks to restore Cambodian arts that are in danger of extinction. More information about Cambodian Living Arts can be found at www.cambodianlivingarts.org.

Chorn-Pond was the subject of Jocelyn Glatzer’s 2008 Emmy-nominated documentary The Flute Player, which describes the struggle to revive the traditional Cambodian music that was nearly wiped out under Pol Pot. Chorn-Pond is the recipient of the Reebok Human Rights Award, the Anne Frank Memorial Award, and the Kohl Foundation International Peace Prize.

For more information or disability accommodations, contact kraadt@carleton.edu. The Skinner Memorial Chapel is located on First Street, between College and Winona Streets in Northfield.