Tracing the Last Breath

Abstract

Anlong Veng was the last stronghold of the Khmer Rouge until the organization's ultimate collapse and defeat in 1999. This dissertation argues that recent moves by the Cambodian government to transform this site into an “historical-tourist area” is overwhelmingly dominated by commercial priorities. However, the tourism project simultaneously effects an historical narrative that inherits but transforms the government’s historiographic endeavors that immediately followed Democratic Kampuchea’s 1979 ousting. The work moves between personal encounters with the historical, academic presentations of the country’s recent past, and government efforts to pursue a museum agenda in the context of “development through tourism” policies.