CAMBODIA Parish Fosters Traditional Dance Among Rural Children, Youth

Posted: 9th September 2005

Young boy and girl in Tahen practise khmer dance in front of the church

TAHEN, Cambodia (UCAN) -- A Cambodian parish is helping to keep Khmer traditional dance alive by training rural young people to perform it during Church feasts.

The parish, based in Tahen, about 290 kilometers northwest of Phnom Penh, was established in the early 1990s. It is part of Battambang apostolic prefecture, and most of the parishioners resettled there from nearby Battambang or from refugee camps across the border in Thailand.

About a year ago Jesuit Monsignor Enrique Figaredo, apostolic prefect of Battambang, started a project in the parish to reintroduce Khmer classical and folk music and songs to a new generation of Cambodians.

The Church in Cambodia was virtually destroyed by warfare and civil strife that peaked in the 1970s. The brutal reign of the Khmer Rouge from 1975 to 1979 is blamed for the deaths of from half-a-million to as many as 2 million Cambodians, including all local priests and nuns. The nation's cultural life also was decimated, as educated people were targets of purges by the radical communist group that wanted to reinvent Cambodian society from Year Zero.

The Khmer Rouge did not succeed, but much was lost. And traditional culture now faces the additional challenges brought by rapid modernization.

"Cambodia has a very rich culture," Monsignor Figaredo told UCA News, "and we must convey this to our new generation, to help them save their own traditions." If they are left only with the influences of modern life, he continued, "they will forget their own culture."

The parish project currently has 43 students, who are grouped according to age: 13-14, 15-17 and 18-20. During school vacation, classes are held throughout the day in three sessions: 7:30 a.m.-11 a.m., 2-5 p.m. and 7-9 p.m. When school is in session, only the afternoon and evening sessions are held. All lessons take place at the parish church.

Keo Chhay, one of three teachers Monsignor Figaredo has enlisted for the project, told UCA News he is very happy to transfer his knowledge and experience. He describes his students as the "new generation that can save and develop their own culture." All the teachers are Khmer Buddhists, who make up at least 90 percent of Cambodia's estimated 13 million people.

Som Salim, 18, told UCA News, "I am proud that I know how to dance our own traditional dance, although it is still difficult."

Koe Sovanna on the right dances with her student Sovann Macha

Teacher Koe Sovanna, 20, told UCA News she is very happy to teach the rural children even though it is "difficult" because they are not familiar with the traditional dances. Nonetheless, the children work hard to learn, and nobody has to push them, she pointed out.

The children perform these traditional dances for Church feasts such as the Assumption, Christmas and Easter. Koe Sovanna said the teachers are also creating new dances for use in church. One such new dance is called "Our Father and Blessed Mary."

Sa, a young boy who has learned to perform a solo song and dance, told UCA News: "I am very proud when I dance it. It is very different from disco."

Cambodia is the successor of the Khmer Empire, which ruled most of the Indochinese peninsula between the 11th and 14th centuries.

Article Source: C.S.C and UCANEWS