Dith Pran
Dith Pran | |
---|---|
File:Dith Pran..jpg | |
Born | Siem Reap, Cambodia |
27 September 1942
Died | Script error: The function "death_date_and_age" does not exist. New Brunswick, New Jersey |
Residence | Woodbridge, New Jersey |
Employer | New York Times |
Known for | The Killing Fields |
Partner(s) | Sydney Schanberg |
Dith Pran (Khmer: ឌិត ប្រន; 27 September 1942 – 30 March 2008) was a Cambodian photojournalist best known as a refugee and survivor of the Cambodian Genocide. He was the subject of the Academy Award-winning film The Killing Fields (1984). He was portrayed in the film by first-time actor Haing S. Ngor (1940–1996), who won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance.
Contents
Early life
Pran was born in Siem Reap, Cambodia near Angkor Wat. His father worked as a public works official.[1] He learned French at school and taught himself English.
The United States Army hired him as a translator but after his ties with the United States were severed, Pran worked with a British film crew for the movie Lord Jim and then as a hotel receptionist.[1]
Revolution
In 1975, Pran and New York Times reporter Sydney Schanberg stayed behind in Cambodia to cover the fall of the capital Phnom Penh to the Communist Khmer Rouge.[1] Schanberg and other foreign reporters were allowed to leave the country, but Pran was not.[1] Due to persecution of intellectuals during the genocide, he hid the fact that he was educated or that he knew Americans and pretended to be a taxi driver.[1] When Cambodians were forced to work in labour camps, Pran had to endure four years of starvation and torture before Vietnam overthrew the Khmer Rouge in December 1978.[1] He coined the phrase "killing fields" to refer to the clusters of corpses and skeletal remains of victims he encountered during his Lua error in Module:Convert at line 1851: attempt to index local 'en_value' (a nil value). escape. His three brothers and one sister were killed in Cambodia.
Pran travelled back to Siem Reap where he learned that 50 members of his family had died.[1] The Vietnamese had made him village chief but he feared they would discover his US ties and escaped to Thailand on 3 October 1979.[1]
Career in the United States
After making his way to the United States, Pran reunited with his friend Schanberg and in 1980 joined his paper, the New York Times, where he worked as a photojournalist. He gained worldwide recognition after the 1984 release of the film The Killing Fields about his experiences under the Khmer Rouge. He campaigned for recognition of the Cambodian genocide victims, especially as founder and president of the Dith Pran Holocaust Awareness Project. He was a recipient of an Ellis Island Medal of Honor in 1998 and the Award of Excellence of the International Center.
Personal life
In 1986, he became a US citizen with his then wife Ser Moeun Dith, whom he later divorced. He then married Kim DePaul but they also divorced.[1]
Death
On 30 March 2008, Pran died, aged 65, in New Brunswick, New Jersey, having been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer just three months earlier. He was living in Woodbridge, New Jersey.[1][2]
References
External links
![]() |
Wikiquote has quotations related to: Dith Pran |
- Dith Pran at Find a Grave
- Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- The Dith Pran Holocaust Awareness Project at the Wayback Machine (archived February 27, 2009)
- The Last Word of Dith Pran New York Times. March 30, 2008. Video Interview of Dith Pran.
- Obituaries:
- Pages with broken file links
- Articles with hCards
- Articles containing Khmer-language text
- 1942 births
- 2008 deaths
- Cambodian Genocide survivors
- Cambodian photojournalists
- Cambodian emigrants to the United States
- The New York Times visual journalists
- Deaths from pancreatic cancer
- Cambodian journalists
- Cancer deaths in New Jersey
- People from Woodbridge Township, New Jersey