Cultural Survival | 15 January 2013
Cambodian human rights activists showed once again that they are on cutting edge of pop culture by performing a choreographed dance to a land rights themed version of the viral video "Gangnam Style" in Phnom Penn.
Celebrating International Human Rights Day on December 17th, activists chanted alternative lyrics to the song by Korean pop star PSY, which has over 1 billion views on YouTube.
Activists sang, "Stop evicting us. Stop, stop stop- stop evicting us! Hey... we have land rights!" while doing the iconic 'horsey dance' in front of the country's National Assembly.
They wore T-shirts signed by over 11,000 Cambodians protesting forced evictions by the government to make room for logging and other other agribusiness and development concessions, usually to foreign-owned companies.
Last year, the Kuy people of Cambodia held protests of illegal logging in their Prey Lang forest dressed as Avatars, in reference to the blockbuster movie about the fictional Navi people facing similar threats.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has called "Gangnam Style" a force for world peace.
Cambodian human rights activists showed once again that they are on cutting edge of pop culture by performing a choreographed dance to a land rights themed version of the viral video "Gangnam Style" in Phnom Penn.
Celebrating International Human Rights Day on December 17th, activists chanted alternative lyrics to the song by Korean pop star PSY, which has over 1 billion views on YouTube.
Activists sang, "Stop evicting us. Stop, stop stop- stop evicting us! Hey... we have land rights!" while doing the iconic 'horsey dance' in front of the country's National Assembly.
They wore T-shirts signed by over 11,000 Cambodians protesting forced evictions by the government to make room for logging and other other agribusiness and development concessions, usually to foreign-owned companies.
Last year, the Kuy people of Cambodia held protests of illegal logging in their Prey Lang forest dressed as Avatars, in reference to the blockbuster movie about the fictional Navi people facing similar threats.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has called "Gangnam Style" a force for world peace.
