French Literature Reviews - 2026

Anne-Laure Porée, La langue de l'Angkar
History, Politics and Society

How to properly torture to conduct a successful interrogation like a true revolutionary? How to present a confession file that satisfies the leadership? These are the lessons taught by Duch, the Khmer Rouge chief of the S-21 extermination center, to the interrogators he trained from 1975 to 1978 in Phnom Penh. His lessons, which dictated how to think and act in the service of the Communist Party of Kampuchea, were carefully recorded in a small-squared, fifty-page black notebook.

Anne-Laure Porée decodes this crucial document, plunging the reader into the daily lives of the Cambodian perpetrators of genocide. She identifies three guiding principles in the service of annihilation: cultivate – revolutionary zeal, the warrior spirit, and the hunt for "enemies"; sort – the "enemies" through various methods, ranging from drafting a summary biography to physical torture, via the rewriting of history; and purify – both the revolutionaries and society as a whole.

These concepts reflect the murderous policies orchestrated by the regime of Pol Pot, who came to power on April 17, 1975, and in less than four years drove a quarter of the Cambodian population to their deaths. By taking the Khmer Rouge at their word, La Langue de l'Angkar sheds light on the underlying logic and specific characteristics of a regime that long remained on the margins of genocide studies.

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Table of Contents:

Foreword. The Black Notebook with the Yellow Label
The scattered traces of S-21
At the School for Torturers
Taking the Khmer Rouge at Their Word

Part One. Cultivate
Absolute!
Drive Down
The Flavor of Being Fighters
The Task of the Santebal
Respect Discipline
Keep Secrets
Three Tons per Hectare

Part Two. Sort
Filthy
Detailing the Biography
The Purpose of the Confession
Doing Politics
Practicing Torture
Propagandizing

Part Three. Purify
Tales of Treason
Annihilate
Check the Condition of the Sticks
Merits + Flaws
Regime of Examination of Our Lives and Revolutionary Perspectives
Mastery

Conclusion. Closing the Black Notebook?
Glossary
Sources
Select Bibliography
Acknowledgements.
Notes.

This scholarly study examines the chilling instructional materials used within the apparatus of Democratic Kampuchea, offering insight into the totalitarian mechanics that enabled mass atrocities under Pol Pot. By analyzing the lexical and conceptual framework of the Angkar, the author uncovers how bureaucratic discipline and ideological indoctrination sustained state violence. The work aligns with broader historical and sociological inquiries into twentieth-century totalitarianism, totalitarian language, and the internal rationales of state-sponsored mass murder, making it a vital contribution to our understanding of the Khmer Rouge regime.

Historians, political scientists, and researchers focusing on genocide studies, Southeast Asian history, and the sociology of violence will find this analysis particularly valuable. It directly addresses questions regarding how ordinary individuals are transformed into perpetrators through institutional routines, linguistic conditioning, and ideological control. Readers seeking to understand the inner workings of twentieth-century communist regimes and the specific historical trajectory of Cambodia will gain rigorous perspective from this careful decoding of archival evidence.