Presenter Biographies and Abstracts
Laura Sjoberg, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Virginia Polytechnic Institute: “Women and the Genocidal Rape of Women: The Gender Dynamics of Gendered War Crimes”
Laura Sjoberg (BA, University of Chicago; Ph.D., University of Southern California, J.D. Boston College) is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. Dr. Sjoberg's areas of teaching and research include: international security, gender in international relations, the Middle East, active learning (debate, mock trial, model UN), and quantitative and qualitative methods. Dr. Sjoberg is author of Gender, Justice, and the Wars in Iraq (Lexington Books, 2006) and Mothers, Monsters, Whores: Women’s Violence in Global Politics (with Caron Gentry, Zed Books, 2007). She is editor of New Problems, Old Solutions: Rethinking 21st Century Security (with Amy Eckert, Zed Books, forthcoming, 2008), Women and Wars: Contested Histories, Uncertain Futures (a textbook, with Carol Cohn, Polity Press, forthcoming, 2009), and Gendering Global Security: Feminist Perspectives (Routledge, forthcoming, 2009).
Abstract: Women and the Genocidal Rape of Women: The Gender Dynamics of Gendered War Crimes
Expanding on work from my 2007 book, Mothers, Monsters, Whores: Women’s Violence in Global Politics (with Caron Gentry), this paper looks at the dynamics of women’s participation in the war crime of genocidal rape against other women. The women whose actions this paper addresses participated in a variety of conflicts (from Rwanda to the former Yugoslavia) at a variety of levels (from perpetration of sexual violence to leadership). It asks two (related but importantly distinct) questions about the gender dynamics of women’s participation. First, it explores both women’s motivations for participation in sexual violence and narratives of their actual behavior to gain leverage in explaining women’s violating other women. Second, it looks at how women’s choices to engage in sexual violence are portrayed in media and scholarly accounts, looking for gender differences in consumption of women’s violence in addition to its commission. The paper looks at these questions by exploring six cases of women’s (alleged) commission of the war crime of genocidal rape. The paper concludes with a reformulated approach to the laws and norms against genocidal rape in the international community, taking account of women’s roles in the crime not only as (often) victims but also as (sometime) perpetrators.
Elavie Ndura, Associate Professor of Education, George Mason University: “The Impact of Ethnic Conflict and War on Women in Burundi”
Elavie Ndura is an Associate Professor in George Mason University‘s College of Education and Human Development. She specializes in critical multicultural and peace education and immigrant acculturation. She has presented numerous papers at national and international professional gatherings. She has contributed chapters to several books. Her scholarly articles have appeared in Harvard Educational Review, Peace and Change; Journal of Adult and Adolescent Literacy; Language, Culture and Curriculum; Multicultural Perspectives; Multicultural Education; American Secondary Education, Intercultural Education; Culture of Peace Online Journal; and other publications.
Elavie formerly served as Board Member of the Center for Holocaust, Genocide, and Peace Studies as well as President and Founder of the Northern Nevada Chapter of the National Association for Multicultural Education (NAME). She currently serves on the National Board of the Peace and Justice Studies Association (PJSA) and the Peace Education Special Interest Group of the American Educational Association (AERA). She is the founder and coordinator of the Burundi Schools Project.
Abstract: The Impact of Ethnic Conflict and War on Women in Burundi
The history of post-independence Burundi has been marked by a cycle of ethnic conflict, genocide, and war that has rendered countless women silent enduring victims. As a male-dominated society, Burundi has rarely engaged in a sustained discourse aimed at unveiling the experiences, perspectives, and hopes of its women. Yet, as the ones who are often left behind to pick up the pieces and carry the crashing burden of family survival, women’s voices ought to be critical resources in the nation’s quests for peace building and societal reconstruction.
Drawing from a qualitative study that examined educators’ perceptions of the role of education in the quest for sustainable peace in the African Great Lakes region, and from her own experiences as a woman born and raised in Burundi, the presenter will discuss women’s experiences with ethnic conflict and violence and the cultural meanings of these experiences within the Burundian and African contexts. She will discuss women’s characterization of the role of education in peace building, and gender-specific challenges impacting their work as educators.
She will conclude with recommendations for framing social justice policies and practices that validate women’s experiences and voices in order to foster healing, reconciliation, development, and sustainability.
Hideko Mitsui, Lecturer, East Asian Studies, University of Leeds: “Gender Justice and Wartime Sexual Violence: The Case of Transnational Feminist Engagements in Japan”
Hideko Mitsui is Lecturer in Japanese Studies at the University of Leeds and a member of the research cluster on East Asian Identities and Cultures at the National Institute of Japanese Studies. She recently received a PhD in Anthropology from Stanford University, California. Her research and teaching interests are gender studies, war and nationalism, postcoloniality in East Asia, and the politics of memory. Her recent publications include “The Resignification of the ‘Comfort Women’ through NGO Trials,” in Rethinking Historical Injustice in Northeast Asia, Gi-wook Shin, Soon-won Park, and Daqing Yang (eds), Routledge 2006, and "The Politics of National Atonement and Narrations of War" in Inter-Asia Cultural Studies: Movements, Vol 9, Number 1, March 2008.
Abstract: Gender Justice and Wartime Sexual Violence: The Case of Transnational Feminist Engagements in Japan
The early 1990’s is often referred to as the era of testimony in East Asia. The post-Cold War East Asia saw a surge of social movements to demand the Japanese government’s compensation and apology for the Japanese Imperial Military’s abuses of civilians during WWII. Kim Hak-Sun of South Korea came forward and spoke of her experience of human rights abuses in sexual enslavement at the hands of the Japanese Imperial Military. Numerous other survivors of wartime abuses filed their grievances against the Japanese government at Japanese, U.S., and international courts, inspiring some scholars to refer to this era as “the litigious ’90s.”
This paper discusses an ethnographic instance of transnational feminist efforts to achieve gender justice. Specifically, it introduces feminist efforts to confront Japan’s wartime and colonial violence against women in Asia. I examine the ways in which Japanese and Korean women in Japan (historians, philosophers, activists and lawyers) have revived the suppressed memories of violence committed by the Japanese Imperial Military through its “comfort station” system which forced tens of thousands of women in occupied territories into military sexual slavery. Based on participant-observation, interviews, and documentary research, my research will examine how women who critically identify themselves as those of “the perpetrator nation” attempt to collectively address Japan’s militaristic and colonialist past, and situate their political practices in the local and global contexts.
Tessa Currie, Political Science MA candidate, Wilfred Laurier University, Waterloo, ON: “Reconciliatory Silence?: Pregnancy and Births in Genocidal Rape Discourse”
Tessa Currie completed her Bachelor’s Degree at Laurentian University, where in March 2007, her essay, “Reframing Canada’s Peacekeeping Role” earned the President’s Award for Excellence. She is currently a Political Science M.A. candidate at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, where she is currently undertaking research on the relationship between genocide and wartime rape/impregnation.
Abstract: Reconciliatory Silence?: Pregnancy and Births in Genocidal Rape Discourse
This paper examines the pregnancies and births resulting from wartime rape in Bosnia between 1992-95 and the 1994 Rwandan Genocide and how they were managed in the context of post-conflict reconstruction. As there is no systematic data source available to track and monitor these outcomes, one has to rely on anecdotage. The scarcity of data suggests a form of post-conflict reconciliation specific to dealing with wartime rape and pregnancy: the lack of disclosure, especially in cases where the mother has chosen to raise the child herself, represents a deliberate silence at both the state and individual levels. Such facilitates the integration of mother and child (who are often referred to as “children of hate” and “children of bad memories”) into the maternal community which, as evidence indicates, appropriates the same genocidal logic underlying wartime rape, through the construction of the child’s identity as one which is determined patrilineally. This may be termed “reconciliation through silence,” contrasted against alternative models of post-war justice whereby the past is exorcised through Truth Commissions or where the guilty are publicly prosecuted and punished through International Criminal Tribunals.
Itai Nartzizenfield Sneh, History Professor, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY: “Gendercide: Women as Victims of Crimes of Humanity”
Itai Nartzizenfield Sneh Tenured at the Department of History in John Jay College of Criminal
Justice of the City University of New York, Prof. Itai Sneh completed
his doctoral studies at Columbia University. He also holds a law
degree and a Masters in Eastern European Jewish History from McGill
University in Montreal, Canada, and a B.A. in Jewish History (with
minors in International Relations, Biblical Studies and Yiddish
Language and Culture) from Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Israel. His
research interests, presentations and publications include articles
and lectures on the history of human rights, U.S. politics,
international law, American foreign policy, terrorism, genocide, the
Vietnam War, and the Middle East. His first book was published in 2008
by Peter Lang Publishers as Volume 5 of the series Studies in
International Relations: The Future Almost Arrived: How Jimmy Carter
Failed to Change U.S. Foreign Policy. ISBN: 978-8204-8185-2 His next
book is Torture Through the Ages is under contract with the Praeger
division of Greenwod Press. It is aided by a research grant from the
Department of Homeland Security.
Abstract: Gendercide: Women as Victims of Crimes of Humanity
My paper will provide a historical context and a political narrative
for the social, economic, ideological, and political reasons behind
the mass victimization of women during armed conflicts.
I will present three major arguments:
1. Genocide is the continuity of conventional war by extreme violent and economic measures;
2. International law does not properly address the uniqueness of women’s vulnerability during times of conflict; thus
3. Women are usually treated as a property issue not as a human rights concern;
I regularly teach a graduate course on the history of geoncide. If there is one lesson I learned from what happened to Jews, Armenians, Cambodians, and other victims is that killings were a long-term pattern of violent conflicts, often lasting centuries. It is the large scope and the relatively short time of murders, the looting of property and land, or the particularly brutal measures, that distinguishes what we recognize as genocides from regular wars.
While treating rape and sexual slavery as particular crimes is an emerging norm in scholarship and actual trials, we are a long time away from amending the Genocide Convention to reflect that horrendous pattern as an independent crime with a specific consequence.
The above problems arise from the conservative, patriarchal nature of law in general and international law in particular. It will take much advocacy to change legal traditions that treated women as property of fathers/husbands/sons (exemplified in the common law principle of coverture) rather than humans.
Joanna Quinn, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Co-Director of Nationalism and Ethnic Conflict Research Group, U of Western Ontario: "Gender and Customary Mechanisms in Uganda"
Joanna R. Quinn is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science, and Co-Director of the Nationalism and Ethnic Conflict Research Group at The University of Western Ontario. Her current research looks at traditional mechanisms of acknowledgement and reconciliation in Uganda, following on an earlier study of the ability of truth commissions in Uganda and Haiti to bring about societal acknowledgement.
Abstract: “Gender and Customary Mechanisms in Uganda”
In the period after civil war or mass atrocity, trials and truth commissions have been used in a growing number of societies to try to bring about social repair and acknowledgement. Unfortunately, they often fail. Researchers have just begun to study the possibility of using customary mechanisms, including traditional ceremonies and rituals, instead of more western institutions like trials and truth commissions, in countries trying to move on in the aftermath of social destruction, with the idea of capitalizing on indigenous knowledge and local solutions in societal restoration. This paper explores the use of customary mechanisms in Uganda. It further examines the access that women in Uganda, who shoulder much of the burden of civil conflict, abuse and abduction, have to these mechanisms. It is clear that women are often left out of the social rebuilding process. But their attitudes toward traditional practices support their continued use.
Dhrubajyoti (Dru) Bhattacharya, Global Health Law fellow, Georgetown: “In Medias Res: Reaffirming Secular Obligations by Aligning Public Health, Law, and Religion to Further Female Empowerment in India”
Dhrubajyoti (Dru) Bhattacharya, J.D., M.P.H., is a Global Health Law Fellow and an LL.M. candidate at Georgetown University Law Center. He also serves as a Law Fellow for the Safety Net Hospitals for Pharmaceutical Access, an organization representing over 400 hospitals, which facilitate access to pharmaceuticals for low-income populations. He has worked with numerous government agencies, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the Health Resources and Services Administration, in furtherance of public health initiatives addressing pandemic influenza, and the deployment of volunteer health professionals during an emergency. Mr. Bhattacharya’s research encompasses a broad array of topics, including maternal and child health, infectious disease control, domestic and international health policy, gender disparities, religion, and reproductive rights.
Abstract: In Medias Res: Reaffirming Secular Obligations by Aligning Public Health, Law, and Religion to Further Female Empowerment in India
In India, unsafe abortions, sex-selective abortions, lack of access to contraceptives, and domestic violence are among the myriad of health-related issues that continue unabated. These problems are, in large part, attributable to transient expressions of female autonomy. Part I discusses trends in global and national rates of unsafe abortions and attendant health consequences. Part II focuses on international and national legal instruments and derogation from essential human rights obligations. Part III explores the impact of non-governmental organization shadow reports and whether the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women is effective in assuaging fears of non-compliance. Part IV contextualizes the discussion with respect to Hinduism, the predominant religion of India, to identify elements of female autonomy stemming from its ideological basis, as depicted in its literary tradition. Secular obligations are thereby reaffirmed, drawing attention to political reluctance that precludes women from achieving equality as a function of political, rather than inherently religious, sentiments. Part V proffers recommendations for ethical, legal, and structural reform to promulgate a unified principle of female empowerment. Part VI concludes by summarizing the argument and reiterating key measures to effectuate change to secure the health of Indian women.
Dan Moshenberg, Associate Professor of English and Women’s Studies, George Washington University: “Tenderness Deliverances: Women In and Beyond the Global”
Abstract: Tenderness Deliverances: Women In and Beyond the Global
Prison defines freedom. Nationally, women’s prison and women-in-prison define citizenship. Globally, women’s prisons define democracy and democracy-to-come. What lies beyond the global?
This presentation traces relationships among surplus populations, surplus value, and biopolitics, in order to wonder about the place of women’s prisons and women’s imprisonment in the global and beyond. The paper focuses on Southern Africa, and in particular South Africa and Zimbabwe
The analysis begins with the current South African women’s prison as a State biopolitical apparatus. I trace the shift from the prison as a university of the insurgent to the prison as a `location’ for criminals. I then follow the specific discursive paths of representations of female inmates and prisoners in South Africa. If biopolitics is about State management of populations, the South African women’s prison has become the ideological biopolitical apparatus par excellence. Where once women prisoners were warriors and comrades, today they are treated as dangerous felons or as hapless victims. Either way, women in prison are to be not seen and not heard because, as we know, society must be defended.
From there, I turn to writings by women in prison in contemporary South Africa and Zimbabwe, which I read as part of a Southern African feminist redemptive and/or recuperative discourse of tenderness. This particular tenderness shuttles between Bessie Head’s version, in The Collector of Treasures and other Botswana village tales, in which imprisoned women in post-colonial Botswana share tenderness, and Yvonne Vera’s version, in Stone Virgins, where the “task is to learn to re-create the manner in which the tenderest branches bend, meet, and dry, the way the grass folds smoothly over this frame and weaves a nest, the way it protects the cool, livable places within – deliverance”. Tenderness deliverances freedom.
Kay Chernush, photographer: “Ensnared and Enslaved--Images of Human Trafficking”
Kay Chernush is a leading US photographer with 25 years of experience in commercial and fine art photography. A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and recipient of a Fulbright grant to India, she started out as a writer but became hooked on photography during an assignment for the Peace Corps in Africa. She has photographed more than 50 feature stories for SMITHSONIAN MAGAZINE and shoots for many other national and international publications and major corporations. Her interest in issues related to human trafficking began with an assignment for the State Department in 2005, work that has been exhibited at the United Nations in New York and Vienna. Her fine art work includes a book and a series of self-portraits entitled “Self-Examination,” based on her experience with breast cancer. Other work is in the permanent collections of the World Bank, the National Institutes of Health, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, and private collections both in the US and abroad. Her images may be viewed at www.kaychernush.com
Abstract: Ensnared and Enslaved—Images of Human Trafficking
Human trafficking is fueled by extreme poverty and the economic dependence of women (and therefore children) on the one hand, and by cultural norms that devalue and commodify women on the other. It is also fueled by a seemingly insatiable demand for exploitive sex and cheap labor. It exists in every country and is a growth industry internationally, ranking third after drug trafficking and arms smuggling. In each country it takes different forms, but the general outlines are remarkably similar. The State Department estimates that 600,000 to 800,000 individuals are trafficked across international borders annually, a statistic that does not take into account the millions more who are enslaved within national borders, trafficked from countryside to cities, or the numbers involved in peripheral activities that feed the trade in human beings. In making photographs of human trafficking in its many different guises, I am trying to put a shocking face on the statistics and headlines and tell the stories behind them. Given the complexity of the problem, the resources of many different disciplines are needed if we are to put an end the scourge of 21st Century slavery.
Lucinda Peach, Associate Professor of Religion and Philosophy, American University: “Sin or Starvation? The Problematic Role of Religious Morality in US Anti-Sex Trafficking Policy”
Lucinda Joy Peach (PhD Department of Religious Studies, Indiana University; JD New York University School of Law) is Associate Professor at American University, where she teaches in the Department of Philosophy and Religion and the Women and Gender Studies Program as well as co-directing the MA Program in Ethics, Peace, and Global Affairs. Her publications include Legislating Morality: Religious Identity and Moral Pluralism and three edited volumes: Women and World Religions, Women in Culture: A Women's Studies Anthology, and Ethics and Global Affairs: An Active Learning Sourcebook. In addition, she is the author of articles on topics ranging from the ethics of women in military combat, reproductive rights, women’s human rights, sex trafficking, women in Buddhism, gender ideology, law and religion, and global ethics. Her recent research has focused on the ethics surrounding sex trafficking and sex work.
Abstract: “Sin, Salvation, or Starvation? The Problematic Role of Religious Morality in US Anti-Sex Trafficking Policy”
In this paper, I will examine some of the morally problematic aspects of the involvement of faith-based organizations on the United States government’s anti-trafficking policy and practice, especially as it impacts on the lives and well-being of women involved in the sex trade in nonwestern and non-Christian cultures. When examined closely, I will argue, the US’s policies favoring the criminalization of prostitution reflect a culturally specific (i.e., conservative Christian) understandings of the sexual body and of prostitution. Using examples drawn from India and Thailand, I will show that the Christian orientation of current US anti-trafficking policies conflicts with both Hindu and Buddhist understandings of human sexuality, gender, and prostitution as well as with the subjective understandings of many sex workers themselves.
Smadar Lavie, Hubert H. Humphrey Distinguished Visiting Professorship Chair, Macalester College: “Mizrahi Feminism and the Question of Palestine: Gendering the Race of Israel's Ashkenazi Feminism”
Smadar Lavie, a Cultural Anthropologist, holds the Hubert H. Humphrey Distinguished Visiting Professorship Chair at Macalester College. Her first book, The Poetics of Military Occupation (1990), has become a multi-disciplinary classic, still in print and in demand. Her co-edited collection, Displacement, Diaspora, and Geographies of Identity (1996) has been widely cited as criticizing the academic US-European hegemony of Cultural Studies by returning to the dispersed, global daily realities from which the theoretical representations were derived. She is presently working on an essay collection that documents Mizrahi ("Oriental," or Arab-Jewish) lower-class women’s daily lives in light of archival Mizrahi histories. The essays illuminate the junctures between cultural theory and critique and the gendered performances of the racialized nation-state under the globalized privatization of Israel’s economy. Lavie is a member of several Palestine/Israel feminist and anti-racist NGOs. Her writings, teaching and activism have inspired many students, scholars and activists in Israel/Palestine, the Middle East and around the world.
Amy Wilson, Program Director, International Development Programs, Gallaudet University: “Women and Girls with Disabilities in Developing Countries”
Amy T. Wilson, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Foundations and Research and is the Director of the International Development Programs at Gallaudet University in Washington, DC. Her teaching and research focus on international development assistance to people with disabilities in developing countries; gender, disability and human rights; the inclusion of deaf people and those with disabilities in development programs; and conducting research with Deaf communities and disabled people’s organizations. She has lived overseas for extensive periods of time as a student, volunteer, researcher, and explorer and shares her knowledge and experiences concerning international development and research through presentations, articles, book chapters, consulting, and teaching.
Abstract: Women and Girls with Disabilities in Developing Countries
One of the greatest barriers to women and girls in developing countries to appropriate health care, education, and acceptance within their home communities is the negative societal attitudes toward their disabilities. Local concepts and beliefs frame a society’s perspective of disability affects the status of disabled women and girls. In addition, the lack of, or non-enforcement of national disability policies or laws also make it difficult for any persons with disabilities to become full participating members of their society. A brief overview of the situation of the human rights of women and girls with disabilities in developing countries will be discussed as well as strategies to implement the recently adopted United Nations Convention on the Human Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
Saida Hodzic, Assistant Professor of Women and Gender Studies, George Mason University: “Rethinking Rights: Ghanaian Gender Activism on the Global Stage”
Saida Hodžić is an Assistant Professor of Women and Gender Studies at George Mason University. She received her Ph.D. in Medical Anthropology at UC, Berkeley and UC, San Francisco and a Designated Emphasis certificate from the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies at UC, Berkeley. Her M.A. is from Cologne University in Germany. Currently, she is writing an ethnography of Ghanaian activism against female genital cutting. This book examines how Ghanaian NGOs negotiate the global construct of FGM which is the dominant paradigm for understanding the practices of cutting and intervening in them. Her award-winning dissertation, Performing Development: Women’s NGOs, Donors, and the Postcolonial Ghanaian State, examines why culture and tradition are articulated as the ground of struggles over women’s rights in the age of neoliberalism.
Abstract: Rethinking Rights: Ghanaian Gender Activism on the Global Stage
In the last twenty-five years, the United Nations Division for Advancement for Women has established an international bureaucracy which examines the compliance of member countries with the most significant women’s rights treaty – the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women. In this paper, I examine the tensions between this formal internationalization of women’s rights and “grassroots” gender activism. How is sovereignty over women’s bodies reconfigured when reports stand for rights and governments represent activists? I address this question by tracking the interactions between the UN CEDAW Committee, the government of Ghana, and Ghanaian feminist NGOs.
Ekaterina Romanova and Erica Sewell, degree candidates, ICAR, George Mason University: “Factors Influencing the Successes and Challenges of Women’s Peace Movements: Case Studies of Liberia and Chechnya”
Ekaterina Romanova is currently a PhD candidate at the Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, George Mason University. Her dissertation research focuses on the influence of immigration on the rise of nationalism and consequently immigration policies. Her area of expertise is the CIS. Her major research interests include women peace movements and the role of women in violent conflicts, ethnic conflicts and national identity. Ekaterina conducted an extensive research on the use of women as weapons of war in the conflict in Chechnya, Russia. In her home country, Russia, Ms. Romanova worked in women NGO "Women in Education, Research, and Business," where she coordinated the youth section and supervised the financial aspect of the organization.
Erica Sewell is the former Executive Director at the Institute for Multi-Track Diplomacy. Erica also worked with the International Rescue Committee in Dallas, Texas, as the Volunteer Program Coordinator and established the Empowering Women to Excel program, which conducts workshops for refugee women. She has developed and taught a peace education course for highschools students. Erica has also assisted at WOMANKIND Worldwide in London, England, studying policy issues impacting women internationally. She holds a MS in conflict analysis and resolution from ICAR, GMU. Her thesis, “Women Building Peace: The Liberian Women’s Peace Movement,”documents the crucial role women played in bringing peace to Liberia and the potential role for women in resolving civil conflicts.
Abstract: Factors Influencing the Successes and Challenges of Women’s Peace Movements: Case Studies of Liberia and Chechnya
Women’s voices in the peacebuilding process have continually been silenced, despite the fact that women bear the brunt of the effects of war and post-conflict reconstruction. Driven by the desire to provide basic human needs, such as food and safety, for their families rather than by political aspirations, women have been able to achieve unexpected success in conflict resolution and in the building of a peaceful and sustainable future in their communities. Women have a unique opportunity to address the needs of their war-torn communities, but their contributions are often neither recognized nor acknowledged. Through a comparative analysis of two cases, Chechnya and Liberia, we will examine stark differences in women’s mobilization. Whether the women mobilize in small groups or in a nationwide movement, in time of war or societal turmoil to advocate for peace or improvement of life conditions, the results have been equally impressive.
This article examines the challenges and successes of women’s peace movements. The research addresses the question of what defines a women’s peace movement and what hinders its broader recognition. Initially the two cases appear remarkably different in terms of political mobilization and participation of women in the conflict resolution process. Through analysis, however, one cannot overlook the common themes in both movements. Liberia illustrates how women can use non violent techniques and political platforms to work towards achieving peace. In Chechnya, women have been excluded from the official political initiative, yet their participation in community peacebuilding is undeniable. It is precisely the difference in the level of participation of women in the peacebuilding process that allows one to see the challenges of women’s peace movements and the need for recognition of women’s initiatives. This article does not measure success of a women’s peace movement by political advancement of women, but rather by the movement’s ability to positively influence the lives of people leading to social change. Determining the factors that advance women’s activism can help build adequate policies to ensure that women’s peacebuilding efforts are recognized by local and international communities as well as further the knowledge based on the elements needed for success.
Amy L. Hill, Community Programs Director, Center for Digital Storytelling: Silence Speaks Digital Media for Gender Justice:
Exploring the Complexities of “Participation” and Polyvocality
Amy Hill is a digital storytelling instructor, documentary filmmaker, and public health/community development consultant. Her twelve-year history of coordinating women’s health and violence prevention projects throughout California led Amy in 2000 to found Silence Speaks Digital Storytelling, which teaches survivors and witnesses of violence how to create short digital videos of courage and healing and promotes the use of these stories in training, community organizing, and policy advocacy contexts. She continues to manage Silence Speaks and other national and international projects in her current role as Community Projects Director at the Center for Digital Storytelling in Berkeley. Amy has a BA in British & American Literature from Scripps College, and a Master’s degree in Gender Studies from Stanford University. She is nearing completion of her first her in the doctoral program in Social Context and Policy Studies in Education, at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Silence Speaks Digital Media for Gender Justice:
Exploring the Complexities of “Participation” and Polyvocality
Silence Speaks is an international digital storytelling initiative that provides survivors and witnesses of gender-based violence and other forms of trauma with a safe, supportive environment in which to tell and listen to each other’s stories. Our participatory media production workshops, which place control over media content in the hands of those directly affected by violence, result in short videos that have the capacity to challenge journalistic legacies of voyeurism and naturalized representation. And yet Silence Speaks stories, like other cultural forms, must be viewed as shaped by and contributing to the constellation of larger discourses that circulate and produce understandings about violence and trauma. This raises important questions about the processes through which stories are produced as media texts, as well as the environments in which they are shared. In this paper, I complicate opaque notions of “participation” by exploring how power and authorship play out in the context of Silence Speaks. Using our work in South Africa as a case study, I also critically examine the practice of sharing stories in public arenas without careful consideration of the spaces in which they are listened to.
Nancy Cantalupo, Assistant Dean for Clinical Programs, Georgetown Law: "Using Law and Education to Make Human Rights Real in the Lives of Real Women"
Nancy Chi Cantalupo is the Assistant Dean for Clinical Programs at Georgetown University Law Center and teaches “International Women’s Human Rights” at The George Washington University’s Law School and “Gender, Oppression, Liberation and Global Laws” with Georgetown’s Women’s and Gender Studies Program. Prior to becoming a lawyer, she was the founding director of the Georgetown University Women's Center, where she built the only university office exclusively devoted to advocating for women on issues related to gender equality. While a student in Georgetown Law’s International Women’s Human Rights Clinic, she participated in a team fact-finding mission and wrote a report entitled Domestic Violence in Ghana: The Open Secret (published in 2006 by the Georgetown Journal on Gender & the Law). She also serves on the board of the Asian/Pacific Islander Domestic Violence Resource Project and has held positions at American University’s Washington College of Law and Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP.
Abstract:
Using Law and Education to Make Human Rights Real in the Lives of Real Women
This presentation focuses upon methods of making international human rights law and principles real to real women, as both an educational and activist project, using three courses involving gender, human rights and global laws that the presenter teaches to two different groups: women’s/gender studies and international affairs undergraduates; and law students. It seeks to demonstrate both the linkages between “thinking globally” and “acting locally” in the area of gender and human rights and how to educate and encourage students to actualize human rights laws and principles in their own communities and lives. In discussing the topics, methods and materials used in these courses, the presentation uses several important women’s human rights legal theories and cases to illuminate ways to educate and encourage both aspiring lawyers and more interdisciplinary/diverse audiences to actualize human rights laws in their communities.