BY STUDYING HUMANITY AT ITS WORST, CENTER ON NEWARK CAMPUS AIMS TO AVERT
FUTURE ATROCITIES, RIGHTS ABUSES
(Newark, N.J., Nov. 30, 2007) - For many Americans, genocide is a horrific
calamity, but one that befalls peoples thousands of miles away, with no
direct impact on their lives and little motivation to end it. The director
of the newly opened Rutgers Center for the Study of Genocide and Human
Rights aims to change that. "Our goal, in a sense, is to connect American
students to those in Phnom Penh, Buenos Aires, Sarajevo, and Kigali," says
Alex Hinton, an internationally known expert on genocide and an associate
professor of anthropology and global affairs at Rutgers University in
Newark.
During his extensive research, including travels to Cambodia to meet with
genocide survivors, Hinton has done more than amass cold facts and data
about genocide; he also witnessed firsthand its emotional toll. But as he
taught courses in genocide over the last several years, he realized, "While
students understand the gravity of genocide, they also feel distance from
events that, while awful, don't seem to have direct bearing upon their
lives."
The newly opened center, housed at Rutgers University in Newark, will seek
to touch hearts while enlightening minds, through public outreach programs,
educational initiatives, and student and faculty exchanges, according to
Hinton. Center projects include interdisciplinary staff research bringing
together experts from diverse fields such as political science, law,
history, global affairs, sociology, languages, and anthropology;
publications; internships; and special projects such as a model United
Nations program for college students. A series of lectures and workshops --
all open to the public -- are scheduled for spring; information is available
at http://cghr.newark.rutgers.edu/events.html .
The center, which is developing a network of international and national
collaborations, already has ties with institutes in Bosnia and Herzegovina,
Argentina and Cambodia, and is developing one with a center in the Ukraine.
The center also will rely on a resource unique to the Rutgers-Newark campus:
the main overseas branch of the Documentation Center of Cambodia. The
Rutgers center includes a Public Information Room and an invaluable archive
of primary Khmer Rouge documents in digital and microfiche form: papers,
photographs, films and other materials that provide a record of the Khmer
Rouge-orchestrated genocide.
Students will be "heavily involved" in research programs and other projects,
according to Hinton, and the center staff, its advisory board, faculty
associates, scholars and partners are drawn from throughout Rutgers as well
as numerous universities here and abroad, and organizations such as Human
Rights Watch, Genocide Watch, and the International Association of Genocide
Scholars.
"For me," says Hinton, "the center will be a great success if it helps
people understand that the prevention of genocide, hate crimes and other
human rights violations begins here and now, with the decisions we make and
the ways that we act."
High on the priority list for the center are three projects: an effort to
develop a human rights literacy initiative for educators that takes a new
look at the relationship between human rights and genocide; a Local Justice
program that will explore global concepts of justice and how they relate to
local ideas of justice and justice systems; and an examination of how civil
resistance, in the form of "people power" movements, can effect beneficial
social change.
Information on the Center for the Study of Genocide and Human Rights is
available at http://cghr.newark.rutgers.edu/
For more information, or to arrange to meet with Alex Hinton, please contact
Carla Capizzi,
973/353-5262
, or email: capizzi@rutgers.edu.
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