The Chair, with the Transitional Justice Institute and INCORE, hosted a successful book launch of “Reconciliation and Building a Sustainable Peace: Competing Worldviews in South Africa and Beyond” by Dr Cathy Bollaert. The book, based on her PhD research at Ulster University (co-supervised by Brandon Hamber, Kris Brown and Fionnuala D. Ní Aoláin), explores how competing worldviews impact on intergroup relations and building a sustainable peace in culturally diverse societies. It raises the question of what happens in a culturally diverse society when competing values and ways of interpreting reality collide and what this means for peace-building and the goal of reconciliation.
Category: Event
Tip O’Neill Diaspora Awards
The Chair was delighted to serve as master of ceremonies for a Life Stories event as part Donegal County Council’s Tip O’Neill Irish Diaspora Awards on 26 September 2019. The event was part of the Life Stories series was hosted by Prof. Paul Moore. Professor Moore interviewed the four award recipients; Pat Doherty, Patrick C. Dunican Jr., Daniel J Hilferty and playwright Frank McGuinness at our Magee Campus.
Summer School 2019
In 2019 INCORE partnered with the University of Massachusetts Summer Institute in Northern Ireland to partner and deliver several sessions on the summer school. The Chair worked directly on this helping plan and arrange sessions in both Derry-Londonderry (13 July) and Belfast (16 July). In Derry-Londonderry sessions on memory and conflict were arranged with the Museum of Free Derry and the Siege Museum, and the trip also involved a city tour (delivered by Dr Adrian Grant). In Belfast students undertook a mural tour, and sessions from INCORE and TJI on tourism and peacebuilding (delivered by Dr Maire Braniff), as well as LGBTQ issues and peace (delivered by Dr Fidelma Ashe).
Visit to Derry-Londonderry
Lectures and Visits in Belfast
UN OHCHR and Reconciliation
On 26 to 28 June 2019, the Chair travelled to Geneva at the invitation of the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UN OHCHR). The Chair was asked to address the concept of reconciliation and how it relates to transitional justice, and human rights. The input took place at the UN in an event entitled “Working Session on Transitional Justice”. The high level meeting included representatives from the UN in a range of their county offices.
Basque Country Engagement
On 7 June 2019, The Chair was invited to a further Social Forum (hosted by Bake Bidea) in the Basque Country. This civil society structure aims to engage the wider society in the peace process and it took place in Biarritz. The Chair gave the keynote address followed by discussion with the wider public focusing on reconciliation and victims issues. The Forum specifically focused on issues in the French Basque Country, as well as reconciliation and victims issues.
Is Ethical Journalism Possible?
The Chair hosted on the Magee Campus Steve Youngblood from The Center for Global Peace Journalism, Park University. The Centre promotes the concepts of peace and peace journalism. A seminar entitled “Is Ethical Journalism Possible?” was held and attended by a number of journalists, students and academics on 28 May 2019. It was interesting to read Steve Youngblood’s blog on the event. He notes:
“Derry, attendees correctly pointed out the many obstacles to peace journalism starting with the name. The word peace, I was told, is loaded with baggage here, much of it negative. One journalist suggested calling PJ socially responsible journalism. I said they could call it bangers and mash if they like and that the principles and concepts are more important than the label. Regarding those principles, journalists at my lectures and workshops seemed to generally agree about their utility. Underscoring this, another participant said that PJ is not that radical and it “nothing different than what we already aspire to.” That’s encouraging”.
The visit of Steve Youngblood was sponsored by the US Embassy-London.
Sexual Abuse and Truth-Telling
On 17 April 2019 the Chair hosted an event on the topic of sexual abuse and institutional responses to sexual violence. A public seminar entitled “Sexual Abuse and Truth-Telling: Institutions Under the Spotlight” was delivered by Dr. Carolyn Stauffer. Stauffer is a consultant and educator in the fields of sexual trauma and domestic violence and has conducted training across three continents. Stauffer served as the co-director of EMU’s Biomedicine program and is currently Associate Professor of Applied Social Sciences in Virginia, USA, teaching on the graduate and undergraduate levels. The seminar outlined the institutional challenges to addressing sexual violence, and engaged the audience in a discussion on the relevance of the topic to local and international contexts.
