By Jill Yesko, University Relations
Contact: (336) 334-5371
Posted 9-16-08
Ishmael Beah
GREENSBORO, NC – The history and politics of human rights, from ancient times, to the modern-day plight of child soldiers in Africa, will be discussed as part of the 2008 Harriet Elliott Lecture Series.
The annual series, which is free and open to the public, will be held Thursday and Friday, Oct. 30-31.
Ishmael Beah, who was conscripted as child soldier in his war-torn home country of Sierra Leone, will offer the keynote address “Children at War.” The lecture takes place Thursday, Oct. 30, at 7 p.m. in Aycock Auditorium.
The lectures are part of Human Rights Week at UNCG Oct. 27-31. 2008 marks the 60th anniversary of the United Nation’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Beah’s 2007 memoir “A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Solder,” recounts the years he spent as a teenage soldier followed by his long journey toward self-forgiveness and healing.
Beah came to the United States in 1998 and graduated from Oberlin College with a BA in political science. He currently serves as a member of the Human Rights Watch Children’s Rights Division Advisory Committee and has spoken before the United Nations, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Center for Emerging Threats and Opportunities and many other NGO panels on children affected by war.
The series continues on Friday, Oct. 31, with four lectures in the Virginia Dare Room of the Alumni House. A reception and book signing will follow at the conclusion of the lectures.
The lectures are:
• 9 a.m. - “Back to the Future? The 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights” by Dr. Micheline Ishay, author of “A History of Human Rights from Ancient Times to the Era of Globalization.” Ishay is a professor and director of the International Human Rights Program at the University of Denver, the largest interdisciplinary human rights program in the United States.
• 10 a.m. – “Back Together Again: The Challenge of Post-Conflict and Post-Dictatorship Societies” by Dr. Jean-Marie Kamatali. A law professor focusing on international human rights and comparative constitutional law, Kamatali was a member of the human rights community in Rawanda before, during and after that country’s notorious 1994 genocide.
• 11 a.m. - “The U.N. as an Agent of International Human Rights: Problems, Pitfalls and Potential” by Reverend Canon Samir Habiby. Born in Haifa, Habiby became a United States citizen in 1964. A retired Episcopalian priest, he has served as a church liaison on humanitarian affairs with several United States government departments and agencies. Habiby was a military chaplain in Vietnam and received a Purple Heart and two Bronze Star medals.
• 12 p.m. – Dr. Thomas F. Jackson, associate professor of history at UNCG, will conclude the lectures with a look at “Human Rights and the African-American Freedom Struggle.” Jackson’s book “Martin Luther King: From Civil Rights to Human Rights,” earned the prestigious Liberty Legacy Foundation Award for the year’s best book on any aspect of the civil rights struggle since the nation’s founding. He is the recipient of two fellowships from the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities at the University of Virginia. Jackson is currently working on a book titled “Jobs and Freedom: The Black Revolt of 1963 and the Contested Meanings of the March on Washington.”
The 2008 Harriet Elliott Lectures are coordinated by the Department of History, (336) 334-5992, www.uncg.edu/his. Parking is available in the Walker Parking Deck for $1 per hour. Campus maps are available at www.uncg.edu/online_map.
The Elliott Lectures honor Harriet W. Elliott (1884-1947), a pioneer in the women’s rights and suffrage movement who served from 1913-47 at the institution that is now UNCG. The namesake of the Elliott University Center, she was a professor of political science and served as dean of women from 1935 until her death.
