HUMAN RIGHTS AT UCONN Examining the most pressing human rights questions and preparing the next generation of human rights leaders.
Human Rights for the Next Generation
On October 1, 1946, the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg delivered its verdict, convicting 19 Nazi leaders of conspiracy, crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity.
Seventy-five years later, as the world faces new challenges to democracy and rule of law, we dedicate The Dodd Center for Human Rights, extending the legacy of Nuremberg for the next generation.
Learn more about the event we hosted on October 15, 2021 featuring Senator Chris Dodd and President Joe Biden.
Evolving Landscapes of Human Rights
Celebrating 20 Years of Interdisciplinarity & Innovation March 29-31, 2023 • Storrs, CT
Human Rights and the Global Assault on Democracy October 25-27, 2023
The Human Rights Summit at The Dodd Center for Human Rights brings together scholars, activists, policymakers, artists, and business leaders from across the world to examine the key human rights challenges of our time and generate new ideas to promote global justice and human dignity.
Through a mix of high-profile lectures, practical workshops, and roundtable discussions, the Human Rights Summit will serve as a critical venue for sharing insights, building relationships, and inspiring action.
Human Rights graduate student Sage Phillips ’22 (CLAS), ’24 MA, speaks with U.S. Treasurer Lynn Malerba ’08 MPA, Chief of the Mohegan Tribe, on the significance of her role as both a tribal leader and senior U.S. official, as well as the values of representation and inspiration.
Kiana Foster-Mauro, an alum of the Neag School of Education and an undergraduate minor in Human Rights, was announced as the 2024 Connecticut Teacher of the Year by Governor Ned Lamont and Education Commissioner Charlene M. Russell-Tucker. Foster-Mauro is a a fourth-grade teacher at Nathan Hale Arts Magnet School in New London, CT.
Rachel Chambers (HRI & the School of Business) and David Birchall write about the potential impacts of a new EU law requiring businesses to reduce human rights abuses and environmental damage in their supply chains.
ES: “El Papel de las Imágenes y Narrativas Indígenas Latinoamericanas en la Sanación de las Heridas Coloniales”
Language:Please note that this discussion will be held in Spanish with simultaneous translation provided to English. Those who would like to listen along in English are encouraged to bring a smartphone and headphones.
Please Register Below
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Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui is a Bolivian sociologist of Aymara and Sephardic descent. Her work focuses on the socio-political history of Bolivia, collective memory, and imagery as a social document. She served as a professor at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés for 35 years until her retirement in 2014. She currently teaches at various universities in Bolivia and abroad. In 2019, she was awarded honorary doctorates from UMSA and the University of San Luis (Argentina). In 1983, she co-founded the Andean Oral History Workshop with Tomás Huanca Laura, alongside students and faculty of the Public University of La Paz. During the challenging times of Bolivian ‘progressivism,’ she organized the Ch’ixi Collective with UMSA faculty and students, with its headquarters (Tambo Ch’ixi in Tembladerani) housing the Free Lecture, where she has directed the Sociology of Image Seminar since 2015.
Rivera Cusicanqui has authored several notable books, including Oprimidos pero no Vencidos: Luchas del Campesinado Aymara y Qhichwa, 1900-1980 [EN: “Oppressed but not Defeated: Peasant Struggles Among the Aymara and Qhechwa in Bolivia, 1900-1980”] (1984, 2003); Los Artesanos Libertarios y la Ética del Trabajo (co-authored with Zulema Lehm, 1988); Las Fronteras de la Coca (2003); Violencias (re)Encubiertas en Bolivia (2010); Mito y Desarrollo. El Giro Colonial del Gobierno del MAS (2015); Un Mundo Ch’ixi es Posible. Ensayos = un Presente en Crisis (2015, 2020); and Sociología de la Imagen (2018, 2023).
She has been a visiting professor at universities spanning Latin America including UNAM, Oaxaca, and Guadalajara (Mexico); FLACSO and Universidad Andina (Ecuador); and São Paulo and Santa Catarina (Brazil). In Europe, she has been invited to teach at universities and art spaces in Tenerife, Lisbon, Paris, and Barcelona. Rivera Cusicanqui has received several awards for her work, including the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Bolivia Strategic Research Program (PIEB, La Paz, 2014); the Culture 21 Award from the United Cities and Local Governments organization (CGLU, Barcelona/Mexico 2016); and the Ester Boserup Award (Copenhagen, 2023).
In the audiovisual field, she has written and directed documentaries and docu-fictions such as Khunuskiw: Recuerdos del Porvenir, Wut Walanti: Lo irreparable, and the series Las Fronteras de la Coca along with the fictional film Sueño en el Cuarto Rojo. She self-identifies as an Anarchist and Birchola.
Francisco Huichaqueo Pérez is an artist from the Indigenous Mapuche community in Chile whose work explores the social landscape, history, culture, and worldview of his people. His films use a variety of approaches to engage with, activate, and preserve Indigenous traditions and foster understanding. Kuifi ül (Ancient Sound) enacts the healing and awakening power of the trutruka, a traditional wind instrument. Trankal Küra presents a dance of resistance on stolen land, while reveries are re-created in Super 8 film and video in Los sueños de la Machi Silvia Kallfüman. Künü documents the commissioning and construction of a Mapuche ceremonial center, memorial, and place for parliament in Loncoche. It demonstrates the diplomatic prowess of the Mapuche leaders, who won consensus amongst disparate Indigenous communities, a forestry company, and the Chilean architects who helped them design the place.
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This event is part of a series held by the Gladstein Visiting Professor of Human Rights. Other events during the residency include:
The Gladstein Visiting Professor is a distinguished scholar with international standing in the study of human rights, who participates in a 10-day visit to the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute at UConn. During that time, they deliver a major public lecture, teach a seminar in their specialty, and consult with the faculty and graduate students of the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute’s research programs.
Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui is a Bolivian sociologist of Aymara and Sephardic descent. Her work focuses on the socio-political history of Bolivia, collective memory, and imagery as a social document. She served as a professor at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés for 35 years until her retirement in 2014. She currently teaches at various universities in Bolivia and abroad. In 2019, she was awarded honorary doctorates from UMSA and the University of San Luis (Argentina). In 1983, she co-founded the Andean Oral History Workshop with Tomás Huanca Laura, alongside students and faculty of the Public University of La Paz. During the challenging times of Bolivian ‘progressivism,’ she organized the Ch’ixi Collective with UMSA faculty and students, with its headquarters (Tambo Ch’ixi in Tembladerani) housing the Free Lecture, where she has directed the Sociology of Image Seminar since 2015.
Rivera Cusicanqui has authored several notable books, including Oprimidos pero no Vencidos: Luchas del Campesinado Aymara y Qhichwa, 1900-1980 [EN: “Oppressed but not Defeated: Peasant Struggles Among the Aymara and Qhechwa in Bolivia, 1900-1980”] (1984, 2003); Los Artesanos Libertarios y la Ética del Trabajo (co-authored with Zulema Lehm, 1988); Las Fronteras de la Coca (2003); Violencias (re)Encubiertas en Bolivia (2010); Mito y Desarrollo. El Giro Colonial del Gobierno del MAS (2015); Un Mundo Ch’ixi es Posible. Ensayos = un Presente en Crisis (2015, 2020); and Sociología de la Imagen (2018, 2023).
She has been a visiting professor at universities spanning Latin America including UNAM, Oaxaca, and Guadalajara (Mexico); FLACSO and Universidad Andina (Ecuador); and São Paulo and Santa Catarina (Brazil). In Europe, she has been invited to teach at universities and art spaces in Tenerife, Lisbon, Paris, and Barcelona. Rivera Cusicanqui has received several awards for her work, including the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Bolivia Strategic Research Program (PIEB, La Paz, 2014); the Culture 21 Award from the United Cities and Local Governments organization (CGLU, Barcelona/Mexico 2016); and the Ester Boserup Award (Copenhagen, 2023).
In the audiovisual field, she has written and directed documentaries and docu-fictions such as Khunuskiw: Recuerdos del Porvenir, Wut Walanti: Lo irreparable, and the series Las Fronteras de la Coca along with the fictional film Sueño en el Cuarto Rojo. She self-identifies as an Anarchist and Birchola.
_____________________
This event is part of a series held by the Gladstein Visiting Professor of Human Rights. Other events during the residency include:
The Gladstein Visiting Professor is a distinguished scholar with international standing in the study of human rights, who participates in a 10-day visit to the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute at UConn. During that time, they deliver a major public lecture, teach a seminar in their specialty, and consult with the faculty and graduate students of the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute’s research programs.
Sama in the Forestis a hybrid documentary set in contemporary Mithila, where a rich cultural identity extends from the mythical past into a globalized present in which pressures on tradition are accelerating. Maithil identity is passed on in part through its renowned painting tradition, as well as through its lesser known wealth of orally transmitted folktales. Women play a central role in both of these expressions. In a creative collaboration with local community members, we highlight the tale of Sama, a young princess who wanders into the forest and befriends a young man, only to be slandered by a muckraking confidante of the king, and subsequently cursed and banished by her father.
The film combines footage of women telling different versions of the tale, the making of elaborate narrative paintings, a dramatization of the story, a yearly festival that celebrates Sama, and in-depth conversations about the morals and meanings of this and other traditional tales. The girls and women at the heart of our film are students and teachers at the Mithila Art Institute, a small school for young aspiring artists. Additional participants — community members of different genders, castes, and generations — help paint a complex picture of the social tensions evident in Mithila today.
About the Producer
Coralynn V. Davis is Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies and Anthropology at Bucknell University. An award-winner teacher, Dr. Davis holds a PhD (1999) in Anthropology at the University of Michigan, where she also earned a Graduate Certificate in Women’s Studies (1994).
She has held Research Associateships at the Five College Women’s Studies Research Center (2005-2006) and at the Harvard Divinity School Women’s Studies in Religion Program (2008-2009). Her ethnographic research with communities in Nepal and India has been supported by three Fulbright Grants (1994-1995; 2003-2004; 2016-2017).
In addition to having published peer-reviewed articles in journals centered in several disciplines, her book Maithil Women’s Tales: Storytelling on the Nepal-India Border was published by University of Illinois Press in 2014. She is the producer of the hybrid documentary film, Sama in the Forest (Dir. Carlos Gómez), which is based on her research. She has also created a public digital archive of Maithil women’s oral tales.
Reception: We welcome you to join us for a catered reception following the event in the Dodd Lounge.
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Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui is a Bolivian sociologist of Aymara and Sephardic descent. Her work focuses on the socio-political history of Bolivia, collective memory, and imagery as a social document. She served as a professor at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés for 35 years until her retirement in 2014. She currently teaches at various universities in Bolivia and abroad. In 2019, she was awarded honorary doctorates from UMSA and the University of San Luis (Argentina). In 1983, she co-founded the Andean Oral History Workshop with Tomás Huanca Laura, alongside students and faculty of the Public University of La Paz. During the challenging times of Bolivian ‘progressivism,’ she organized the Ch’ixi Collective with UMSA faculty and students, with its headquarters (Tambo Ch’ixi in Tembladerani) housing the Free Lecture, where she has directed the Sociology of Image Seminar since 2015.
Rivera Cusicanqui has authored several notable books, including Oprimidos pero no Vencidos: Luchas del Campesinado Aymara y Qhichwa, 1900-1980 [EN: “Oppressed but not Defeated: Peasant Struggles Among the Aymara and Qhechwa in Bolivia, 1900-1980”] (1984, 2003); Los Artesanos Libertarios y la Ética del Trabajo (co-authored with Zulema Lehm, 1988); Las Fronteras de la Coca (2003); Violencias (re)Encubiertas en Bolivia (2010); Mito y Desarrollo. El Giro Colonial del Gobierno del MAS (2015); Un Mundo Ch’ixi es Posible. Ensayos = un Presente en Crisis (2015, 2020); and Sociología de la Imagen (2018, 2023).
She has been a visiting professor at universities spanning Latin America including UNAM, Oaxaca, and Guadalajara (Mexico); FLACSO and Universidad Andina (Ecuador); and São Paulo and Santa Catarina (Brazil). In Europe, she has been invited to teach at universities and art spaces in Tenerife, Lisbon, Paris, and Barcelona. Rivera Cusicanqui has received several awards for her work, including the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Bolivia Strategic Research Program (PIEB, La Paz, 2014); the Culture 21 Award from the United Cities and Local Governments organization (CGLU, Barcelona/Mexico 2016); and the Ester Boserup Award (Copenhagen, 2023).
In the audiovisual field, she has written and directed documentaries and docu-fictions such as Khunuskiw: Recuerdos del Porvenir, Wut Walanti: Lo irreparable, and the series Las Fronteras de la Coca along with the fictional film Sueño en el Cuarto Rojo. She self-identifies as an Anarchist and Birchola.
_____________________
This event is part of a series held by the Gladstein Visiting Professor of Human Rights. Other events during the residency include:
The Gladstein Visiting Professor is a distinguished scholar with international standing in the study of human rights, who participates in a 10-day visit to the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute at UConn. During that time, they deliver a major public lecture, teach a seminar in their specialty, and consult with the faculty and graduate students of the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute’s research programs.
Shunned by the political establishment and the media, this longtime champion of marginalized Americans asked for support from people of color, women, gays, and young people newly empowered to vote at the age of 18. Chisholm’s bid for an equal place on the presidential dais generated strong, even racist opposition. Yet her challenge to the status quo and her message about exercising the right to vote struck many as progressive and positive.
A Double Life unravels the mystery of Stephen Bingham’s past as a civil rights activist/lawyer and political fugitive, including his alleged involvement in a 1971 prison rebellion that left six people dead. In the aftermath of this incident, he spent 13 years living underground in Europe under an assumed identity, finally returning in 1984 to stand trial. The film presents a multi-layered portrait of a turbulent era and the role of one individual seeking justice for others and later for himself.
Trailer
Speakers
Catherine Masud is an award-winning filmmaker and an Assistant Professor-in-Residence in the Department of Digital Media and Design and the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute.
Stephen Bingham, the protagonist of A Double Life, has dedicated his legal career to providing support and advocacy on behalf of the marginalized and disenfranchised.
Luca Falciola is a lecturer in history at Columbia University and the author of Up Against the Law: Radical Lawyers and Social Movements 1960s-1970s.
Are our buildings ethically sourced, as well as sustainably designed? This is the question at the core of Design for Freedom, the movement led by Grace Farms to eliminate forced and child labor from the building materials supply chain. As we confront the climate crisis, we must approach sustainable solutions that address the human suffering endured in the making of building materials, as well as the damage being done to the environment in the process.
This event explores ways in which companies and communities can work together to drive human rights-respecting market transformation and address the challenges and opportunities of ethical decarbonization in the construction sector.
Reception
Following the event, please join us for a catered reception in the Dodd Lounge.
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Our Speakers
Sharon Prince is the CEO and Founder of Grace Farms Foundation. Prince commissioned Pritzker Prize-winning SANAA architects Kazuyo Sejima and Ryue Nishizawa to design Grace Farms, which has become widely known as a global humanitarian and cultural center located in New Canaan, Connecticut.
The Foundation’s interdisciplinary humanitarian mission is to pursue peace through nature, arts, justice, community, faith, and Design for Freedom, a new movement to eliminate forced labor from the building materials supply chain.
Since opening, Grace Farms has garnered numerous prestigious awards for contributions to architecture, environmental sustainability, and social good, including the AIA National 2017 Architecture Honor Award and the Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize.
For her work launching Design for Freedom, Prince was recognized by Fast Company as one of the Most Creative People in Business 2022 for “cleaning up construction” and the AIA NY and Center for Architecture recognized her with the NYC Visionary Award.
Nora Rizzo is the first Ethical Materials Director of Grace Farms Foundation, focusing on the Design for Freedom movement. She serves as Ethical Material Advisor on Design for Freedom Pilot Projects and led the development of the Design for Freedom Toolkit.
She previously spent over a decade as Director of Sustainability for Fusco Corporation and has dedicated more than 15 years to creating change in the built environment through her sustainability and social equity work. She is on the Board of Directors for mindful MATERIALS and the CT Green Building Council.
Anna Dyson is the Hines Professor of Architecture, with an appointment in the School of Environment (YSE) at Yale University. She teaches design, technology, and theory at the School of Architecture. At Yale, Anna has also founded a new research entity titled CEA - Center for Ecosystems in Architecture. CEA is a joint initiative between the Yale Schools of Architecture, Forestry & Environmental Studies to unite researchers across multiple fields to develop transformative systems for the Built Environment. CEA supports Masters and PhD level students as well as professional researchers towards the invention and development of building systems that metabolize energy, water and materials while supporting biodiverse ecosystems. CEA has its central think tank within the heart of Yale University in New Haven. Dyson was previously the Founding Director of CASE, The Center for Architecture, Science and Ecology (CASE) in 2007 which hosts the Graduate Program in Architectural Sciences / Built Ecologies.
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Sponsors
This event is supported by the Business & Human Rights Initiative, Economic & Social Rights Program, and Engineering for Human Rights Initiative at the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute, as well as the Grace Farms Foundation.
Art Heals began in Nepal and will soon release findings from research in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
In 2015, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck Nepal, followed by hundreds of aftershocks that have led to physical destruction, loss, and negative mental health outcomes. Yet, in the days, months, and years following the disaster, numerous forms of community art rose from the rubble, such as urban murals, spoken-word poetry, public dance performances, and sacred art. In this creative project, we explored the relationship between community art and health in post-earthquake Nepal. We utilized photography to capture a range of unique artworks that were created in the aftermath of the earthquakes and conducted in-depth interviews with artists and experts, including art therapists and gallery owners.
About the Speaker
Sara Baumann, an Assistant Professor in Behavioral and Community Health Sciences at the University of Pittsburgh School of Public Health, is a mixed methods global health researcher. She is the Principal Investigator and Director of the Global Women’s Health Research (GLOWHER) collective, and affiliated faculty of the Center for Women’s Health Research and Innovation, Asian Studies Center, and Concept Mapping Institute at Pitt. Her primary research interests encompass three cross-cutting domains: 1) the innovative application of participatory, arts-based, and visual research methodologies; 2) women’s and adolescent reproductive health, and 3) mental health. Her research using arts-based and embodied tools is characterized by a commitment to community-engaged methods, a transformative research paradigm, and is guided by principles of design justice.
Every individual has different ideas when they hear the word Patriotism. It can fill us with a powerful feeling of pride, or a strong sense of civic responsibility. Some might feel suspicious and wary of the concept, seeing it as a way of creating political division. Others might not feel anything at all, thinking it an outdated concept in a modern, globalized society. As the world around us becomes more divided, so too does the idea of patriotism. But what does it mean to be a patriot? Has patriotism really outlived its usefulness? What does patriotism look like today? And can it be used to bring us together?
Join us for an informed and collaborative exploration of these critical and fascinating questions! Encounters programs dive deep into subjects through facilitated, small-group dialogues followed by a question-and-answer style conversation with our UConn faculty and community partners. Resources are provided beforehand to encourage informed and informal dialogue. The aim is to develop a forum for respectful and challenging dialogue, followed by a communal meal and coffee.
Angélica Giménez is a Ph.D. student in Judaic Studies at the University of Connecticut. Her research focuses on the history of Latin American Jewry, particularly in Argentina. She wrote her master’s thesis on Jewish responses to the capture and trial of Adolf Eichmann in Argentina and is currently working on her dissertation project, which explores the role of American Rabbi Marshall Meyer in the fight for human rights during Argentina’s Dirty War. Her interests also encompass the memory of the Holocaust, Israeli history, and Argentine-Jewish literature and popular culture.
Lunch will be served alongside the talk. Please register to attend.
About the Human Rights Graduate Research Forum
The Human Rights Graduate Research Forum provides an opportunity for graduate students in any discipline or school doing human rights-related work to receive feedback from peers and faculty in an informal and supportive environment. These forums occur once per month during the academic year. Each session is split between the student researcher’s presentation and time reserved for questions and feedback.
We welcome graduate students and faculty from any discipline or school to attend. UConn graduate students doing human rights-related work are encouraged to sign up to discuss their work in a future forum.