Events

Reimagining Gender Violence as Torture

Tuesday, April 4, 2023
4:00 pm - 5
:30 pm
Konover Auditorium
The Dodd Center for Human Rights

About This Event

Is gender-based violence (GBV) different in any important way from what is understood as torture?
The participants in this forum, basing their arguments on decades of experience in law, clinical work, activism and scholarship, assert that understanding GBV as torture is essential for furthering public understanding of the true nature of GBV, and importantly, for improving the response and redress measures for victims.

This expert panel is one in a series of public engagements of the 2023 Gladstein Visiting Professor of Human Rights Rashida Manjoo, the former United Nations Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, its causes and consequences. 

Join us!

This event is free and open to the public, we kindly ask that you RSVP.

Please note that this event is in-person only.

Reception

A catered public reception will follow in the Dodd Lounge. All are welcome!

Associated Workshop – April 5 – Violence Against Women and the Normative Gap

For UConn Faculty & Graduate Students

Join Professor Manjoo for an interactive workshop on Violence Against Women and the Normative Gap.

April 5, 2023
1:30 pm - 3:00 pm
The Dodd Center for Human Rights Lounge

Interested in joining us? Please confirm your attendance with David Richards.

About Our Experts

Rashida Manjoo

Rashida Manjoo is Professor Emeritus at the University of Cape Town where she taught for many years in the Department of Public Law and also convened the LLM Human Rights Program. She continues to supervise PhD candidates in the Faculty of Law.

Professor Manjoo has over four decades of experience in social justice and human rights work both in South Africa and abroad. Until July 2015, she held the position of United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, its Causes and Consequences, a post she was appointed to in 2009 by the United Nations Human Rights Council. Her UN work over six years has included monitoring and reporting on States' compliance in responding to and preventing violence against women, its causes, and consequences, both generally and in different country contexts. She has particularly highlighted the interaction of interpersonal, communal, institutional, and structural factors that negatively impact the interdependence and indivisibility of the human rights of women, and the challenges of the normative gap in international law on the issue of violence against women.

Professor Manjoo is the former Parliamentary Commissioner of the Commission on Gender Equality, an institution created by the Constitution of South Africa, with a mandate to oversee the promotion and protection of gender equality and women's rights. She has also been involved in social context training for judges and lawyers, where she has designed both content and methodology.

She has authored several journal articles, book chapters and reports, including the co-edited books Women’s Charters and Declarations: Building another World; The Legal Protection of women from violence - normative gaps in international law; Criminal Justice and Accountability in Africa; and Violence against Women: Law, Policy, and Practice.

Rashida Manjoo is the 2023 Gladstein Visiting Professor of Human Rights at the University of Connecticut Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute.

Carla Ferstman

Carla Ferstman joined Essex Law School in January 2018. She is a barrister and solicitor (British Columbia, 1994). DPhil (Public International Law) (Oxon); LL.M (NYU); LL.B (UBC); BA (Philosophy) (Western). She was Fernand Braudel Fellow (2022) at European University Institute (Florence); visiting professional (2015) at Centre for International Governance and Justice at RegNet, Australian National University (Canberra); and Jennings Randolph Senior Fellow (2012/13) at the United States Institute of Peace (Washington, DC).

Carla is a member since 2018 of the Council of Europe's Expert Council on NGO Law (a specialist body that provides commentary and expertise on the regulation of civil society activities throughout the Council of Europe). She is also on the JRR-UN Women SGBV Justice Experts Roster and on the Advisory Committee of Lawyers for Justice in Libya. She was a judge on the Aban Tribunal, an International ‘People’s Tribunal’ established to investigate atrocities alleged to have taken in place in Iran during the November 2019 protests, which held oral hearings in November 2021 and February 2022 and issued its final judgment in November 2022.

Carla has worked in the human rights field for the bulk of her career to date. After a brief period in private practice in Canada as a criminal defence lawyer, she began working internationally, first for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Rwanda and thereafter, at the International Secretariat of Amnesty International in London. She served as the Executive Legal Advisor of the Commission for Real Property Claims of Refugees and Displaced Persons in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1999-2001), a mass claims body established pursuant to the Dayton Peace Accords to re-establish property rights and assist displaced persons to return home. In 2001, she joined REDRESS, a nongovernmental human rights organization which pursues justice on behalf of victims of torture and related international crimes, first as Legal Director and from 2004 - 2018 as Director. During her tenure, REDRESS won the MacArthur Foundation Award for Creative and Effective Institutions.

In 2022, Carla won the Essex Faculty of Arts and Humanities Supervisor of the Year award.

Felice Gaer

Felice Gaer directs AJC’s Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights. Gaer served as Vice-Chair and Member of the Committee against Torture, treaty monitoring body, between 2000-2019. She was Chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, a federal advisory commission. Gaer was a public member of the U.S. delegation to the Beijing World Conference on Women (1995), the Vienna World Conference on Human Rights (1993), and numerous sessions of the UN Commission on Human Rights. A graduate of Wellesley College, from which she received the Alumnae Achievement Award (1995), Gaer was recently presented the Honorary Member Award of the American Society of International Law and was Regents Professor at UCLA in 2010.  Her most recent publications are “Engendering Torture: the Experience of the Committee against Torture (AJHR),” and “The Committee Against Torture Tackles Violence against Women: A Conceptual and Political Journey (Torture: 30th Anniv. Issue)”

Linda MacDonald & Jeanne Sarson

Linda MacDonald and Jeanne Sarson are feminist human rights activists living in Nova Scotia, Canada. For 30 years they have focused their work on supporting women who detail being victimized by family and non-family-based non-State torturer-traffickers with organized criminal informal networks with like-minded others. As independent researchers and scholars with many published articles, book chapters, and their 2021 book, “Women Unsilenced: Our Refusal To Let Torturer-Traffickers Win,” which shares their developed theory, models, and non-State torture (NST) victimization-traumatization informed care, expanding this work to name the infliction of consequential conditioned suicide-femicide victimizations. Their participatory research represents the voices of women from Canada, the U.S., Mexico, the UK, Western Europe, the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and Papua New Guinea, plus women who identify torture victimizations in prostitution and pornographic exploitations. Since 2004 they have participated in non-governmental organizational panels at the United Nations in New York, Geneva, and in Vienna where they are involved in a Working Group addressing non-State torture (NST) to create global education with the aim to eliminate all forms of non-State torture of women and girls. They develop resources, provide educational presentations and webinars nationally and internationally, including in the UK, the U.S., Spain, Portugal, and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

David Richards

David Richards is an Associate Professor at the University of Connecticut, with appointments in both the Department of Political Science and the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute, where he is Director of Graduate Studies.

David’s body of work on human rights includes more than two-dozen studies of: gender-violence law, the measurement of government respect for human rights including torture, US public support for torture, and the effects of globalization on human rights respect, among others. He has also authored reports for governments and international organizations.

Some current projects include studies of: torture in the time of COVID; sexual violence as torture; school infrastructure as a children’s right; the language of torture in narratives; and best-practices in teaching college students about torture.

David Richards is likely best known as the co-founder/director of the now-archived Cingranelli-Richards (CIRI) Human Rights Data Project. Funded multiple times by the National Science Foundation and World Bank, among others, this project provided information on the level of government respect for 16 human rights in 196 countries from 1981 to 2012. The CIRI Project’s data have been used by international organizations such as the United Nations and World Bank, and in 170 countries by governments, media, activists, businesses, scholars, and students.

David’s book (with Jill Haglund, Univ. of Kentucky) Violence Against Women and the Law (Routledge 2015), examines the strength of laws addressing four types of violence against women–rape, marital rape, domestic violence, and sexual harassment–in 196 countries from 2007 to 2010. Of central importance is the question of why these laws exist in some places and not others, and why they are stronger or weaker in places where they do exist. The book’s original data allow the testing of various hypotheses related to whether international law drives the enactment of domestic legal protections. Also examined are the ways in which these legal protections are related to economic, political, and social institutions, and how transnational society affects the presence and strength of these laws.

If you require an accommodation to participate in this event, please contact humanrights@uconn.edu.

Human Rights Close to Home Youth Summit

January 11, 2023
8:30 AM - 4:00 PM
In Person - UConn Storrs

About the Youth Summit

We're pleased to announce the second annual Human Rights Close to Home Youth Summit! This one-day summit is designed by youth for youth and convenes young activists and allies from around Connecticut to learn and mobilize as a community. It will take place on January 11, 2023 at the University of Connecticut Storrs Campus.

The Youth Summit is part of Human Rights Close to Home (HRCH), which is an innovative three-year pilot program that aims to promote rights-based civic engagement by youth through human rights education.

We are offering Connecticut students an opportunity to participate in the Youth Summit, a major event within the Human Rights Close to Home initiative. This Youth Summit is created and led by the Human Rights Close to Home Youth Advisory team. This is a one-day educational space for young activists and allies from around CT to come together as a community.

In May 2022, we succeeded in gathering students from a diverse range of Connecticut high schools for an engaging day of hands-on workshops and guest speakers. Our goal was to provide powerful learning experiences that would enable and encourage attendees to take action for human rights back in their school communities. 

Throughout the Youth Summit, students and educators will participate in workshops designed by youth and will interact with a wide range of speakers, from fellow youth activists to professional human rights advocates.

At this time, the Youth Summit is open only to Connecticut high school students and teachers. Please direct any questions to the HRCH Youth Advisory Team coordinators Chris Buckley, Sian Charles-Harris, and Jake Skrzypiec.

Students & Teachers – Register Now!

Interested in attending the HRCH Youth Summit? Register here by Monday, December 5, 2022.

If you are an educator and are in need of transportation assistance we are happy to help.
Please contact our Youth Advisory Team Coordinators for assistance: Chris Buckley, Sian Charles-Harris, and Jake Skrzypiec.

Call for Student Proposals

Students who would like to present should visit the Call for Presentation Proposals form and view the  Youth Summit Presentation Proposal Guide.

Students creating demonstration signs & art in a hands-on workshop

Students creating demonstration signs & art in a hands-on workshop

Denise Merrill (Fm. CT Secretary of State), Terra Volpe (CT Against Gun Violence), Leila Affini (Manchester youth leader), speaking on female empowerment panel

Denise Merrill (Fm. CT Secretary of State), Terra Volpe (CT Against Gun Violence), Leila Affini (Manchester youth leader), speaking on female empowerment panel

Students from across Connecticut gathering together for keynote speaker

Students from across Connecticut gathering together for the keynote speaker

HRCH Youth Advisory Team

Lilly Coleman, Manchester High School
Kevin Maysonet, Manchester High School
Quinn Hope, E.O. Smith High School
Lysa-Raye Mccaw, Bloomfield High School
Skylar Mattice, Brookfield High School
Mac Rodriguez, Brookfield High School
Shirin Unvala-Brien McMahon, Center for Global Studies High School

HRCH Youth Advisory Team Coordinators

Chris Buckley, Brookfield High School
Sian Charles-Harris, UCONN Neag School of Education 
Jake Skrzypiec, Manchester High School

Human Rights Close to Home (HRCH) engages educators and youth in the development and implementation of human rights education for civic action. We empower teachers with the knowledge, skills, values, and relationships to become expert human rights and civics educators. We foster youth leadership through experiential learning opportunities that have a direct impact on our youth and their communities. 

Human Rights Close to Home is a program of Dodd Impact, a part of the Human Rights Institute at UConn.

Ordinary Curators at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial

Wednesday, November 30, 2022
4:00 pm - 5:15 pm
The Dodd Center for Human Rights - Room 162
In Person & Online

About This Event:

This talk will draw on a companion article to Christine Sylvester's recent book Curating and Re-Curating the American War in Vietnam and Iraq (Oxford, 2019). Published in the International Relations journal Security Dialogue, “Curating and Re-Curating the American War in Vietnam” (2018) explores the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington as a "museum" site where "ordinary curators" authorize themselves to re-curate the war to put mortality --not state, honor or soldier heroism –at the heart of it. The piece mixes elements of new museum thinking with consideration of object assemblages composed and left at the Memorial, as well as the personal memories Nobel Laureate Orhan Pamuk curates into a museum to lost love in his novel The Museum of Innocence (2008). It challenges a field known for abstract theory to humanize its knowledge base by noticing ordinary civilians re-curating inherited versions of war.

Join us!

This event will take place in-person
in The Dodd Center for Human Rights.

It will likewise be available online
on Zoom. Please register regardless
of the modality you plan to join.

About Christine Sylvester:

Christine Sylvester is sole author of 7 books on International Relations, among them Art/Museums: International Relations Where We Least Expect It (Routledge), Feminist International Relations: An Unfinished Journey (Cambridge) and Producing Women and Progress in Zimbabwe (Heinemann). She has held the Swedish Research Council’s Kerstin Hesselgren Professorship, a Leverhulme fellowship at SOAS University of London, and was an Eminent Scholar of the Feminist Theory and Gender Studies Section of the International Studies Association. She was named one of Fifty Key Thinkers in International Relations (Griffiths, Roach, Solomon), and today’s article was among 20 pieces recognized for pushing academic boundaries of security thinking over the 50-year history of Security Dialogue (M. Murphy, 2020).

The Research Program on Arts & Human Rights explores how the arts can promote the full exercise of human rights and the consolidation of a democratic culture. It is a proud collaboration between the Human Rights Institute and the School of Fine Arts.

Civic Engagement: Our Collective Responsibility to Participate in Democracy

Thursday, December 8, 2022
4:00 pm - 5:30 pm

Konover Auditorium
The Dodd Center for Human Rights 

About This Event:

In a time of unprecedented partisanship and political divisiveness, what role do we all as individuals play in fostering/cultivating a robust democracy with respect for human rights? Join us to consider these and other questions about the central role of civic engagement in the United States today. 

Opening remarks will be delivered by former Senator Chris Dodd. Special guest Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut will be joining us from Washington. Professor and President Emeritus Susan Herbst will serve as moderator.

This discussion is made possible by Travelers.

At Capacity

Thank you for your interest in joining us! We have unfortunately reached the seating capacity for the room. If you would still like to still attend, we will happily accept walk-ins for any remaining available seats when the event begins.

About Christopher J. Dodd:

Christopher J. Dodd represented Connecticut in the United States Congress for 36 years – three terms in the U.S. House of Representatives and five terms in the U.S. Senate. Senator Dodd was a widely respected legislator and a key participant in nearly every major national policy debate over his four decades of public service. He authored or co-authored major legislation in the areas of education, health, financial services, foreign policy, and election reform.

About Chris Murphy:

Chris Murphy, United States Senator for Connecticut, has dedicated his career to public service as an advocate for Connecticut families. Senator Murphy has been a strong voice in the Senate fighting for affordable health care, sensible gun laws and a forward-looking foreign policy. As a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, he has been an outspoken proponent of diplomacy, international human rights and the need for clear-eyed American leadership abroad. Murphy currently serves as the Chairman of the Subcommittee on Near East, South Asia, Central Asia and Counterterrorism.

 

About Susan Herbst:

Susan Herbst is Professor of Political Science and UConn President Emeritus.  She is author of many books and articles about public opinion, media and American democracy.  Her recent book, A Troubled Birth:  The 1930s and American Public Opinion (University of Chicago Press, 2021) explores our sustained struggle to understand the nature and role of popular sentiment in the United States.

If you require an accommodation to participate in this event, please contact humanrights@uconn.edu.

Community Dialogue on Solar Energy & Electro-Mobility: Opportunities & Challenges for a Just Energy Transition in Connecticut

Wednesday, February 1, 2023
12:00 pm - 1
:30 pm
In Person and Online
Heritage Room - Homer Babbidge Library

About This Event:

Clean energy has become one of the key strategies to mitigate and reduce the effects of climate change, reduce oil dependency, improve the quality of our environment, and reduce household expenses on energy. However, the benefits from energy production and distribution have not been equally experienced by all communities. And the negative social and environmental consequences have not been equally shouldered. The clean energy transition may be an opportunity to redress some of those inequalities.

Please join us for an event aimed at fostering dialogue among community representatives, researchers, and policymakers interested in the equity implications of solar energy and electric mobility. Together, we’ll explore the sustainability and human rights challenges and opportunities that the clean energy revolution might bring to these sectors. We’ll focus, in particular, on the situation of historically underserved communities in Connecticut.

Faculty members from the University of Connecticut’s School of Engineering and Human Rights Institute will share their research and all participants will engage in active discussion. In-person and hybrid options for participation are available.

Join us!

This accessible event is free and open to the public, but registration is required.

The event will be hosted in the Heritage Room (Level 4 of the Homer Babbidge Libary), as well as online through Zoom.

About The Engineering For Human Rights Initiative

A collaborative venture between the Human Rights Institute and UConn’s School of Engineering, the Engineering for Human Rights initiative is focused on making human rights an integral component of effective engineering practice. We are teaching tomorrow's engineers risk management, climate resiliency, life-cycle analysis, and impact assessment. Our faculty specialize in research key to advancing human health, environmental sustainability, and industrial competitiveness. Together, we are focused on safeguarding people and nature, while advancing innovation.

If you require an accommodation to participate in this event, please contact humanrights@uconn.edu.

Understanding the Effectiveness of State and Worker-Led Efforts to Combat Forced Labour in Supply Chains

Tuesday, November 1, 2022
12:30 pm - 1:45 pm
Virtual Event

About This Workshop:

The Business and Human Rights Workshop is dedicated to the development and discussion of works-in-progress and other non-published academic research. 

Multi-national corporations’ (MNCs) responsibility for human rights abuse within global supply chains, including forced labour, human trafficking and modern slavery is increasingly recognised in international standards including the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, United Nations Global Compact, and the Sustainable Development Goals. However, there is mounting evidence that voluntary corporate social responsibility (CSR) mechanisms—such as supplier codes of conduct, ethical certification, and social auditing—widely relied upon to uphold human rights in supply chains are failing. In light of these failures, governments and worker organizations are pioneering alternatives, including home state legislation—through which the home states of MNCs introduce top-down requirements for more meaningful changes in corporate behaviour— and new legally binding transnational supply chain agreements called worker-driven social responsibility (WSR) initiatives, which exert bottom-up pressure to change commercial practices. There is considerable optimism that these twin developments are creating a new wave of regulation to address forced labour and overlapping abuses in global supply chains. How can we best study the effectiveness of these mechanisms and their interactions?

 Presenter:

Genevieve LeBaron
School of Public Policy
Simon Fraser University

Discussant:

Rachel Chambers
School of Business
University of Connecticut

This workshop will take place on Zoom and will not be recorded. Please register to attend.

This event is hosted by the Business & Human Rights Initiative, a partnership between Dodd Human Rights Impact, the UConn School of Business, and the Human Rights Institute. It is co-sponsored by the Research Program on Economic & Social Rights in the Human Rights Institute.

From Crisis to Activism: The Human Right to Adequate Food in the 1970s

Wednesday, November 9, 2022
3:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Dodd Center for Human Rights - Room 162

About This Event:

How did the human right to adequate food figure in an intersection of U.S. foreign and domestic politics in the 1970s? This presentation will address the joint history of human rights principles and neoliberal economics in the response of state and non-state actors to global food insecurities. This subject poses questions about the principles and politics that formulated modern concepts of resource distribution and access to the most basic necessities of life.

About The Presenter:

David L Evans is a doctoral candidate in U.S. foreign relations history at the University of Connecticut. His research focuses on the formulation and global politics of economic, social, and cultural human rights, and specifically the human right to adequate food. Prior to pursuing his Ph.D., David earned his B.A. and M.A. degrees at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. Before entering academia, he served eight years in the United States Marine Corps where he deployed to Iraq, Afghanistan, Philippines, and Japan.

Location:

This event will take place in-person in the
Dodd Center for Human Rights, Room 162.

We kindly ask that you register to join us.

 

Presenter:

David L Evans
Department of History
University of Connecticut

The History of Human Rights and Humanitarianism Colloquium is a space for interdisciplinary dialogue on issues that require perspectives and expertise from multiple fields. Contributors represent the fields of history, art history, literature, critical theory, philosophy, political theory, anthropology, sociology, and law.

2022 Malka Penn Award Ceremony

November 1, 2022
5:00 pm - 6:00 pm
In-person with Livestream
Reception to Follow

The Malka Penn Award for Human Rights in Children’s Literature

The Malka Penn Award is given annually to the author of an outstanding children’s book addressing human rights issues or themes such as discrimination, equity, poverty, justice, war, peace, slavery or freedom. Named in honor of author Michele Palmer, who writes under the pseudonym Malka Penn, the award recognizes works of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, memoir, or biography which are written for children from preschool to high school. Within these larger themes, the award committee is particularly eager to recognize stories about individuals – real or fictional, children or adults – who have been affected by social injustices, and who, by confronting them, have made a difference in their lives or the lives of others.

The 2022 Malka Penn Award will be presented to author Wade Hudson on November 1, 2022 in the Dodd Center for Human Rights. Hudson will speak about his career, the inspiration behind his memoir Defiant: Growing Up in the Jim Crow Southand the founding of his and wife Cheryl Hudson's publishing outlet Just Us Books. Following the ceremony will be a reception with light refreshments, copies of the winning book available for purchase, and time reserved for book signings by the author.

About the 2022 Award Recipient – Wade Hudson

Author Wade HudsonWade Hudson, author of Defiant: Growing Up in the Jim Crow South, founded Just Us Books in 1988 with Cheryl Willis Hudson. Wade serves as president and CEO of the company. His career as a writer spans more than three decades and has resulted in more than 25 published books for children and young adults. They include Book of Black Heroes from A to Z, Jamal's Busy Day, Pass It On: African American Poetry for Children, Powerful Words: Two Years of Outstanding Writing by African Americans, the Great Black Heroes series, The Underground Railroad and The Two Tyrones.

Wade serves on a number of community boards and is a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and Pen America. He speaks around the country about issues of inclusion, empowering Black boys to succeed through literacy and other topics. He has received numerous honors for his contributions to children's literature, including the Stephen Crane Literary Award, induction into the International Literary Hall of Fame for Writers of African Descent, the Harlem Book Fair Phyllis Wheatley Award (2007), the Ida B. Wells Institutional Leadership Award (2008) presented by the Center for Black Literature and the Madame C. J. Walker Legacy Award (2012) given by the Zora Neale Hurston-Richard Wright Foundation.  He is co-editor with his wife of the anthologies, We Rise, We Resist, We Raise Our Voices, The Talk, Conversations About Race, Love & Truth and Recognize: An Anthology Honoring and Amplifying Black Life. Kirkus Reviews called his recent coming-of-age memoir, Defiant, Growing up in the Jim Crow South a “powerful testimony from a children’s literature legend.”

Join us!

We kindly ask that you register to attend to join us for the in-person ceremony.

In-person:
Ceremony: 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Dodd Center for Human Rights - Konover Auditorium

Reception to Follow
Dodd Center for Human Rights - Lounge
Refreshments & Book Signing

Online:
Access to the livestream of the ceremony is available here from 5:00 pm November 1, 2022. Livestream