The Program on Human Rights at CDDRL and the Center for South Asia  are honored to host Basharat Peer, Sugi Ganeshananthan, Tsering Wangmo and Pireeni Sundaralingam for the panel debat on Writing Under Seige. This event is part of the PHR Collaboratory project.

The Program on Human Rights at CDDRL and the Center for South Asia  are honored to host Anand Patwardhan, Gopal Guru and Aishwary Kumar for this special film panel discussion as part of the PHR Collaboratory project.

Although Czechoslovak politicians in exile frequently proclaimed towards the end of the Second World War an ambition for their country to mediate between the U.S.S.R. and the Western powers, their deeds and utterances, imprinted in Soviet, Czech and other archival materials, testify to something else.  With their faith in the West fatally shaken by Munich 1938, which was only amplified by the U.S. failure to liberate Prague in May 1945, they relied on a Soviet security guarantee against any further German aggression and on Stalin's promises of non-interference in internal Czechoslovak affairs. However, numerous concessions to the Soviet wishes and a growing domestic power of the Czechoslovak Communists undermined this cardboard castle that in the atmosphere of the growing East-West confrontation finally collapsed in February 1948.

Co-sponsored by the Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies (CREEES) and the Department of History

Could you ever forgive the people who slaughtered your family? In 1994, hundreds of thousands of Rwandan Hutus were incited to wipe out the countrys Tutsi minority. From the crowded capital to the smallest village, local patrols massacred lifelong friends and family members, most often with machetes and improvised weapons. Announced in 2001, and ending this year, the government put in place the Gacaca Tribunals open-air hearings with citizen-judges meant to try their neighbors and rebuild the nation. As part of this experiment in reconciliation, confessed genocide killers are sent home from prison, while traumatized survivors are asked to forgive them and resume living side-by-side. Filming for close to a decade in a tiny hamlet, award-winning filmmaker Anne Aghion has charted the impact of Gacaca on survivors and perpetrators alike. Through their fear and anger, accusations and defenses, blurry truths, inconsolable sadness, and hope for life renewed, she captures the emotional journey to coexistence. (Synopsis courtesy of iMDb)

Anne Aghion, the film's writer and director, will introduce the film to the audience.  This screening is the opening event of the 2 day conference, "Stanford Interdisciplinary Conference on Conscience" (11/8/12-11/9/12), of which Ms. Aghion will also be the keynote speaker.

Abstract:

Zainah Anwar will speak on the necessity and possibility of reform in the way Islam is understood and used as a source of law and public policy in Muslim contexts. From Sisters in Islam in Malaysia and its ground-breaking work at the national level to Musawah, the global movement for equality and justice, Muslim women activists today are at the forefront in challenging the use of Islam to justify continued discrimination against women and violations of fundamental liberties. They are producing new feminist knowledge, combining Islamic principles, human rights, constitutional guarantees of equality and non-discrimination, and women's lived realities to break the constructed binary between Islam and human rights, and the disconnect between law and reality. They are publicly challenging traditional religious authorities with alternative understandings of Islam in ways that take into consideration changing times and context. Anwar will share the experience of Sisters in Islam and the global movement it initiated, their work and challenges, and the resulting public contestations and  hope for change. 

About the Speaker: 

Zainah Anwar is currently a visiting Social Entrepreneur in Residence at Stanford for fall 2012 through CDDRL’s Program on Social Entrepreneurship. Anwar is a founding member of Sisters in Islam (SIS) and currently the director of Musawah based in Malaysia, the global movement for equality and justice in the Muslim family. She is at the forefront of the women’s movement pushing for an end to the use of Islam to justify discrimination against women. The pioneering work of SIS in understanding Islam from a rights perspective and creating an alternative public voice of Muslim women demanding equality and justice led it to initiate Musawah in 2009. This knowledge-building movement brings together activists and scholars to create new feminist knowledge in Islam to break the binary between Islam and human rights and the disconnect between law and reality.  

Anwar also writes a monthly newspaper column on politics, religion and women’s rights, called Sharing the Nation. She is a former member of the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia. Her book, Islamic Revivalism in Malaysia: Dakwah Among the Students, has become a standard reference in the study of Islam in Malaysia.

Faculty, staff, researchers, and friends welcome - come view the diverse research and educational programs FSI offers

The 2012 FSI Orientation and Open House will take place in the Bechtel Conference Center in Encina Hall from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. Take advantage of this annual opportunity to meet FSI's faculty, staff, and researchers, and explore their diverse educational and research programs.

FSI's centers and programs have prepared informative posters and electronic presentations, capturing the timely and exciting work currently in progress throughout the institute.

Food and beverages will be served. We look forward to welcoming you.