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Educating a New Generation: The Model of the “Genocide and Human Rights University Program”

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Abstract

This paper examines the design and teaching of "Genocide and Human Rights," an innovative, higher education course introduced in 2002 to provide training for a new generation of scholars and teachers. The course was developed and funded by a small non-profit organization, the Zoryan Institute, in Toronto, Canada. One purpose of the course is to teach about the Armenian genocide within a comparative genocide and human rights framework. Another goal is to fill a gap in the curriculum in response to increased student interest and research in genocide and human rights. The course serves as a valuable pedagogical model including its comparative framework, teaching by invited specialists, adjusting the curriculum to reflect student interest and new scholarship, and setting up and maintaining formal and informal scholarly networks. Features of critical pedagogy include classroom dialogue and critique and respect for differences in background and opinion. For example, interactions between students of Turkish and Armenian background provide an opportunity to explore issues of stereotypes, memory, denial and reconciliation. The course provides training for a new generation in research, publications, teaching and advocacy in fields related to genocide and human rights.

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Notes

  1. Data for this paper include: the author’s participation as a teacher and observation of other instructor’s sessions in GHRUP from 2004–2010. Conversations and email correspondence were with teachers, students, and administrators. Of particular importance was data collected from “GHRUP Student Evaluation” questionnaire sent via email to participants in the course during 2002–2010. The author wants to convey appreciation to Beth Apsel and Nora Apsel for their editorial assistance.

    A number of the essays were first presented during the International Conference on the Holocaust and Genocide in Tel Aviv in 1982. The Turkish government put pressure on the Israeli government to exclude the Armenian Genocide from the conference. Hovannisian points out that these papers “were delivered under the heavy shadow of intimidation. Yet, in spite of the pressure to exclude discussion of the Armenian genocide or else cancel the conference, people of good conscience prevailed, refusing to put political considerations above moral and humanitarian imperative.” (p.2).

  2. For example, the two-volume Encyclopedia of Genocide (1999) included both original articles and reproductions of New York Times coverage under the heading “The Armenian Genocide” (pp. 61–104) as well as sections on Denials of Genocide, Adana, and other subjects. The Encyclopedia was the first of its kind and was widely distributed in academic and public libraries throughout North America. An interesting contrast is The Oxford Handbook of Genocide Studies (2010) that includes 31 essays with one analysis of the Armenian genocide by Hilmar Kaiser, “Genocide in the Twilight of the Ottoman Empire.”

  3. The disturbance of lectures and conferences by deniers planted in the audience was a regular phenomenon from the 1970 s on at scholarly conferences where papers were presented on the Armenian genocide. As an eyewitness to such disruptions, I can attest to how disturbing and counter-productive the attacks of denialists can be. My most recent encounter with a denialist took place in spring, 2010 during a session I chaired at the Association of Nationality Studies at Columbia University.

  4. For example, at its meeting in Montreal Canada in June 1997, the International Association of Genocide Scholars unanimously voted to confirm the validity of the Armenian Genocide; the resolution emphasized these events fit the genocide definition in the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.

  5. Besides the enormity of the subject and public interest and representation (from film to museums and centers), there are a number of reasons for this development including: study of the Holocaust was an important early development in the evolution of genocide studies; the politics and funding of education, faculty and student interest in the subject, and resources and funding available, including establishment of endowed chairs and programs in Jewish Studies and Holocaust, etc. For further discussion of Holocaust education and the politics of education see (Apsel 2004).

  6. One notable exception is the two-semester course originally designed and taught by historian Frank Chalk and sociologist Kurt Jonassohn from 1980 entitled the History and Sociology of Genocide. Following Jonassohn’s retirement, Chalk, who heads the Concordia University, Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights (MIGS), continues teaching the year-long course to undergraduates. Mark Levene at Essex University has also taught a year-long course on the history of genocide. See his important two volumes of a planned four-volume work on Genocide and the Modern State (2005).

  7. The initial group included Jirair Libradian (who conceived the idea of an institute and was its director in Cambridge for a number of years) along with the late Garbis Kortian, Nora Nercessian, and Greg Sarkissian. Additional early participants include Varouj Aivazian, Alvart Badalian, Levon Chardoukian, Levon Chorbajian, Salpi Ghazarian, and Khachig Toloyan, among others. For current Board and Committee members see http://wwwzoryaninstitute.org. The administrative center was in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with offices in Los Angeles, Paris, and Toronto. In the early 1990s the Los Angeles and Paris offices closed, and since the late 1990s, the main office is in Toronto.

  8. http://www.zoryaninstitute.org/AboutUs/AboutUs.html; accessed 2/8/2010.

  9. These small institutes focused on genocide studies early on; some were housed in universities and others were independent not-for-profits. They were the vision of one or two people and sustained by the commitment and support of volunteers over the last decades. They represent another example of how a small group of people can have an impact from scholarship to advocacy. All these institutes support recognition of the Armenian genocide. Examples include: Institute for Study of Genocide (Helen Fein, Joyce Apsel, Orlanda Brugnola, Roger Smith, Herb Spirer, and Louise Spirer); Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights at Concordia University (Kurt Jonassohn and Frank Chalk); Institute for Holocaust and Genocide in Jerusalem (Israel Charny, Marc Sherman, Samuel Totten, and Elihu Richter); Australian Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, University of NSW, Sydney, Australia, (Colin Tatz); and Danish Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (Eric Markusen, Martin Mennecke).

  10. Email from gshirinian@zoryaninstitute.org, 2/6/2010.

  11. Ibid. G. Shirinian wrote that he put together the syllabus “based on my reading and understanding of genocide at the time,” and it was changed about 20% by the committee before being approved.

  12. Through contract with the University of Toronto, the course meets on campus for 10 days from Monday through Friday; 6.5 h daily for a total of 65 instruction hours. Most students do not enroll for credit. Students who elect to receive credit submit a research paper of minimum 20 pages as well as fulfill all other course requirements. In 2003, the Zoryan Institute created a separate division, the International Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies (IIGHRS) whose mandate includes overseeing the course.

  13. “Introduction” in Genocide and Human Rights University Program Required Readings, Toronto, Canada, July 30–August 10, 2007, International Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studied (a Division of the Zoryan Institute) and University of Minnesota, p. 2. The statement goes on to point out that given the length of the program not every genocidal event can be studied. However, “the inclusion or exclusion of any particular case or theme does not signify and endorsement of its validity, superiority, or lack thereof.”(Ibid.) For a list of faculty and syllabi for 2002–2010 see http:www.genocidestudies.org/GHRUP.

  14. Besides Lorne Shirinian and Roger Smith (who taught in the course in 2002 and has been director since 2003), faculty from 2002–2010 include: Rouben P. Adalian, Taner Akcam, Joyce Apsel, Yair Auron, Elazar Barkan, Brent Beardsley, Doris Bergen, Gerald Caplan, Frank Chalk Vahakn N. Dadrian, Wendy C. Hamblet, Maureen S. Hiebert, Alex Hinton, Herbert Hirsch, Richard G. Hovannisian, Stephen Feinstein, Hoori Hamboyan, Claudia Koonz, Jacques Kornberg, Eric Markusen, Robert Melson, Louis M. Najarian, Simon Paysalian, William A. Schabas, Gregory Stanton, Ervin Staub, Pamela Steiner, Scott Straus, Khachig Toloyan, and Samuel Totten.

    Eric Markusen taught in the program from 2004–2006; after his death, several former students worked to establish a scholarship in his honor. Stephen C. Feinstein who died in 2008 taught in the program in Toronto in 2004 and Minnesota in 2003 and after. He was Director of the Center for the Holocaust and Genocide Studies since 1999 and Adjunct Professor of History at the University of Minnesota. In 2003, he took a leadership role in creating a partnership between the University of Minnesota and the IIGHRS to run, for credit, the yearly GHRUP course simultaneously in Toronto and Minnesota. The Minnesota program was particularly tailored for high school teachers with a core of instructors from the University of Minnesota including Taner Akcam, Katherine Sikkink, and Eric Weitz.

  15. “GHRUP Student Background Sheet, ” Zoryan Institute, 2009.

  16. GHRUP 2008, student response 27.

  17. Rouben Adalian, Taner Akcam, Vahakn Dadrian, Richard Hovannisian, and Simon Paysalian have taught sections including history and sociology, historic memory, denial, and diaspora.

  18. Email from gshirinian@zoryaninstitute.org, 01/07/2010.

  19. GHRUP 2009, student response 24.

  20. GHRUP 2009, student response 23.

  21. GHRUP 2009, student response 29.

  22. GHRUP 2004, student response 15.

  23. GHRUP 2009, student response 17.

  24. GHRUP 2005, student response, 7.

  25. GHRUP 2004, student response, 13.

  26. GHRUP 2004, student response 6. “I was pleasantly surprised by the depth and the breadth of the course at the time, and my opinion remains. I recommend the class to everyone.” Five years after taking the course, this student writes that she is “in touch with at least five of my fellow GHRUP students” and kept in contact with George Shirinian including meeting him when he was in Los Angeles to discuss professional issues.

  27. GHRUP 2006, student response 14.

  28. GHRUP 2005, student response 19.

  29. GHRUP 2009, student response, 23.

  30. GHRUP, student response, 7. This student entered an interdisciplinary master’s program at the University of Victoria in anthropology, history, indigenous government, forensics, and law. She will focus on missing children from former residential schools in Canada and the identification and analysis of unmarked graves.

  31. GHRUP 2007, student response, 17.

  32. GHRUP, student response, 21.

  33. GHRUP, student response, 23.

  34. GHRUP 2010, student response, 32.

  35. GHRUP 2007, student response, 7.

  36. Ibid.

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    Joyce Apsel

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Apsel, J. Educating a New Generation: The Model of the “Genocide and Human Rights University Program”. Hum Rights Rev 12, 465–486 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-011-0198-7

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