The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded the Human Rights Initiative a major grant to conduct a Sawyer Seminar on the theme of "Vulnerability and Resilience: Rethinking Human Rights for the 21st Century." The seminar series began in February 2010 and will run through April 2011. The series consists of nine distinct seminars, each a day long, that are focused on specific themes. The first seminar (2/05) focused on vulnerability and human rights, the second (3/12) focused on resilience and human rights, and the third (4/16) focused on representation and human rights. To read an abbreviated version of our framing document, please consult this text. To read participants' bios, seminar memos, and writing samples, please click here. For access to the site, please email humanrights@international.wisc.edu. In addition to sponsoring the seminar series, the Mellon award funds two graduate students who are conducting advanced research on human rights, as well as a post-doctoral fellow who will be in residence at UW-Madison for the 2010-2011 academic year.
The HRI is sponsoring a new book series on "critical human rights," which began publishing in the 2009-2010 academic year. Interdisciplinary in nature, Critical Human Rights publishes empirically grounded and theoretically innovative work. The series emphasizes research that opens new ways to conceptualize and examine human rights. Books in the Critical Human Rights series transcend simplified accounts of perpetrators and victims, resist triumphalist narratives, emphasize the importance of local perception, incorporate socio-economic rights, and anticipate human rights problems of the future. To view the University of Wisconsin Press website on this series, and read more about upcoming publications by Elke Zuern, Molly Todd and Thierry Cruvellier, click here. Prospective authors interested in submitting manuscripts should direct queries simultaneously to Scott Straus at sstraus@wisc.edu, Steve Stern at sjstern@wisc.edu, and Gwen Walker at gcwalker@uwpress.wisc.edu.
The HRI sponsors a series of programs to cultivate opportunities for students and faculty in the field of human rights. First, the Initiative is working with the International Studies major to offer a human rights certificate and a human rights track within the major. The HRI also hopes to develop a service learning program in human rights for undergraduates through internship programs. Second, the HRI is sponsoring a graduate student working group and symposium to showcase research in progress. Last year the HRI awarded four faculty course development grants which resulted in four new courses on human rights. In the future, the HRI hopes to provide research support to faculty and graduate students.
For the 2009-2010 academic year, the Human Rights Initiative organized an additional seminar series on the human rights implications of climate change. The HRI teamed up with the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies as well as the Land Tenure Center to sponsor the series. Talks covered a range of issues--climate change and conflict, climate change and indigenous rights, and climate change and patterns of health. The series also helped to bring two filmmakers to campus to screen documentaries on human rights and climate change. The series was funded with support from the Division of International Studies and Global Studies.
Since 2007, the Initiative has sponsored a lively speaker series, featuring guests such as former Irish President and United Nations High Commissioner Mary Robinson, historian Micheline Ishay, Virginia Vargas, and others. For a full list of HRI's previous events and speakers, please check our past events page. View President Robinson's lecture and Q&A and Virginia Vargas's lecture. Please sign up to join our mailing list to be notified of upcoming events. |
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