Preventing Mass Atrocities: Lessons Learned from Rwanda

Location

Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice, Theatre

Free

This reception and panel discussion served as the opening event for a photography exhibit produced by University of San Diego's University Galleries and Joan B. Kroc School of Peace Studies.

Watch Panel Video

Panelists:

- Dida Nibagwire, a Rwandan genocide survivor who is now an actress in Rwanda

- Daniel Bekele, Executive Director of the Africa Division of Human Rights Watch

- Philip Lancaster, aide to General Romeo Dallaire in Rwanda during the genocide

- Paige Stoyer, a photographer who has been working in Rwanda with Global Press Institute to train women journalists

- Eugene Gatari, a USD alumnus of the master’s program in peace and justice studies from Rwanda, now a fellow at Harvard’s Kennedy School for Public Policy

Moderated by Dustin Sharp, JD, assistant professor at Kroc School of Peace Studies.

Co-sponsored by USD’s Department of Political Science and International Relations, Center for Christian Spirituality and Center for Community Service Learning.

Rwanda, 1994-2014: Seven Photographers, April 24 - June 6, 2014

RWANDA, 1994 - 2014 brings together more than two dozen works by leading photographers and conceptual artists who were in Rwanda at the time of the genocide or else who have visited the nation since. Powerful images in black and white by Fazal Sheikh and Robert Lyons suggest insights into a broad spectrum of concerns from the 1990s: from representations of human cruelty, to images attesting to individuals’ determination to survive amidst scarcity, to acts of retribution and justice. Alfredo Jaar’s installation Six Seconds deploys a single photograph taken in Rwanda to create a highly impactful experience. Other photographers who have returned to Rwanda in the two decades since 1994 form yet another critical dimension of this project. Large color prints by Paige Stoyer, Michal Safdie, Riccardo Gangale, and Vanessa Vick provide a nuanced view of the changes still taking place in Rwanda. Taken together, the photographic imagery displayed at USD reminds us of the significance of this humanitarian crisis, as well as its painful aftermath, and causes us to ponder the peacetime solutions at work within the region.

Read:

"The shameful legacy of Rwandan genocide" by Dustin Sharp and Derrick Cartwright, UT San Diego

"Rwanda, 20 years later -- in photos and memories" by Peter Rowe, UT San Diego

"Revisiting Rwanda 20 Years Later" by Kristen Darling ‘15, Inside USD

Genocide in Rwanda: 1994, Copley Library- an exhibit of books and media about the genocide—including photographer Michele Zousmer’s recent images of Rwanda and its people. Learn more from the library’s subject guide. The exhibit will continue through June 16, 2014.

Photographs of current day Rwanda by John Rowe exhibited in the Hoehn Print Study Room, Founders 102, though June 6, 2014. For more information on the Hoehn Print Study Room, a University Galleries space, go to www.sandiego.edu/galleries/collections/hoehn-print-study-room/index.php.