‘Uncategorized’ CategoryPage 3
Community Advocacy and Rhetorical Strategy
Many social justice NGOs and advocacy groups have a mission and a message that we would like to see succeed, but not all of them do. Why is that? What makes some messages fly and others flop? This semester I have been studying a community advocacy group called ISAIAH for the answer. Here I offer […]
Has the ability to empathize declined?
This is from The Chronicle of Higher Education and discusses a recent study that suggests college students today show less empathy than the students of a few decades ago. This sort of testing is always controversial. What do you think of its case? Should empathy be part of education? The link is here.
Hair Hierarchy
For women of color especially in the Black community hair extensions are a controversial issue. One would question why? Well, within the Black community there are so many different hair types and textures. Most women within the black community constantly strive to achieve perfect polished, straight or curly hair. Although, that may seem like an […]
Nobel Peace Prize Laureates (among others) Gather to Discuss and Disagree
The meeting at the Newark Peace Education Summit, which included the Dalai Lama, offers an interesting snapshot of the most prominent personalities in international peace advocacy. The link is here.
Cesar Chavez’s Embattled Legacy
Chavez’s legacy can certainly not be reduced to the present circumstances of the movement he began, but the current infighting between his family members in the organization highlights the difficulty of crafting and maintaining the direction in which a movement will advance after its inspirational founder has passed from the scene. The link is here.
Nonviolence: A Strategy in Itself
We have been discussing non-violent strategies, responses, and options all semester. I think that we are evolving as a country as years pass and as such what used to work for us may no longer do so and vice versa. Some laws that used to be implemented in the cases of women’s or civil rights […]
Outside the classroom
Although we are learning a lot about the theory and methods of large scale nonviolent movements I would like to take a moment to stress the importance of individual change. We have great opportunities for nonviolent action in our personal lives. Not only does Gustavus have wonderful organizations to become involved in but there are […]
Mediating Abortion – A Catch-22?
Growing up in a predominately conservative and Christian family, the abortion debate was never even considered a controversial topic for my family. Simply put, there was no other option to believe – Abortion was wrong. Always. Looking back, I have a hard time deciding whether this stance was brought about by my families strong political […]
Army ROTC on Campus
This week in Peace Studies, our class had the unique opportunity of engaging in dialogue with several fellow students members of the Gustavus chapter of ROTC. Before our discussion, I knew very little about the program aside from the generals: they are always in Lund at the crack of dawn and they become soldiers after […]
Humans not Positions
The abortion debate makes me standoffish. Yes, it’s a controversial topic, but I’ve never liked how it provokes such strong reactions from people—murdering abortion doctors or using illegitimate methods of abortion to get rid of an unwanted baby girl, for example. For those reasons I’ve tried to remain distant from the abortion debate. It has […]