0Student Perspectives on The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
Thursday, Jan. 30, 2014 • MG 2001 • 7 p.m.
As one of the longest ongoing international conflicts in the world, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has generated much controversy. The Global Issues Colloquium and Students for Middle East Peace bring together a student panel covering various dimensions of the conflict. Six students will share perspectives based on research and personal experiences traveling through the region. Topics include the Separation Wall, U.S. involvement, Israel’s Settlers Movement, U.N. Security Council Resolutions 242 and 348, the Gaza Strip and Iran-Israeli relations. There will be a short Q and A following the presentations.
War: What’s It Good For? Absolutely Something
Michael Rudy, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Truman State UniversityThursday, Feb. 13 • MG 2001 • 7 p.m.
A quantitative database documents over 700 cases of violent force used from 1970-2000. Cases which illustrate the data points about the uses of warfare include the Gulf War, the Cod Wars, the Iran-Iraq war (and the Tanker Wars), US/Libya conflicts, and/or various Cold War ideological conflicts in Africa and Latin America. The research has applications for the more recent Iraq War and Afghanistan conflicts as well.
Culture Against Life: Ayoreo in the Gran Chaco
Lucas Bessire, Documentary Maker, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma
Thursday, March 27 • SUB 3200 • 7 p.m.
In 2004, one of the world’s last bands of hunter-gatherers left the forest in Northern Paraguay, fleeing rancher’s bulldozers. In their new home, they were subjugated by already-acculturated relatives and tormented by a host of moral, social, and physical challenges: deforestation, tradition-seeking anthropologists, soul-collecting missionaries, neoliberal economists, new forms of addiction and madness. To survive, the Ayoreo resisted imposed notions of indigenous culture and instead followed their principles of “becoming-through-negation.” Their effort to find a path between the politics of life and the politics of culture suggests ways to reimagine the political anthropology of indigeneity. Co-sponsored by the History Department and Global Issues.
U.S. foreign drug policy
Sanho Tree, Director of the Drug Policy project, Institute of Policy Studies in Washington, DC.
Thursday, April 3 • Baldwin Hall Little Theater (BH 176) • 7 p.m.
Sanho Tree will talk about how to change U.S. foreign drug policy to end the “War on Drugs” and replace it with policy that promotes health, safety and economic growth.
People, Parks, and Power: The Global Implications of Wildlife Conservation and Development in Southern Africa
Robert Hitchcock, Department of Society and Environment, Truman State University – Global Issues
Thursday, April 24 • MG 2001 • 7 p.m.
Southern African countries have been world leaders in community-based approaches to wildlife conservation and development. Since the 1980s, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia, and South Africa have focused on community-based natural resource management in and around national parks, game reserves. There have been changes in these approaches recently, including removing local people from parks and game reserves, allowing the private sector to dominate tourism, and increasing anti-poaching activities. Data compiled during 35 years of research supports insights about the impact of state policies related to resource access of local people, subsistence and commercial hunting, ecotourism, and human rights of local people. The presentation explores global questions about the ethics of wildlife conservation and development, and about who has the power to determine policies and practices in and around conservation areas.