Dr. Elisa von Joeden-Forgey, PhD, is a scholar with expertise in genocide, gender, and the history of colonialism. [1] She is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention. [2]
von Joeden-Forgey holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in History from Columbia University. She earned her Masters of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in History at the University of Pennsylvania. [3]
During trips to Iraq in 2016 and 2017 where they met with survivors of the ISIS genocides, von Joeden-Forgey and her colleague international human rights attorney Irene Victoria Massimino, saw a need for an organization that offered direct assistance for grassroots genocide prevention to communities in crisis. These experiences prompted the two to found the Iraq Project for Genocide Prevention and Accountability in 2017. [4] Eventually, the need to focus on grassroots genocide prevention worldwide prompted the organization to broaden its focus. To reflect this shift in mission, it was renamed as the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention, honoring Raphael Lemkin. [5]
Previously, she served as the endowed chair of the Holocaust & Genocide Studies Department at Keene State College. [6] Before that, she was the Dr. Marsha Raticoff Grossman Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Stockton University where she started the school's Genocide Prevention Certificate Program in 2015. [7]