Genocide education

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Genocide education refers to education about patterns and trends in the phenomenon of genocide and/or about the causes, nature and impact of particular instances of genocide. [1]

Contents

Educating about genocide in Rwanda

Recent Rwanda history curricula explicitly stipulate the teaching of the 1994 genocide of the Tutsi, notably through the comparison "of different genocides" with a view to "suggest ways of preventing genocide from happening again in Rwanda and elsewhere". A comparative approach has been adopted, which is clearly reflected in the 2015 Curriculum for Sustainable Development. [1]

The competence-based curriculum framework mentions "genocide studies" as a cross-cutting issue, therefore introducing the study of genocide in a variety of subject areas. It further states that "Rwandan children should know about the genocide perpetrated against the Tutsi alongside the Holocaust and other genocides". [2]

Teaching about the 1994 genocide of the Tutsi in Rwanda, and thereby introducing genocide studies in history textbooks and curricula, has been part of a gradual process to promote national unity and peace. This process included a moratorium on some chapters of Rwandan history in 1995, which ended when considerations pertaining to the 1994 genocide were introduced into the 2008 history curriculum. Recent approaches also built on the acknowledgement of the disastrous effects of pre-genocide Rwandan education, which contributed to discrimination against the Tutsi population and constituted a backdrop for the ideology that led to the genocide. In contrast, introducing the history of the genocide in the education system was a recognition that schools, in addition to non-formal and informal learning environments, are crucial venues to impart knowledge about the genocide and to overcome silence, denial and conflict. These changes also correspond to a deeper reflection on appropriate pedagogies to help learners grapple with the legacy of the genocide. According to Jean-Damascène Gasanabo, director-general of the Research and Documentation Center on Genocide at the National Commission for the Fight against Genocide (CNLG) in Kigali, "This change in the curriculum has been supplemented by a shift to transform learning from one based on standard rote memorization to one that encourages discussion and a spirit of critical thinking and analysis. This approach identi es the student as an active participant in the learning experience, not merely a silent recipient of history as 'evangelical speech'." [1]

Aegis Trust's Sustainable Peace Model/Framework Aegis Trusts Education about the Holocaust.svg
Aegis Trust's Sustainable Peace Model/Framework

The Kigali Genocide Memorial and Aegis Trust, in partnership with other Rwandan organizations such as the Educators' Institute for Human Rights, has developed education programmes and in-service training to help teachers build capacity and acquire historical knowledge to deal with genocides and mass atrocities. Such programmes emphasize "critical thinking, empathy and individual moral responsibility." [3] They explore historical examples, primarily the genocide of the Jewish people and the genocide of the Tutsi, through a "Sustainable Peace Model/Framework" which seeks to link genocide education (looking back) to genocide prevention (looking into the present) to peace-building (looking forward). [1]

Education about the Holocaust

"Genocide education" deals with the phenomenon of genocide, while education about the Holocaust focuses above all on the causes and dynamics of the genocide of the Jewish people and responses to it. However, both fields are increasingly interconnected. Genocide studies – referring to academic research about the broader trends and patterns of genocide and mass atrocities – and genocide education have become more widespread in universities and schools, as genocide and mass atrocities are recurring phenomena in the world. The studies have expanded to examine theories about how and why genocide happens. Education about the particular event of the Holocaust includes considerations about the concept, planning and implementation of that genocide, and can prompt reflections as to how what we learn about the Holocaust can contribute to the prevention of mass atrocities today. [1]

The role of gender

Scholars and educators are increasingly recognizing and exploring gender as a dimension of genocide and other mass atrocities. Educators may wish to consider how gender influences, affects, and manifests itself in genocide, from the strategies of its perpetrators to the experiences of its victims. [1]

Historically, most atrocities have been committed by men. Genocide scholar Adam Jones, however, notes that "when women, along with men, are mobilized, forced, encouraged, allowed to participate in genocide and other atrocious violence, they generally display no more reluctance than (often reluctant) males". Wendy Lower, for example, studied the role of German women during the Third Reich and found that relative to their role in German society and their professional positions, women participated in the perpetration of crimes "as zealous administrators, robbers, tormentors, and murderers". [4] [5] [1]

Gender can shape and dictate both the experiences of victims and the methods perpetrators employ when committing genocide and mass atrocities. Roles often relegated to the female sphere can influence the fates of women. As traditional caregivers, for example, women who provide direct care for children or elderly relatives may inadvertently hinder or eliminate their own ability to survive genocidal violence. At the same time, perpetrators often differently persecute men and women. During the Holocaust, pregnant women and mothers of small children were consistently labeled "incapable of work". Consequently, women often found themselves among the first sent to the gas chambers. [6] Aggressors' intent on a symbolic and physical disruption of group reproduction often target women and girls for sexualized violence, such as mass rape or forced sterilization. Cases also exist in which boys and men have been systematically sexually victimized. Transgressions of gender norms such as homosexuality and transsexuality have also served as grounds for the targeting of both men and women. [1]

See also

Sources

Definition of Free Cultural Works logo notext.svg  This article incorporates text from a free content work. Licensed under CC-BY-SA IGO 3.0( license statement/permission ). Text taken from Education about the Holocaust and preventing genocide , 18, 30, 34-35, 51-52, UNESCO, UNESCO. UNESCO.

Further reading

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Genocide</span> Intentional destruction of a people

Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people in whole or in part. In 1948, the United Nations Genocide Convention defined genocide as any of five "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group". These five acts were: killing members of the group, causing them serious bodily or mental harm, imposing living conditions intended to destroy the group, preventing births, and forcibly transferring children out of the group. Victims are targeted because of their real or perceived membership of a group, not randomly.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rwandan genocide</span> 1994 genocide in Rwanda

The Rwandan genocide occurred between 7 April and 15 July 1994 during the Rwandan Civil War. During this period of around 100 days, members of the Tutsi minority ethnic group, as well as some moderate Hutu and Twa, were killed by armed Hutu militias. The most widely accepted scholarly estimates are around 500,000 to 800,000 Tutsi deaths.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bibliography of the Rwandan genocide</span>

This is a bibliography for primary sources, books and articles on the personal and general accounts, and the accountabilities, of the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Waller</span> American scholar

Dr. James E. Waller is a widely recognized scholar in the field of Holocaust and genocide studies, and the inaugural Cohen Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Keene State College located in Keene, New Hampshire.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Androcide</span> Violence against men

Androcide is a term for the hate crime of systematically killing men, boys, or males in general because of their gender. Not all murders of men are androcides in the same way that not all murders of women are femicides. Androcides typically happen during war or genocide. Typically, men are not targeted because of misandry, or a base hatred of men. Rather, male civilians are targeted during warfare as a way to remove potential combatants, and men are targeted during genocide as a way to destroy the entire community. Perpetrators of androcide are overwhelmingly male.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kigali Genocide Memorial</span> Museum in Kigali, Rwanda

The Kigali Genocide Memorial commemorates the 1994 Rwandan genocide. The remains of over 250,000 people are interred there.

Rwandan genocide denial is the assertion that the Rwandan genocide did not occur, specifically rejection of the scholarly consensus that Rwandan Tutsis were the victims of genocide between 7 April and 15 July 1994. The perpetrators, a small minority of other Hutu, and a fringe of Western writers dispute that reality.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Genocidal rape</span> Mass sexual assault during wartime as part of a genocidal campaign

Genocidal rape, a form of wartime sexual violence, is the action of a group which has carried out acts of mass rape and gang rapes, against its enemy during wartime as part of a genocidal campaign. During the Armenian Genocide, the Greek genocide, the Assyrian genocide, the second Sino-Japanese war, the Holocaust, the Bangladesh Liberation War, the Bosnian War, the Rwandan genocide, the Congolese conflicts, the South Sudanese Civil War, the Yazidi Genocide, Rohingya genocide, and the Uyghur genocide, the mass rapes that had been an integral part of those conflicts brought the concept of genocidal rape to international prominence. Although war rape has been a recurrent feature in conflicts throughout human history, it has usually been looked upon as a by-product of conflict and not an integral part of military policy.

The term international framework of sexual violence refers to the collection of international legal instruments – such as treaties, conventions, protocols, case law, declarations, resolutions and recommendations – developed in the 20th and 21st century to address the problem of sexual violence. The framework seeks to establish and recognise the right all human beings to not experience sexual violence, to prevent sexual violence from being committed wherever possible, to punish perpetrators of sexual violence, and to provide care for victims of sexual violence. The standards set by this framework are intended to be adopted and implemented by governments around the world in order to protect their citizens against sexual violence.

During the Rwandan genocide of 1994, over the course of 100 days, up to half a million women and children were raped, sexually mutilated, or murdered. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) handed down the first conviction for the use of rape as a weapon of war during the civil conflict, and, because the intent of the mass violence against Rwandan women and children was to destroy, in whole or in part, a particular ethnic group, it was the first time that mass rape during wartime was found to be an act of genocidal rape.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Risk factors for genocide</span> Signs of active or impending genocide

The assessment of risk factors for genocide is an upstream mechanism for genocide prevention. The goal is to apply an assessment of risk factors to improve the predictive capability of the international community before the killing begins, and prevent it. There may be many warning signs that a country may be leaning in the direction of a future genocide. If signs are presented, the international community takes notes of them and watches over the countries that have a higher risk. Many different scholars, and international groups, have come up with different factors that they think should be considered while examining whether a nation is at risk or not. One predominant scholar in the field James Waller came up with his own four categories of risk factors: governance, conflict history, economic conditions, and social fragmentation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Genocide prevention</span> Any act or actions that works toward averting future genocides

Prevention of genocide is any action that works toward averting future genocides. Genocides take a lot of planning, resources, and involved parties to carry out, they do not just happen instantaneously. Scholars in the field of genocide studies have identified a set of widely agreed upon risk factors that make a country or social group more at risk of carrying out a genocide, which include a wide range of political and cultural factors that create a context in which genocide is more likely, such as political upheaval or regime change, as well as psychological phenomena that can be manipulated and taken advantage of in large groups of people, like conformity and cognitive dissonance. Genocide prevention depends heavily on the knowledge and surveillance of these risk factors, as well as the identification of early warning signs of genocide beginning to occur.

As of 2018, the African country Rwanda ranks in the top five countries for gender equality according to the Global Gender Gap Report. The idea of fairness that dominates this country arose after the genocide against the Tutsi that occurred in 1994. The government is committed to ensuring equal rights for women and men without prejudice to the principles of gender equality and complementarity in national development. These ideas are exhibited through the roles of Rwanda women in government, the respect for women's education and the role of women in Rwanda healthcare. The country also took an active stance against rape in genocide, created a national action plan after United Nations Resolution 1325, and is pushing towards ending gender-based violence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Post-Conflict Research Center</span>

The Post-Conflict Research Center (PCRC) is a Sarajevo-based non-governmental organization, which aims to nurture an enabling environment for sustainable peace and facilitate the restoration of inter-ethnic relationships in Bosnia-Herzegovina. PCRC's expertise consists of innovative multimedia projects and creative educational curricula that engage youth in fostering long-lasting tolerance, mutual understanding, and social activism in the Western Balkans region. The Center’s overall mission is to build a robust network empowering youth with transferable skills and resources to spread an all-encompassing culture of peace among the many ethnic groups composing the country. PCRC’s overall strategy encompasses six core areas of operation: creative multimedia, preventing genocide, mass atrocities & violent extremism, peace education, transitional justice, post-conflict research and consultancy.

The Holocaust in curricula discusses the ways in which the Holocaust is presented in secondary school level history and social studies curricula worldwide. It is a key component of education about the Holocaust. The status of the Holocaust in curricula varies considerably worldwide. A leading publication on the subject, The International status of education about the Holocaust: a global mapping of textbooks and curricula, reveals four main categories of curricula in respect of the Holocaust: Direct Reference, Partial Reference, Context Only, and No Reference.

The Holocaust is conceptualized and narrated in textbooks worldwide in a variety of approaches to treating temporal and spatial scales, protagonists, interpretative paradigms, narrative techniques, didactic methods and national idiosyncrasies with and within which the Holocaust. There exist convergent trends or internationally shared narrative templates, and divergent trends or narrative idiosyncrasies, which generally establish links between the Holocaust and local events. Textbooks in most countries focus most closely, via photographs and legal documentation, on the perpetrators’ point of view. This is a key component of education about the Holocaust.

Gender inequality in curriculum exposes indications that female and male learners are not treated equally in various types of curriculum. There are two types of curricula: formal and informal. Formal curricula are introduced by a government or an educational institution. Moreover, they are defined as sets of objectives, content, resources and assessment. Informal curricula, also defined as hidden or unofficial, refer to attitudes, values, beliefs, assumptions, behaviours and undeclared agendas underlying the learning process. These are formulated by individuals, families, societies, religions, cultures and traditions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holocaust education</span> Efforts to educate populace on the Holocaust

Holocaust education is efforts, in either formal or informal settings, to teach about the Holocaust. Teaching and Learning about the Holocaust addresses didactics and learning, under the larger umbrella of education about the Holocaust, which also comprises curricula and textbooks studies. The expression "Teaching and Learning about the Holocaust" is used by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Incitement to genocide</span> Crime under international law

Incitement to genocide is a crime under international law which prohibits inciting (encouraging) the commission of genocide. An extreme form of hate speech, incitement to genocide is considered an inchoate offense and is theoretically subject to prosecution even if genocide does not occur, although charges have never been brought in an international court without mass violence having occurred. "Direct and public incitement to commit genocide" was forbidden by the Genocide Convention in 1948. Incitement to genocide is often cloaked in metaphor and euphemism and may take many forms beyond direct advocacy, including dehumanization and accusation in a mirror.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 UNESCO (2017). Education about the Holocaust and preventing genocide (PDF). Paris, UNESCO. pp. 18, 30, 34–35, 51–52. ISBN   978-92-3-100221-2.
  2. Rwanda Education Board. 2015. Competence based curriculum: Curriculum framework pre-primary to upper secondary. Ministry of Education, Republic of Rwanda. http://www.tcop.rw/ le/2041/download?token=T398Bm6a
  3. Gasanabo, J.D., Mutanguha, F. and Mpayimana, A.. 2016. Teaching about the Holocaust and Genocide in Rwanda. Contemporary Review of the Middle East. Special Issue: Holocaust Education, Volume 3, Issue 3, pp. 329-345. http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/2347798916654583
  4. Jones, A. 2017. Genocide: A Comprehensive Introduction, 3rd edition, Routledge.
  5. Lower, W. 2013. Hitler's Furies: German Women in the Nazi Killing Fields, Houghton Mi in Harcourt.
  6. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, "Women during the Holocaust," https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005176