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In Solidarity: Engaging Empire Conference

Featured Speakers

Rebecca Walker (Plenary session 3) - Rebecca Walker is the author of the international bestseller Black, White and Jewish: Autobiography of a Shifting Self (Riverhead Books) and the editor of What Makes a Man: 22 Writers Imagine The Future (Riverhead Books) and To Be Real: Telling the Truth and Changing the Face of Feminism (Anchor/Doubleday), which has been in print for ten years and is required reading in universities throughout America and abroad. Her work has appeared in Harper's, Salon.com, Interview, Vibe, Essence, SPIN, Glamour, and Buddhadharma, and her essays are widely anthologized. She is the recipient of the Alex Award from the American Library Association, and fellowships from Yaddo and the MacDowell Colony.

In 1997 Rebecca co-founded the Third Wave Foundation , the only national, philanthropic organization for women aged 15-30. Since its inception, Third Wave has contributed over $750,000. to individuals and organizations that support young women's health, education and activism. For her leadership, Rebecca has received numerous awards, including the Paz y Justicia Award from Vanguard, and the Women Who Could Be President Award from the League of Women Voters, among others. When she was 25, Time Magazine named Rebecca one of fifty future leaders of America. Rebecca has lectured at over 300 universities including Harvard , Oberlin, MIT, and Stanford, addressed dozens of organizations including the Northwest Women's Law Center, and acted as a consultant to Sony Music, Microsoft and JP Morgan Chase. She has presented work at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, among others, and made appearances at the Harlem Book Fair, The Los Angeles Book Fair, and dozens of renowned bookstores across the country. Rebecca has been interviewed by Terri Gross, Charlie Rose, and been featured on the Oprah Winfrey Show .

Rebecca grew up in New York and San Francisco and graduated with honors from Yale University. She currently hosts a series on new masculinity on Pacifica Radio, and in 1997 made her acting debut in Primary Colors, a Mike Nichols film. She sits on GenderPAC 's Parenting Advisory Council and the advisory board of the environmentalist organization Save the Bay . Rebecca is also currently at work on a second memoir and a third anthology, and divides what time she has left after giving birth to her son Tenzin between New York City and Northern California.

Manuela Aguilar (Universidad Americana, Nicaragua) (Plenary session 2) - Manuela Aguilar is the Dean of the School of Diplomacy and International Relations at Universidad Americana in Managua, Nicaragua, the Director of the School´s Center for Political Studies and she also directs the University´s American Studies Program. She is a member of the international team for QED Consulting, based in New York, in charge of training UN personnel worldwide in the area of alternative conflict transformation and negotiation. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Kansas and her M.A. from the University of Bonn (Germany).

Dr. Aguilar teaches international conflict resolution and negotiation in Nicaragua as well as as a visiting professor in Sweden and has published a book and several articles. Her research interests are located quite broadly within the conflict transformation and peacebuilding area and include topics from reconciliation processes and gender studies to justice and security reform and international organizations and their involvement in conflict resolution. She has taught in the United States, Sweden and Nicaragua, has been invited as a conferences speaker to Canada, Germany, the United States, Sweden, and the Dominican Republic and received several research grants and scholarships.

 

Imam Ibrahim Kazerooni (Abrahamic Initiative) (Plenary session 2) - Ibrahim Kazerooni was born in 1958 in the holy city of Al-Najaf in southern Iraq into a family of theologians. He began his religious studies at an early age and continued them until his life took an unexpected turn. In 1974, he was arrested by Saddam Hussein's regime. He was imprisoned on a number of occasions, one lasting for more than 5 months. During that time, he spent two weeks in the infamous Abu Ghraib prison. He was brutally tortured there, but somehow survived. After being released, Ibrahim resumed his academic life, but had to leave Iraq soon after, to escape being imprisoned again. He traveled through the Middle East in search of a safe place to stay. While in Iran, he completed his theological studies. Fearful of Iraq's secret police, he fled to England and began his secular education. The Iraqi Embassy found him and tried to force him to return, but he refused. The refusal cost a number of his family members their lives.

Ibrahim has traveled to many countries on lecture tours. He currently resides in Denver and works as Imam for the Muslim community. He is a Board member for the Stapleton Interfaith council, the Housing Justice, Interfaith Alliance. He was recently elected the interim director of the Abrahamic Initiative program at St. John Cathedral in Denver. He also serves as a member of the Board of Religious advisers to the Denver Police chief and the University of Denver Bridges to the Future program. He is currently working in the MTS Program at Iliff in preparation for research on Medieval History of Spain (Andalusia period) and in a Masters Program at GSIS (International Relations with emphasis on Middle East Politics).

 

George "Tink" Tinker (Plenary session 1) - George E. (Tink) Tinker is Professor of American Indian Cultures and Religious Traditions at the Ilif School of Theology and earned his Ph.D. at Graduate Theological Union.

"Tink" Tinker teaches courses in American Indian culture, history, and religious traditions; cross-cultural and Third-World theologies; and justice and peace studies. His publications include Missionary Conquest: The Gospel and Native American Genocide.

An ordained Lutheran pastor, Dr. Tinker continues to work in the Indian community as (non-stipendiary) director of Four Winds American Indian Survival Project in Denver. He is past president of the Native American Theological Association and a member of the Ecumenical Association of Third World Theologians. Firmly committed to the ecumenical movement, he has been active in volunteer capacities with several denominations at the national level, the National Council of Churches and the World Council of Churches. He currently serves as an "Honorary Advisor" to IMADR, the International Movement against all Forms of Discrimination and Racism.

Panelists

Simon Deng (Panel 1) - Abducted into slavery at the age of nine, Simon lived as a slave for two years in the north of Sudan before making his escape. Now living in New York, he is a powerful speaker with a strong message, inspiring activists wherever he goes. He recounts government raids on his village, including watching friends shot before his eyes and discovering elders burned alive in their homes. Simon was recently profiled in the Christian Science Monitor and has spoken to student activists at Harvard , Columbia , and Yale. As one student remarked about Deng's recent presentation at NYU , "You could hear a pin drop in the room, it was so quiet. Everyone gave him the attention that he deserved."

Felix Lohitai (Panel 1) - Felix Lohitai Served in Sudan Peoples Liberation Army for more than 9 years. He lived as a refugee in Kenya for 9 years. Recently immigrated – as a refugee - with his family to the United States from Sudan. Felix Lohitai is now a Plowshares Peace Studies student at Manchester College in North Manchester , IN.

 

 

Bernardine Dohrn (The Weather Undergound Panel) - Bernardine Dohrn became part of the Revolutionary Youth Movement , a radical wing of Students for a Democratic Society , in the late 1960s. As one of the leaders of RYM, she publicly announced their break with SDS at a public meeting, creating a new group, which would become the Weathermen. Dohrn was a charismatic lawyer, attractive and well-spoken, becoming the most famous face in The Weather Underground. She remained one of the most flamboyant and popular leaders of the group, becoming well-known as the signatory on the Weather Underground's "Declaration of a State of War", and as one of the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives .

Since the breakup of the Weather Underground, she has become a Clinical Associate Professor of Law at Northwestern University in Chicago, a director and founder of the Children and Family Justice Center , and a founder of the Blum Legal Clinic. She teaches courses in Children and Human Rights, Children in Conflict with the Law, and the comparative law of South Africa, Cuba and Rwanda, and with her law students travels to conduct field research about children's human rights and contemporary legal issues. She also serves on the boards of many other organizations, especially those related to children and/or human rights. Since 2002, she has served as a Visiting Law Faculty at Vrieje University, Amsterdam.

Bill Ayers (The Weather Undergound Panel) - Bill Ayers went underground with several comrades after their co-conspirators' bomb accidentally exploded in 1970, destroying a Greenwich Village townhouse. Ayers, along with Bernardine Dohrn raised two children underground before turning himself in in 1981, when most charges were dropped because of "extreme governmental misconduct" during the long search for the fugitives. Today Ayers is a highly respected educator and community activist. He is a school reform activist, Professor of Education, and Senior University Scholar at the University of Illinois at Chicago where he teaches courses in interpretive research, urban school change, teaching for justice and democracy, youth and modern predicament, and the cultural contexts of teaching. He is also the co-founder of the Annenberg Challenge in Chicago, and the co-chair of the Chicago School Reform Collaborative. A graduate of the Bank Street College of Education and Teachers College, Columbia University, he has written extensively about the importance of creating progressive educational opportunities in urban public schools. Ayers is the author of Fugitive Days, an account of 1960s culture, American radicalism, the WUO and an incendiary chapter in our history.

 

Dan Berger (The Weather Underground) - Dan Berger is a writer, activist, and graduate student in Philadelphia . He was a founding editor of Onward, a radical newspaper that emerged out of the global justice movement, and has been involved in the Colours of Resistance anti-racist network. Berger has also organized around prison issues and in support of U.S. political prisoners. He is the author of "Outlaws of America: The Weather Underground and the Politics of Solidarity" (forthcoming, AK Press, 2006), a book about the politics and practice of the Weather Underground, based on two dozen interviews with former members and supporters. With Chesa Boudin and Kenyon Farrow, he is also the editor of "Letters From Young Activists: Today's Rebels Speak Out" (forthcoming, Nation Books, 2005), a collection of writings from today's movements. Berger is currently a Ph.D. student at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania

 

The Beehive Collective (Concurrent session 6) - Grassroots design collective for social change based in Maine, specializing in educational graphics campaigns, stone mosaic murals, apprenticeship programs. Posters, picture-lectures, tours. Their focus is on politics of globalization. They will conduct a hands on workshop.

 

Sunday Collective Workshop

Betsy Raasch-Gilman - Betsy Raasch-Gilman has a very ecclectic, yet very engaged career path. She has served in different capacities with various organizations such as Black Veterans for America, Global Justice mobilizations, Prairie Island Coalition Against Nuclear Storage, and several others. Among other projects, she co-founded and worked in "Future Now: A Training Collective" of paid social change activist-trainers. Betsy Raasch-Gilman received a Bachelors of Arts degree (with honors) in History and Spanish from Grinnell College, and a Master of Divinity (with honors) from the United Theological Seminary (New Brighton, Minnesota). Betsy is also a graduate of the Training for Change program, in Philadelphia, where she was mentored by George Lakey. She is a training associate of Training for Change since 1996.

Matt Guynn is a social change trainer, writer, and organizer. In his job with On Earth Peace, a church-related peace organization, Matt organizes a national counter-recruitment network and tends a garden of emerging leaders and social action projects. Matt also serves on the staff of Diana's Grove, a leadership development retreat center in the Ozark Mountains of Missouri, and leads training of trainer workshops for activists through Training for Change, a social change training center in Philadelphia. He is a member of the reserve corps of Christian Peacemaker Teams, having previously served as CPT's co-coordinator of training. He holds Masters degrees in Peace Studies (Notre Dame) and Theology (Bethany Theological Seminary). Matt lives in Richmond, Indiana.