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The Time of Genocide: How to understand the most extreme form of violence

Class at Faculty of Humanities |
YMH557

Syllabus

* Lecture

1. Introduction: - Structure of the course * Lecture

2. What is genocide? - The real story of Raphael Lemkin - Legal, sociological, and statistical definition * Lecture

3. Why does genocide happen? - What are the main causes of genocide? - Why is genocide the most extreme form of violence? * Lectures

4. How does genocide happen? - Is every case of genocide really unique? - Gregory H. Stanton: The real fighter against genocide * Lecture

5. From German South West Africa to Holocaust - The first genocide of the 20th century: the “incubator” of Holocaust - Different place and time, but same practices * Lecture

6. Invited guest lecture - Students will discuss preprepared topics with the expert specializing in genocidal violence - Guest: Mr. Edin Serezlic: Justice and Security Sector leader. Bosnian war and postwar situation specialist since

1997. (UN personnel, Regional war crimes investigation coordinator, Political Rule of Law adviser) * Lecture

7. Rwanda from a different perspective - Scott Straus: the scientist who finally gave us the answers - Things that need to be explained: Controversies about the Rwandan genocide * Lecture

8. Lesson learned - Have we learned anything from particular cases of genocide? - What have we learned from: Armenia, Cambodia, Srebrenica, and Darfur? * Lecture

9. The camps of death - Concentration and Extermination camps - Nazis were not the first who come up with this idea * Lecture

10. Genocidaires - The architects x executors of genocide - How fast an ordinary man can become a perpetrator of genocide? * Lecture

11. Sexual violence: a tool of genocide - Could sexual violence be considered an act of genocide? - Is sexual violence a common part of genocide? * Lecture

12. Interactive lecture - Students will discuss and analyze the real world ́s “genocide alert” situations - Students will try to propose solutions to these situations, based on the knowledge acquired in this course * Lecture

13. Final discussion and Test

Annotation

The course deals with the social phenomenon of Genocide, particularly genocidal violence. The structure of the course is divided into three interconnected parts.

The first part deals with the phenomenon of genocide itself. The second part provides a deeper understanding of the worst cases of genocidal violence in the 20th century.

The last part focuses on the specific types of violence, which take place during genocide. Lectures are accompanied by two special lessons, one guest lecture and one interactive lecture.

The main aim of this course is to provide a better understanding of genocidal violence at its different forms and introduce different perspectives. In other words, the main goal of the course is to persuade you, that genocide is the most extreme form of violence and when the time of genocide comes, we have to do our best to stop it.