Political Apologies across Culture Seminar

Invited participant in the ‘Political Apologies across Cultures’ Series hosted by The Political Apologies team from Tilburg University. 13 January 2022.

USIP Special Report on Reconciliation

Invited participation in The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) and the Mary Hoch Center for Reconciliation and Think Peace Learning and Support Hub discussion on a new USIP Special Report on Reconciliation drafted by Dr. Fanie Du Toit and Angelina Mendes. 12 January 2022.

Challenges of Intergenerational Healing after Mass Atrocity

Hamber, Brandon and Palmary, Ingrid (2021). A Dance of Shadows and Fires: Conceptual and Practical Challenges of Intergenerational Healing after Mass Atrocity. Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal, 15 (3), 100-120 [Download]

Challenges of Intergenerational Healing after Mass Atrocity

We have just a new piece published in Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal. 

Hamber, Brandon and Palmary, Ingrid (2021). A Dance of Shadows and Fires: Conceptual and Practical Challenges of Intergenerational Healing after Mass Atrocity. Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal, 15 (3), 100-120 [Download].

Abstract

The legacy of mass atrocity – including colonialism, slavery or specific manifestations such as apartheid – continue long after their demise. Applying a temporal inter-generational lens adds complications. We argue that mass atrocity creates for subsequent generations a deep psychological rupture akin to witnessing past atrocities. This creates a moral liability in the present. Healing is a process dependent on the authenticity (evident in discourse and action) with which we address contemporary problems. A further overriding task is to open social and political space for divergent voices. Acknowledgement of mass atrocity requires more than one-off events or institutional responses (the grand apology, the truth commission). Rather acknowledgement has to become a lived social, cultural and political reality. Without this acknowledgement, healing, either collectively or individually, is stymied. Healing after mass atrocity is as much about political action (addressing inequalities and racism) as an act of re-imaging created through constant and contested re-writing. 

 [Download]