Platform Speakers
The following key speakers have confirmed their attendance, and we are awaiting responses from others.
Platform 'Being at War', 19th July
Joanna Bourke
Joanna Bourke is Professor of History at Birkbeck College, University of London. She has published seven books, on Irish history, gender and the body, the history of psychological thought, modern warfare, and the emotions. Her books have been translated into nine languages. An Intimate History of Killing: Face- to-Face Killing in Twentieth Century Warfare (Granta) won the Fraenkel Prize in Contemporary History for 1998 and the Wolfson History Prize for 2000. Her book entitled Fear: A Cultural History was published by Virago in 2005. Her history of rapists in C19-20 will be published by Virago in October 2007.
- Professor Joanna Bourke, Birkbeck
- Article: Sex, lies and stereotypes, April 2006
- Interview by Michael O'Connor, May 2005
- Guardian Article: Torture as pornography, May 2004
Abdel-Rahman Ghandour
Abdel-Rahman Ghandour is political advisor to the UN Special Representitive for the Great Lakes region.
An expert on Islamic NGOs, he has worked for the Lebanese and International Red Cross and was for seven years MSF's head of mission in the Middle East.
- Publication: Jihad humanitaire: enquête sur les ONG islamiques, (Flammarion, Paris, 2002)
- Publication: ' The Modern Missionaries of Islam', In the Shadow of Just Wars: Violence, Politics, and Humanitarian Action, Fabrice Weissman ed., (Cornell University Press: Ithaca NY, 2004), pp. 325-340
- Article: Humanitarianism, Islam and the West: contest or cooperation?, Humanitarian Practice Network
- Address: 2nd Ministerial meeting of the Nairobi Secretariat on Small Arms in the Great Lakes region and the Horn of Africa Nairobi, 21 April 2004
Anatol Lieven
British journalist, writer and historian, currently Senior Research Fellow for the New America Foundation, Anatol Lieven was a former senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Lieven has written for a number of newspapers and journals in the UK and the USA, previously covering Central Europe for The Financial Times; Pakistan, Afghanistan, the former Soviet Union and Russia (including the Chechen War, 1994-96) for The Times (London); and India as a freelance journalist. He was also an editor at the International Institute for Strategic studies in London, where he worked for the Eastern Services of the BBC.
Anatol Lieven is the author of numerous books on foreign policy, including The Baltic Revolution: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and the Path to Independence (1993), which won the George Orwell Prize for Political Writing and the Yale University Press Governors' Award. His latest book is America Right or Wrong: An Anatomy of American Nationalism (2004). Mr. Lieven has a BA in history and a PhD in political science from Jesus College Cambridge.
- Senior Research Fellow, New America Foundation
- Publication: America Right or Wrong, 2004
- Conversation: 'American Nationalism', 2004
- Interview, Asia Source, 2004
Chair: Anna Ford
Broadcaster and journalist Anna Ford was independent television's first female newsreader, having graduated from the Victoria University of Manchester with a degree in economics. She was the first woman President of the Students' Union and later helped to set up the International Society to cater for the welfare and social needs of international students at Manchester's three universities. In 2001, she was the first woman to be elected Chancellor in the University of Manchester's history.
Anna Ford is a familiar and well respected voice and face on radio and television, and presented the BBC One O'Clock News until she retired in April 2006 to "pursue other interests while she still has the interest and energy".
- Alumni, University of Manchester: Anna Ford
- Wikipedia: Anna Ford
- Museum of Broadcast Communications: Anna Ford
Platform 'Aftermaths of War', 21st July
Urvashi Butalia
Urvashi Butalia is a writer, publisher, feminist and historian, and co-founder of Kali for Women, India's first publishing house set up in 1984 to increase the body of knowledge on women in the Third World, now split into two independent imprints, with Butalia launching Zubaan. A dedicated women's and civil rights activist, she writes on issues relating to women, the media, communications and communalism.
Urvashi has edited and authored many books including The Other Side of Silence: Voices from the Partition of India, the critically-acclaimed and path-breaking chronicle of the untold stories of Partition, which has been translated into several languages including Chinese and Japanese and has won international recognition, particularly amongst scholars in anthopology, South Asian literature, and Women's Studies. Her main interests are gender and history, particularly oral histories, and she has published various articles and essays in local and international journals (e.g. Media, Culture and Society, New Internationalist, Oxford Literary Review, Economic and Political Weekly, and Indian Journal of Gender Studies).
A Reader in the Delhi University teaching Book Publishing, she has served on the board of national and international organizations including Panos (London and South Asia) and Aman Trust.
- Arena Council of Fellows (2003-2006): Urvashi Butalia
- Article: 'It's a man's war', The Little Magazine, 2000
- Amardeep Singh, 'Partition Violence, 1984, and Public Memorialization', response to presentation, 2004
- Jury Member: Lettre Ulysses Award for the Art of Reportage, July 2006
- Article: 'Kali for Women: moving on', The Hindu, 2003
Rony Brauman
Rony Brauman was the president of the French humanitarian organization Médecins Sans Frontières from 1982 to 1994, having joined as a volunteer in 1978. During his presidency, and in numerous essays that he has published since, he elaborated a doctrine of humanitarian action that outlines the both the promise and limits of humanitarianism and unravels its inherent dilemmas.
Rony Brauman was the co-author, together with Eyal Sivan, of the documentary film 'The Specialist' on the Eichmann trial. In recent years, he has become a prominent protagonist of the Palestinian cause and takes an important part in the public debate on Zionism and anti-Semitism in France. Rony Brauman moved on to become a researcher at the Médecins Sans Frontières Foundation, and taught at the Institut d'études politiques in Paris. In 1997 he received the Prix Henry Dunant.
His publications include:
- Humanitaire: le dilemme (1996, and 2002 for the new edition)
- Les médias et l'humanitaire (1996, together with René Backmann)
- Utopies Sanitaires (2000, editor)
- Eloge de la désobéissance (together with Eyal Sivan, 2001)
- L'action humanitaire (2002)
- Research Seminar: "Humanitarian Action in States of Occupation: The Occupied Palestinian Territories in a Global Perspective", November 2005
- Article: Iraq: in Search of a "Humanitarian Crisis", with Pierre Salignon, 2004
- Interview: Carnegie Council: Politics and Humanitarianism, 2004
Chair: Admiral Sir John Kerr
Manchester born Sir John Kerr has had a distinguished naval career, which culminated in his appointment as Commander-in-Chief Naval Home Command and member of the Admiralty Board. Sir John became involved with the Higher Education sector on retiring from the Royal Navy in 1994 and served on the Council (governing body) and Court of Lancaster and then the Victoria University of Manchester between 1994 and 2004, as well as being a member of the Court of UMIST from 2000-2004. He was part of the small group that oversaw the merger of the Victoria University with UMIST and became the Pro-Chancellor of the current University of Manchester from its inauguration in 2004. He was also a member of the national Independent Review of Higher Education Pay and Conditions in 1999, including chairing its Scottish sub-committee.
Sir John has been involved with a range of other activities since 1994 including being a Commissioner of the (national) Museums and Galleries Commission, chair of the Manchester Museum, and a Commissioner and Vice-Chairman of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.'
- HMS Victory Commanders
- Patron: Second World War Experience Centre and various naval organisations
- 'Speaker: at various universities and other organisations primarily on Naval history related topics