June 4, 2015
Media Contact, Elizabeth Rau, 401-874-2116
WHO: Scholars, activists, human rights workers from throughout the world, including community activist Dave Ragland, who was in Ferguson, Mo., when Michael Brown was shot and killed by a police officer. Ragland, a professor at Bucknell University, has written extensively about the killing and social justice issues involving African-Americans. Other participants include the first female mayor of Afghanistan who is now living in Westerly; a lawyer from Nepal; a Nigerian man who negotiates peace among warring factions in his country; human rights activists from Liberia and Uganda; and an American woman whose mother was murdered by the KKK after participating in the 1965 Voting Rights March from Selma to Montgomery.
WHAT: International Nonviolence Summer Institute hosted by URI’s Center for Nonviolence and Peace Studies.
WHEN: June 1 through12.
WHERE: Multicultural Center, 74 Lower College Road, on URI’s Kingston campus.
CONTACT: For information about covering this event or talking to participants, contact Elizabeth Rau in the URI Department of Marketing and Communications at 401-874-2116 or elizabeth_rau@uri.edu.
Background: The International Nonviolence Summer Institute has grown steadily since it started 14 years ago, attracting leaders who want to learn how to achieve nonviolence, conflict reconciliation and social change. There are two levels of training. In the first level, participants study the nonviolent methods of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. In the second level, participants study how to organize communities to peacefully resolve conflicts. More than 500 people have attended the institute since it began.