Genocide Today: The Erasure of Cultures

Catalog description

This course offers an introduction to the global issue of genocide and other mass atrocities, with an in-depth look at two genocides in Asia ongoing since 2017: in China, and in Burma (Myanmar). First, we will study how genocide works: the prerequisites, warning signs, and how it is carried out. We study the creation of the term genocide as a new crime in international law after WWII, in the UN Genocide Convention, and the checkered history of failing to prevent new genocides (incl. in Cambodia, Rwanda, etc.), but also some successes. Then, we focus on the new genocides under way against the Uyghurs in China and against the Rohingya in Burma: background, events, actors involved, the role of media and propaganda, and why Burma expels people while China force-assimilates people in place. (ASIAN-SC)