Pain & Torture Through History

Catalog description

A seminar course for first year students designed to introduce college level reading, discussion and writing. The UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment in 1987 unequivocally banned the use of torture. Nevertheless torture still occurs, even in the 130 countries that ratified the agreement.There is a great deal of controversy about what constitutes torture and some claim that it is justified in special situations like the War on Terror.This course will examine the goals and methods of torture through history, as it moved from a focus of inflicting pain to the use of psychological torture and sensory deprivation. We will explore how to study pain in history - does pain exist as an entity; unravel the changing relationships between the state, law, and torture; look at the torturers themselves - who they are, how they learn the techniques, and the effects on them. We will also consider what it says about us when we pursue "enhanced" quasi-torture interrogation techniques.