The University of California Confronts Violence, Mass Atrocity and Hate: Conversations on Human Rights, Humanity and Peacemaking
Artistic and Literary Freedom and the Destruction of Culture, Education and Heritage in Times of Mass Atrocity
Conference report
February 27-28, 2025
UC Davis Human Rights Studies hosted the second conference in the series: Artistic and Literary Freedom and the Destruction of Culture, Education and Heritage in Times of Mass Atrocity
The silencing of creative voices and the targeted destruction of cultural heritage are central to episodes of mass violence, not simply collateral damage. How can we find ways to resist silencing and ensure the resilience of creative voices? What are the ways in which national and transnational networks of solidarity can be built to support artists, writers and scholars? How can we understand the many dimensions and impacts of the wholescale destruction of cities, which has been called “urbicide” as a strategy of conflict and weaponized against communities targeted for discrimination? What are some of the ways in which culture can be central to processes of repair?
Organized and chaired by Heghar Zeitlian Watenpaugh (UC Davis Art History/Human Rights Studies) and Patricia Morton, (UC Riverside Media and Cultural Studies) the conference brought faculty and graduate students from across the UC-system working at the intersection of culture destruction, mass violence, genocide, film, and literary freedom.
Graduate Student Symposium
Jake Hubert- UCLA
Islamic Heritage in the Republic of Georgia: An assessment Local versus
Administrative Approaches
Alia Kalla- UC Davis
Libraries of Absence: Legal Mechanisms of Cultural Erasure
Marisa Raya - UC Davis
Reparative Geographies of California
Katrina Katzenbach- UC Davis
The Role of Inner Emigration as a Response to Mass Violence
Marc Dadigan - UC Davis
“Tell them Who We Are” - A Winnemem Wintu History of Cultural Resurgence
through Genocide Resistance
Rye Purvis - UC Davis
James Luna's Artifact Piece
Erika Schumacher- Discussant- UC Davis
Adam Zientek - Chair - UC Davis
Film Festival Showing
Cruess Hall 1002
7:00 PM - 9:00 PM
Borderland: The Line Within (2025) which will be followed by a wide-ranging conversation on refugees, migration and the border between Raquel Aldana UC Davis Law and Jeffrey Kahn UC Davis Anthropology
University of California Faculty in Conversation
1:00 PM - 6:00 PM
International Center - 3rd floor conference room
Bianca Hand - UC Davis
Hand carved in Contrast
Fatima Quraishi- UC Riverside
Liquid Landscapes: Heritage and Art in Pakistan's Climate Disaster
Judith Rodenbeck- UC Riverside
Missing Landscape/Palestine
Jeff Sacks- UC Riverside
Pomegranate Colloquy
Ecem Saricayir - UC Santa Cruz
Life in Ani: Future Past of the Heritage Site in Visuals a Century-Apart
Heghnar Watenpaugh- Chair- UC Davis
Talinn Grigor – Disscussan – UC Davis
Patricia Morton- Chair- UC Riverside
