Middle East Studies

New Perspectives on Guantanamo

Friday, September 12, 2014

8:30 a.m. – 5 p.m.

New Perspectives on Guantánamo: Art, Activism and Advocacy will explore the history of the United States’ use of GTMO in the 1990s to house individuals from Haiti and Cuba who fled political persecution or sought asylum within the U.S, and its post-9/11 use as a prison for suspected terrorists.

Bringing together legal scholars, historians, activists and others knowledgeable about the base during these periods, the conference will include thematic panels on organizing and activism among detainees at the base; the legal context for the use of GTMO’s facilities as a base, a refugee center and a prison; and artistic expression at and about GTMO.

The conference is free and open to the public but registration is required. It is part of “Bringing Guantánamo Home”, a series of events examining Guantánamo and issues relating to its past, present, and future, throughout September, 2014.

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Conference Schedule

8:30 Check-in and light refreshments

9:15-9:30 Opening remarks, Esther Whitfield (Associate Professor, Departments of Comparative Literature and Hispanic Studies, Brown University)

9:30-11:00 Panel 1: Guantánamo and the Law
Marc Redfield (Professor, Departments of Comparative Literature and English, Brown University; moderator), Omar Farah (Staff Attorney, Guantanamo Global Justice Initiative, Center for Constitutional Rights), Albert Shimkus (Associate Professor, Department of National Security Affairs, Naval War College), Naomi Paik (Assistant professor, Asian American Studies at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign)

11:00-11:15 Break

11:15-12:45 Panel 2: Organizing and Activism at the Guantánamo camps
Jenny Lambe (Assistant Professor, Department of History, Brown University; moderator), Captain James Yee (former U.S. Army chaplain), Colonel Stephen Kinder (retired Second Lieutenant, U.S. Army; Commander of the Joint Task Force Guantanamo, September- December 1992), Ninaj Raoul (co-founder and community organizer, Haitian Women for Haitian Refugees)

12:45-2:00 Break (lunch is not provided), Encouraged visit to : "The Way of Strategy", an installation by Fitt Artists in Residence Pedro Frank Gutierrez Torres and Alexander Beaton Galano (Cuba)
LOCATION: Lower Atrium Gallery, Perry and Marty Granoff Center for the Creative Arts [map]

2:00-4:00 Panel 3: Artistic Expression and Guantánamo
Kate Diedrick (Graduate Student, John Nicholas Brown Center for Public Humanities and Cultural Heritage, Brown University; moderator), Carol Rosenberg (Military Affairs Reporter, The Miami Herald), Marc Falkoff (Associate Professor, Northern Illinois University, College of Law), Aurora De Armendi (Artist, Parsons School of Design), Pedro Frank Gutierrez Torres and Alexander Beaton Galano (Fitt Artists in Residence-Cuba).

4:00 Closing Remarks, Anne Valk (Associate Director for Public Humanities, Williams College)