A Vertically Integrated Project
Albert Suriñach I Campos, April 2024 J.R.R.Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings”, “The Hobbit”, “The Silmarillion” and his other many tales and poems from his fictional world of Middle-Earth have garnered world-wide acclaim in the 20th and 21th century, cementing him as one of the fathers of modern fantasy. However, despite the many militaristic and … Read more
‘Scotland’s national curriculum, the Curriculum for Excellence (CfE), represented a radical departure from Scotland’s previous prescriptive curriculum. While it has had great success in many areas, it has also been met with staunch criticism (Stobart, 2021). Regarding this criticism, and the increasing importance and relevance of Education for Peace, I believe it is worth considering a review of the Scottish … Read more
Jakub Lewandowski, April 2024 The Visualising Peace Project has previously included a significant focus on peace education, examining the roles of students and teachers in fostering expanded and critical pedagogies of peace in the classroom. Building on this work, this paper aims to examine how narratives and understandings of childhood and youth agency undermine the … Read more
‘The friendly, fun-looking teddy bear in the picture below is relatively innocuous on its own; but the fact that we can pick a Peace Pal off the shelf in the Pentagon gift shop raises broader questions about how we entwine military power and peace.’ Jenny Oberholtzer, Pentagon Peace Pals As team member Jenny Oberholzter observes … Read more
We spend increasing amounts of our time using digital tools, navigating virtual worlds and inhabiting cyber space. Policy-makers and researchers are alert to the threats posed by cyberwarfare; as we discussed in our Peace Debates, social media is frequently harnessed to drive both virtual and real conflict; and AI-enabled technologies are revolutionising conventional military tactics … Read more
Over the course of our project, we have benefited from the generosity of a host of guest lecturers – including feminist scholar, peacebuilding practitioner and storyteller Dr Roxani Krystalli. Together with her colleague Philipp Schultz, Krystalli is leading a research project called ‘A different kind of war story: centering love and care in peace and … Read more
Prominent monuments are backed either through approval or funding by the state and these monuments present a selective historical narrative that marginalizes and facilitates the Sri Lankan government and the perpetrator state. According to Bellentani and Panico’s method of semiotic analysis,[1] considering both the material and cultural contexts, state-backed war memorials are exclusionary and ethno-nationalist on … Read more
The Visualising Peace team has been exploring the relationship between responsible debate and peacebuilding. As part of this a group of students – Tao Yazaki, Zoe Gudino, Finlay Whitton, Anna Pilgrim, Jazmin Smallridge, and Tabitha Stuart – have been running a series of debates using different formats, from competitive to collaborative approaches. We had two aims … Read more
In October 2000, the United Nations Security Council adopted a Landmark Resolution on Women, Peace and Security (UNSCR 1325). UNSCR 1325 was intended to mark a turning point for the representation and inclusion of women in politics and peace-building; but more than twenty years later, its implementation has been limited. Women remain marginalised from many decision-making spaces; they … Read more
Building on work by other team members on the role that NGOs can play in peacebulding, Visualising Peace student Sofia Lobue has done some in-depth research using quantitative methods to explore the relative impact of foreign aid programmes delivered by the US to various recipient countries. You can read her report below.