Ohio Wesleyan to Host Illustrated Talk on the History of Genocide
Yale University Professor, Author Ben Kiernan, Ph.D., to Present Free Lecture Feb. 26
Ben Kiernan, Ph.D.
DELAWARE, Ohio – Ben Kiernan, founding director of the Genocide Studies Program at Yale University, will give an illustrated lecture on the history of genocide from its earliest times to present when he speaks Feb. 26 at Ohio Wesleyan University.
The free presentation – Ohio Wesleyan’s biennial Robert Kragalott Lecture on Genocide, Mass Atrocity, and Human Rights – will begin at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 26 in Benes Rooms A and B of the university’s Hamilton-Williams Campus Center, 40 Rowland Ave., Delaware.
Kiernan, Ph.D., also is the A. Whitney Griswold Professor of History and a professor of international and area studies at Yale. He has been deeply involved in the study of genocide and crimes against humanity for more than 30 years, and his writings are credited with transforming people’s understanding of the phenomenon of genocide.
While genocide typically is associated with the violent 20th century, Kiernan shows such killings have a pre- and post-20th century history, a global history that spans the Americas, Asia, Europe, Africa, and Australia.
His most recent book, “Blood and Soil: A World History of Genocide and Extermination from Sparta to Darfur,” was published by Yale University Press to great acclaim. It won the 2008 gold medal for the best work in history, given by the Independent Publishers Association, and the 2009 Sybil Halpern Milton Memorial Book Prize for the best book in Holocaust Studies, given by the German Studies Association.
Kiernan’s scope is past, present, and future: The world, perhaps, can do something about genocide, he suggests, if people can better understand how it happens, including recognition of its early warning signs. Of “Blood and Soil,” a reviewer for the Air Force Research Institute states Kiernan’s book “is more than another work of history – it is a tool for waging peace.”
Ohio Wesleyan’s Kragalott Lecture honors the career, contributions, and memory of Robert Kragalott, Ph.D., a professor in the OWU Department of History from 1964 to 1991. In years when lectures are not held, the endowment supports a student research project supervised by a faculty member in the history department. Learn more about the department at https://www.owu.edu/academics/departments-programs/department-of-history/.
Founded in 1842, Ohio Wesleyan University is one of the nation’s premier liberal arts universities. Located in Delaware, Ohio, the private university offers 86 undergraduate majors and competes in 23 NCAA Division III varsity sports. Ohio Wesleyan combines a challenging, internationally focused curriculum with off-campus learning and leadership opportunities to connect classroom theory with real-world experience. OWU’s 1,750 students represent 46 U.S. states and territories and 43 countries. Ohio Wesleyan is featured in the book “Colleges That Change Lives,” listed on the latest President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll with Distinction, and included in the U.S. News & World Report and Princeton Review “best colleges” lists. Learn more at www.owu.edu.