This article is from the EMU News Archive. Current EMU new is available at www.emu.edu/news

Tenth Summer Peacebuilding Institute Opens

L. to r.: Valerie Helbert, Laura Schildt and Kerry Saner of the United States and Vaweka Djayerombe from the Democratic Republic of Congo lead SPI participants in a "peace song" to conclude the ceremony opening the 2005 Summer Peacebuilding Institute. All four were students in EMU's Conflict Transformation Program in 2004-05.
Photo by Jim Bishop

How often does one modest-sized auditorium in a small Virginia city hold people from Rwanda, Brazil, Italy, Syria, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Guatemala, Bombay, Burundi, Egypt, Nigeria, Israel, Palestine, Pakistan, the Congo, Ethiopia, Iraq, Jordan, Nepal, Australia, Indonesia, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, and the United States?

In all, 35 nations were represented among the 98 participants arriving on May 9 at Eastern Mennonite University, for the tenth annual Summer Peacebuilding Institute gathering that brings such diversity to the Harrisonburg, Va., campus.

SPI learners, from all continents and faith traditions, have experience in peacebuilding work, including human rights and relief. Most are sponsored by home organizations. Living on campus during four sessions spread over six weeks, they will complete workshops such as "Analysis: Understanding Conflict" and "Peacebuilding for Traumatized Societies," while sharing food, music and games as friendships form.

The opening session addressed cross-cultural communication issues with a humorous skit:

"We don’t all have the same sense of time," Huda Abu Arquob remarked after Matt Byrne (according to script) showed up late. He calls professors by first names, while she uses courtesy titles, added Byrne and Abu Arquob – real-life colleagues in EMU’s year-round Conflict Transformation Program.

The pair demonstrated an obviously poor conversation gambit: Byrne, a native of Dublin, Ireland, asked Abu Arquob, who is Palestinian, whether she was "a terrorist"; she retorted the label could just as well fall on him. In a fresh start, they exchanged greetings again. Byrne suggested a less extreme culture clash when he hugged Abu Arquob - a practice they explained is not acceptable everywhere. They encouraged participants to be forgiving as well as sensitive to others’ traditions.

EMU President Loren E. Swartzendruber welcomes participants at the opening celebration session of the 2005 Summer Peacebuilding Institute May 9.
Photo by Jim Bishop

EMU President Loren E. Swartzendruber shared a memory of language confusion when he and wife Pat hosted a Guatemalan student. After the student asked why the couple mentioned a chair while starting out each morning, the Swartzendrubers discovered their daily farewell expression, "See ya," sounded like the Spanish "silla," for chair.

SPI participant Vaweka Djayerombe has been documenting human rights abuses near his home in the northeastern Congo for the nongovernmental organization, Justice Plus. With its focus shifting from violators to conflict resolution, Djayerombe is attending SPI on a Fulbright Scholarship to study methods and theory behind resolving conflicts, taking the workshops, "Strategic Peacebuilding" and "Globalization, Conflict and Peacebuilding."

Merwyn DeMello, a Kenyan of Indian heritage, greets fellow-peacebuilders with the Hindustani blessing, Namaste – "blessings on you." DeMello earned a master’s degree this spring from EMU’s Conflict Transformation Center, where Djayerombe has also been studying.

DeMello has done advocacy and peacebuilding in northwest Tanzania refugee camps for the Jesuit Refugee Service. The refugees – numbering 750,000 at their peak – fled Burundi because of a cyclical conflict which is nearing resolution. Many are returning home.

Meanwhile, DeMello has continued advocacy work within the European Union and U.S. Congress. A lay missionary for Maryknoll, his work has also taken him to Japan and the Middle East and will soon entail a four-month practicum in Zimbabwe.

"I’m hoping to take some of the skills I’ve learned here and contextualize them" – adapt them to the contexts of cultures and communities where they are needed," he said.

Like many who attend SPI, DeMello will be "training trainers" – in his situation, refugees from the camps. He hopes to help them undertake peacebuilding "in their own context."

SPI brings many to the university campus for the first time. SPI Director Pat Hostetter Martin noted that some participants obtained visas and/or funding at the last minute. Numerous other applicants were not so fortunate. The SPI sessions run through June 24.

Chris Edwards is a free-lance writer living in Harrisonburg.

— article by: Chris Edwards; posted May 12, 2005