SPI 2024

Gloria Rhodes and Joe Cole

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Analysis focuses on understanding the factors that cause conflict and violence and those that support peacebuilding. Good conflict analysis skills are a central component of designing effective strategies for transforming conflict and building peace.

Course participants will use lenses including identity (gender, religion, nationality, etc.), human needs, narratives, power, culture, worldview, and others to understand conflict and propose possibilities for change.  Case studies of conflicts at multiple levels will provide content and an opportunity to practice analysis skills individually and in small groups. Participants will become more aware of their own roles and biases in conflicts through self-analysis and will develop their ability to “see” and describe conflict from different perspectives. The class will also focus on research strategies for gathering and organizing data and developing theories of change as an intermediate step from analysis to designing effective social change.

Syllabus

Ram Bhagat and Lisa Collins

During STAR Level II participants are invited to:

• Share STAR experiences from your context with each other.

• Review the core concepts of STAR and the 3-part STAR snail model, using Village STAR, a practical and simply illustrated manual.

• Practice exercises and skills that promote healing and build resilience.

• Plan and receive feedback on how you will engage STAR concepts and tools.

• Reflect on your own position, power, and challenges as a STAR practitioner.

• Envision and understand how to shape structural and organizational change toward trauma-informed, resilient organizations and communities.

The Level II training includes additional content, exercises, and skills for addressing trauma and building resilience to deepen the experiences from STAR I. Participants will create and present action plans about how they will adapt and apply STAR concepts and pedagogy within their work and life contexts. Upon completing STAR II, participants are invited to join the STAR online learning community, a group of STAR Practitioners working in a variety of contexts, sharing their questions, learnings, and experiences.

Participants must have applied STAR concepts personally or professionally since completion of STAR Level I training (normally for a period of about 3-6 months).

Syllabus

Benjamin Bergey

In this course, we will examine various aspects of the potential application of music in peacebuilding activities. There is significant research showing the benefits of using the arts, and particularly music, in disciplines such as peacebuilding, conflict transformation, healing, and others. Furthermore, the cross-disciplinary synergy of music and peacebuilding, alongside music therapy, ethnomusicology, neuroaesthetics, neuroscience, empathy, diplomacy, protest, community engagement, and social justice to name a few, is significant and growing.

There are vast numbers of organizations actively promoting social justice and various issues in peacebuilding through music, and we will learn how to find and evaluate efficacy throug various frameworks. Through this process students will also define their project topics for this course.

We will also engage with various theories to avoid conceptual pitfalls and allow students to catch up with current developments, including ambivalence of music, musicking as action, controversies regarding the universality of music, how to make the extraordinary ordinary through repetition, and the inescapable interference of power relations in musical activities, all the way from the neuroscience of music individually to decolonial thinking and practice.

The course will also spend significant time reading and discussing articles by active researchers in the field. Introductions to training from Musicians without Borders and Deep Listening will supplement the practical learning, with each student having the opportunity to practice musical facilitation in class.

Syllabus

Lori Pyle
Dr. Amanda Blake talks about leadership as “a process of connecting to what matters,
envisioning what could be, and taking action to bring that vision to life.” (pg. 5, Your Body is Your Brain). What is required of us to be transformational leaders, to work with others to bring about a substantial change for the common good? This kind of transformational leadership requires a dual focus on developing ourselves as fully flourishing and present individuals while also leading creative and intentional organizational and social change. In this course, we will explore emergent strategy, somatic (body) intelligence, and the Appreciative Inquiry approach to organizational change through a mix of reading, experiential learning, writing, reflection, and practice. We will study and observe the interconnectedness of many forms of intelligence(nature, brain, body, and emotional) that expand the possibilities of where and how change can be imagined and created.

Syllabus

Gloria Rhodes

As individuals working for peace, social justice, and the reduction of violence, we are the instrument of the work. Therefore, we need to cultivate our ability to engage conflict and injustice with wisdom, compassion, and clarity.

Participants will strengthen their abilities to understand and manage self and to attend to self-care, to listen and communicate, create and maintain healthy boundaries, recognize and promote diversity, lead from their vision and values, and engage people in dialogue and decision-making. The course will survey leadership roles, key skills, systematic processes, and varied contexts within the broad field of peacebuilding and conflict resolution/transformation. Contemporary strategies for structuring conversations and decision-making, including arts-based approaches, will be explored along with traditional processes of negotiation, mediation, and facilitation.  

Course participants will gain a holistic understanding of self as person, practitioner, and leader, with emphasis on the importance of intellectual, emotional, physical, and spiritual well-being and growth.

 Syllabus

Paula Facci

This course will focus on social and global processes of transformation by exploring global challenges, local experiences and struggles, and transnational solidarities that emerge in response to those challenges. It will be concerned with institutions, relations of power, and the relationship between power and the production of justice and peacebuilding theories and practices. It will pick up where the core courses Formation for Peacebuilding Practice and Analysis: Understanding Conflict left off, aiming to add to students’ comprehensive overview of justice and peacebuilding practice and its multi-disciplinary, multi-level aspects. 

Whereas Formation for Peacebuilding Practice and Analysis: Understanding Conflict centered on personal, interpersonal and communitarian transformation analysis, theory and practice, this course will equip students to further develop their knowledge and skills for dealing with conflict and situations of injustice and building sustainable peace. Particular focus will be given to social, state, and political change with increased sensitivity to race, gender, ecology, and other political economy traditions. Particular attention will be given to the colonial legacies and decolonial possibilities in justice and peacebuilding, exploring decoloniality as both an epistemic and a political project.

Action and struggle for justice and peacebuilding are always found in peoples’ local, place-based experiences, but to gain understanding in order to effect change, we have to explore their global features. To do this we will examine the intersections and overlaps among the local and the global, including the transnational solidarities that connect local struggles around the world. Students will become familiar with theories and frameworks that help explain the causes and dynamics of larger-scale conflicts, injustice, and structural violence. Students will work individually and in small groups to apply these ideas and skills to cases that progress in complexity from the community to the national and global levels (and back again). Students will also continue to develop their self-awareness as well as their capacity for professional judgment and reflective practice with attention to vocation, values, ethics, faith and spirituality. 

This course is required for all MACT and MARJ students. (taken from the PAX 635 syllabus)

Syllabus

Hizkias Assefa

This course will explore the concepts of forgiveness and reconciliation from different philosophical, cultural, spiritual and social science perspectives. Through cases and simulations, participants will learn how these approaches have been and can be used for generating durable solutions and healing in interpersonal conflicts as well as in large-scale political, economic, ethnic, religious and ecological conflicts at the intrastate and the interstate (international) levels.

Syllabus

Tammy Krause

This course combines a critical examination of various restorative justice frameworks and direct dialogue with practitioners on how the principles of restorative justice can be applied in actual circumstances. We will also meet and learn from both parties who have participated in restorative justice practices. Immersing ourselves in the principles and ethos of RJ, this course presents the fundamental teachings of restorative justice to then consider how the practice is applied in various contexts. We begin with the origins of restorative justice, which were adapted from indigenous societies to both learn from indigenous wisdom and from current practices. With a better understanding of how current practices developed, we turn our focus on the U.S. criminal legal system and the problems posed by its dominant responses to harm and violence. We examine how restorative justice presents a contrasting philosophy of justice that addresses the needs of multiple stakeholders and challenges interpersonal and structural forms of harm. The class will also explore applications of restorative justice in multiple fields and movements including racial justice, trauma healing, education, youth development, and transitional justice.

Syllabus

Katie Mansfield and Crixell Shell

Traumatic events impact how individuals and groups think, feel, and behave as well as how societies are organized. Unhealed trauma often leads to violence and violence causes more violence as victims act out against others or become self-destructive. Created to help those who work with individuals, groups, or communities suffering from current or historic trauma, the STAR training presents – in both theory and practice – an integrated approach to understanding the trauma, conflict, and violence caused by nature, human beings, and/or structural systems.

STAR is for those who want to bring a trauma-informed perspective to their work. The course brings together learnings from neurobiology, conflict transformation, human security, spirituality, and restorative justice to:

• Increase awareness of the impact of trauma on the body/brain, beliefs, and behavior of individuals, communities, and societies;
• Offer tools and processes for addressing trauma and breaking cycles of violence;
• Explore ways of building individual and collective resilience, including self-care strategies.
• Discuss meta-level trauma awareness as well as personal/societal situations that have caused trauma and how to move forward.

Syllabus

Kay Pranis

Understanding and Using the Peacemaking Circle Process will be an in-depth exploration of thephilosophy, structure and applications of this process, exploring the potential of Circles to helpus transcend the isolation, demonization and polarization that is a source of pain and violencein the world.

The Peacemaking Circle is a dynamic group process that works to provide equal voice to everyparticipant and access collective wisdom by uncovering shared ground that can hold individualuniqueness and difference. Peacemaking Circles are used for community building, individualand group healing, conflict resolution and collective decision making.T

his course will explore the foundational principles of Circles drawing from indigenousteachings and modern use of this ancient process, examine the structural elements thatsupport manifestation of the core principles and describe applications of the Circle process in awide variety of settings. Participants will learn to plan and facilitate Circles.T

he course will be conducted primarily in Circle, using the experience of participants as a majorsource of knowledge. The course will also include small group work, group discussion andlecture. Special attention will be given to the role of the facilitator and the key skills of facilitation.

In light of intense polarization among citizens around numerous topics, both in the US andaround the globe, this course will work on designing circle processes to create spaces wheredramatically different perspectives are shared with respect and thoughtfulness. This course isappropriate for both experienced practitioners and those new to the process.

Syllabus

David Evans and Jonathan McRay

Antiracism shapes social movements and corporate marketing. It permeates the front pages of newspapers and back covers of best-selling books. It also foments the reactions of school book-bans, governmental censures, and right-wing political rallies. Who defines what antiracism means? Who benefits from the popularity of antiracism activity? What world, or worlds, are antiracist educators and organizers imagining and building?

We aim to unsettle the status quo conversations that have captured the liberatory vision of antiracism. Rather than instructors delivering a preplanned outline, we'll make the road by walking together. Participants will build a course curriculum together through emergent strategy and popular education so our questions, challenges, and themes speak to us right now and here. By exploring the collective wisdom in the room, what we talk about will keep us awake and alive.

This isn't a workshop or training. Through roundtable conversations, careful reading, and unsettled silences, we invite movers, shakers, and makers to join us as we engage critical questions at the heart of antiracist struggle for a world where everyone, and every community, can survive and thrive in their full humanity.

Syllabus

Ram Bhagat 

Gun violence is an on-going intergenerational crisis in the United States. The increase in mass shootings across the country is almost a daily occurrence. Movie theaters, playgrounds, grocery stores, night clubs, concerts, churches, graduations, and even Super Bowl parades are susceptible to massive loss of life caused by gun violence. School and community shootings continue to cause deep and far-reaching harm. This course will examine the individual and collective impact of gun violence related trauma.

An Afro-Indigenous value system, centered around the principles of Sankoka, Ubuntu, and Sawubona, is the cultural framework for Gun Violence, Restorative Justice, and Community Healing. This five-day workshop incorporates healing circle processes, which provide participants with a sacred safe space to build community and establish trust, as we explore the intersectionality of race and gun violence in the US context, where Black and Brown bodies are disproportionately injured and killed from gun related incidents.

Through the transformative power of story, participants will be invited to engage in the development of a vision for healing the traumatic effects of gun violence in their chosen community. We will utilize drumming, dramatization, dance, and dialogue to tap into the intuition and wisdom of the collective. Paulo Freire – renowned Brazilian Educator – stated “the community must be uplifted… through a process of self-healing.” The purpose for this course is to examine the impact of gun violence trauma, explore Afro-Indigenous community healing processes, and engage in the creation of a vision for reducing gun violence in the US.  

Syllabus

Facilitator: Courtney Joyner

Date: Wednesday, May 22, 2024

Time: 8:30 – 12:30a ET

Location: Hybrid (On Campus and Online)

This workshop connects with and builds from the renowned STAR training developed by EMU’s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding. Participants will examine harmful patterns of relationships that can develop during rapid transition and community trauma. Then we will learn to take up faith-based leadership practices that can help us manage and transform negative patterns. And finally, we will discover ways to build on life-giving patterns that can emerge during crisis and change.

Cost

$99 on-campus registration includes lunch. Register for $79 to join via Zoom.

About the Facilitator

Courtney Joyner instructs students in the areas of spiritual and ministry formation for both the Seminary and the undergraduate Theology and Religion program. She also serves as the Director of the Thriving in Minstry Grant, Director of Mentored Ministry, and Director of the Ministry Inquiry Program. She is currently working on her doctoral thesis at Wesley Theological Seminary focusing on Clergy Traumatic Stress. 

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Facilitator: Jonathan Swartz

Date: Wednesday, May 22, 2024

Time: 1:30 – 4:30p ET

Location: Hybrid (On Campus and Online)

This workshop serves as an introduction to the promises and challenges of restorative justice in the context of congregational life. Participants in the workshop will be introduced to Restorative Justice theory and practice as well as the theological and biblical roots from which theory and practice have sprouted. Churches can be sites of harm; can a Restorative Justice framework help us imagine repair and accountability in the service of healing? 

Cost

$89 on-campus registration includes lunch. Register for $69 to join via Zoom.

About the Facilitator

Jonathan Swartz is the associate director for the Zehr Institute for Restorative Justice and Associate Dean of Students at Eastern Mennonite University. He teaches courses on restorative justice at EMU’s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding and facilitates trainings in the areas of restorative practices within educational institutions, Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience (STAR), violence prevention, and more. Jonathan holds graduate degrees from both the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding and Eastern Mennonite Seminary. 

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Facilitator: Jacob Alan Cook

Date: Thursday, June 13, 2024

Time: 9:00a – 4:00p ET

Location: On Campus

In this clinic, we will envision faith communities as a space for developing a sense of both personal agency and social responsibility—and for promoting these life-giving values even during tough conversations. We will explore ethical and psychological frameworks that can help us understand sometimes hidden sources of conflict and other barriers to agreement and collaborative action. Ultimately, we will experiment with practices for reflecting on our own deep convictions and hidden judgments, managing ourselves to engage diverse perspectives with curiosity, and intervening non-coercively in complex social settings in the hope of making progress together on pressing challenges.

Cost

$199 registration includes lunch.

About the Facilitator

Jacob Alan Cook is a visiting assistant professor of Christian ethics and the director for the Pathways for Tomorrow grant program at Eastern Mennonite Seminary. He is the author of Worldview Theory, Whiteness and the Future of Evangelical Faith and numerous articles and book chapters. Jake regularly facilitates workshops for denominational and congregational leaders and laypersons, ranging from "formation for moral agency and leadership" to "adaptive leadership skills for navigating tough conversations."

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