{"id":5172,"date":"2015-07-27T09:00:34","date_gmt":"2015-07-27T14:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/?p=5172"},"modified":"2015-07-24T10:52:54","modified_gmt":"2015-07-24T15:52:54","slug":"conference-at-cmu-leads-to-formation-of-peace-and-conflict-studies-association","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/2015\/conference-at-cmu-leads-to-formation-of-peace-and-conflict-studies-association\/","title":{"rendered":"Conference at CMU leads to formation of peace and conflict studies association"},"content":{"rendered":"

Emerging issues in peace and conflict studies, and the formation of a peace and conflict studies association in Canada, were the key topics covered at the first annual Canadian Peace and Conflict Studies Conference<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"http:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/canadianpeacestudies\/\"<\/a>Canadian Mennonite University (CMU) hosted the inaugural conference June 18-20.<\/span><\/p>\n

More than 70 academics, students, and conflict resolution practitioners from across Canada gathered for a series of keynote addresses, panel discussions, and workshop sessions.<\/span><\/p>\n

Conflict resolution academics and practitioners don\u2019t often meet together, says Wendy Kroeker, one of the event\u2019s organizers.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur vision was to bring those two groups together and talk about how we want to contribute to the Canadian and international context in what our fields can offer or assist with,\u201d says Kroeker, who teaches Peace and Conflict Transformation Studies at CMU.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOften we do things individually, so we were wanting a stronger voice to emerge for the national context. This conference was to initiate that space for folks around the country interested in these issues, to decide what kind of group, what kind of organization, we\u2019d like to form going forward.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Kroeker says that she and her fellow organizers wanted to include a variety of voices in the dialogues at the conference.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a broad spectrum of people and we wanted to open up an invitational space,\u201d Kroeker says. \u201cWe want to stretch the boundaries of the field to be accessible, provocative, and inclusive.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The impetus for the conference was sparked in May 2014 during a meeting of academics from the field of peace and conflict studies at Saint Paul University in Ottawa.<\/p>\n

The assembled group began inquiring if creating a Canadian peace and conflict studies association would be of interest.<\/span><\/p>\n

A steering committee was formed and the first conference was organized.<\/span><\/p>\n

On Friday, June 18, those assembled at CMU made the decision to put together an association in Canada for peace and conflict studies.<\/p>\n

An interim board has been put together, with Dr. Timothy Donais, Associate Professor for Global Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University, serving as interim coordinator. The board\u2019s first meeting is scheduled for September.<\/span><\/p>\n

In addition to the historic agreement, the conference included a keynote address by Dr. Christopher Marshall, Professor of Restorative Justice at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. During his address, Marshall explored current trends in restorative justice theory and practice.<\/span><\/p>\n

Dr. Jessica Senehi, Associate Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Manitoba, and Dr. Jean-Fran\u00e7ois Rioux, Associate Professor in Conflict Studies at Saint Paul University, also delivered keynote addresses.<\/span><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Dr. Dean Peachey, Executive Director of the University of Winnipeg\u2019s Global College, and Ruth Taronno, an International Development Studies instructor and Director of Practicum and Alumni Relations at Menno Simons College, kicked off the conference with a roundtable discussion exploring field\/practicum placements in peace and conflict studies.<\/span><\/p>\n

Anglophone and francophone academics from throughout western Canada and southern Ontario presented papers during the three-day conference, which also included a visit to the brand new Canadian Museum for Human Rights.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kroeker says she is pleased with how the conference went.<\/span><\/p>\n

She and her fellow organizers wanted to allow for the possibility of relationship-building, and planned an academic conference that left plenty of time and space for registrants to mingle and speak with one another during breaks and mealtimes.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur focus was to get some cross-fertilization going, and people said we did accomplish that,\u201d Kroeker says.<\/p>\n

About CMU
\n<\/strong>A Christian university in the Anabaptist tradition, CMU\u2019s Shaftesbury campus offers undergraduate degrees in arts, business, humanities, music, sciences, and social sciences, as well as\u00a0graduate degrees in theology, ministry, peacebuilding and collaborative development, and an MBA. CMU has over about 900 full-time equivalent\u00a0students, including those enrolled in degree programs at the Shaftesbury and Menno Simons College campuses and in its Outtatown certificate program.<\/em><\/p>\n

For information about CMU visit www.cmu.ca<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

For additional information, please contact:
\nKevin Kilbrei, Director of Communications & Marketing
\nkkilbrei@cmu.ca; 204.487.3300 Ext. 621
\nCanadian Mennonite University
\n500 Shaftesbury Blvd., Winnipeg, MB\u00a0 R3P 2N2<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Emerging issues in peace and conflict studies, and the formation of a peace and conflict studies association in Canada, were the key topics covered at the first annual Canadian Peace and Conflict Studies Conference. Canadian Mennonite University (CMU) hosted the inaugural conference June 18-20. More than 70 academics, students, and conflict resolution practitioners from across […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[20,25,5],"tags":[666,561,664,667,279,49,506,665],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5172"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5172"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5172\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5177,"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5172\/revisions\/5177"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cmu.ca\/media_archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}