How to Use the Architects of Peace Site
Table of Contents
- Introduction: Using the Site in Peace Studies
- Supplemental Ways
to Use this Site
- Issue-oriented Studies in
Ethics
- First Year Composition
- Women's Studies
- Political Science
- Rhetorical Analysis
- Communications and Media
Studies
- Photographic Critique
- Environmental Philosophy
- Studies in Popular Culture
- History/International
Relations
Introduction: Using the Site in Peace Studies
The Architects of Peace website contains 73 discreet lesson
plans primarily geared toward collegiate freshmen and sophomores,
but easily adaptable to high school juniors and seniors.
A lesson plan has been prepared for each featured architect,
the core of which is the composition of an essay, usually
in the three-to-five page range, but expandable to meet
course requirements. Preliminary research for these essays
is primarily internet-based, with some links being provided
within the lesson plans themselves.
Each lesson plan follows the same basic format, using a
five-step explication in the following order: prepare, read,
explore, write, and expand. The explication is followed
by an additional resource students may find to be helpful
in their research.
This website has been optimized for class projects where
individual students will choose the area they wish to investigate
on an architect-by-architect basis. This model allows students
to pursue research in areas of greater personal interest.
It is recommended that a copy of the Listing of Architects
by Issue [link] be distributed to all students prior to
assigning them the task of selecting an architect upon which
they want to base their research.
If instructors wish their students to give reports on their
research after the papers have been completed, it might
be advisable to put together a sign-up sheet prior to the
beginning of research so that students select the greatest
possible diversity of architects.
Students should be encouraged not to view their papers
as reports about the architects themselves, but rather as
dialogues where they are participating in discourse in which
the architect has also been participating. It should be
made clear that the purpose of this website is not to "canonize"
those who have been designated "Architects of Peace,"
but rather to enter into the discourse of Peace Studies
with a diverse and divergent set of personalities, not all
of whom would agree on how to go about the process of making
peace, or even about how to define peace.
The Architects of Peace project has been created on a somewhat
free-flowing definition of peace, a definition that is purposely
expansive and that refuses to view peace narrowly as the
mere absence of warfare. Inclusive in this definition are
concerns about human rights, economic justice, interpersonal
tolerance, environmental sustainability, and even health
care. As such, it might be said that we've elected to take
an "upstream approach" to Peace Studies, where
part of the peacemaking process is to eliminate potential
conflict at its source, rather than merely to respond to
quarrels after they've developed.
To assist students in understanding an upstream approach
to Peace Studies, instructors may wish to relate the story
of the hero who, in the course of wandering about the countryside,
came upon a crowd of disconcerted citizens gathered on the
bank of a river. When the hero inquired as to the nature
of their distress, they pointed out a victim being swept
downstream. The hero jumped into the water and rescued the
victim, but no sooner were they safely ashore than a second
victim was swept into view. This person, also, was rescued
by the hero. However, when a third victim floated down the
river, the hero began to journey upstream. "What kind
of hero are you," the crowd jeered, "if you fail
to rescue the third victim?" "Rescue the victim
yourself," the hero replied. "I'm going upstream
to find out why all these people end up in the water."
Supplemental ways to use this site:
Although the Architects of Peace project was originally
envisioned as an exercise in Peace Studies at the undergraduate
and secondary levels, it has purposely been designed to
accommodate interdisciplinary needs across the curriculum.
Faculty engaged in the following areas will find the Architects
of Peace website particularly useful as a resource for class
projects:
-
Issue-Oriented studies in Ethics.
The Listing of Architects by Issue [link] matches the
various architects of peace with the issues upon which
they've focused. Some of the architects tend to concentrate
on individual issues, while others branch out into numerous
elements of the peacemaking process. The Listing of
Architects by Issue [link] provides an alternative way
for classes to access Architects of Peace material by
focusing research on an area of particular personal
interest rather than on the accomplishments of a single
individual.
-
First Year Composition. The exercises
proposed in the "write" section of each lesson
plan were designed by a specialist in collegiate Composition
and Rhetoric courses who currently teaches at Santa
Clara University. They can be used as one of the regular
composition projects assigned within a syllabus where
the emphasis is placed on working in multiple genres
in response to rhetorical needs. Without modification,
it would probably best fit into a two-week assignment
sequence where the first week is devoted to student
research, both in terms of choosing the architect about
whom they wish to write and in terms of researching
the issue in accordance with the lesson plan, and where
the second week is devoted to the composition/revision
process. It is suggested that instructors who wish to
use Architects of Peace as a class project develop their
own assignment sheet, specifying such items as due dates
and required length of papers in accordance with an
appropriate level of rigor for the individual course.
-
Women's Studies. Twenty eight of the
seventy-four portraits included in the original volume
of Architects of Peace were of women, ranging from women
heads of state to feminist activists. While to some
this ratio, slightly better than one-in-three, might
represent progress given that issues of war and peace
have traditionally been considered a male domain, to
others it could indicate that gender equality still
has a long way to go in the world arena. Bella Abzug's
essay in this volume states that, "
men support
our quest for quality on the more narrowly defined women's
issues but seem much less willing to examine critically
the premises of society and governmental decisions in
the same way that women are unafraid to do." How
might women examine the premises of society differently
than men? Class projects and individual research can
be structured around the question of whether women tend
to approach the peacemaking process differently than
men. Is there any evidence that women heads of state
tend to go to greater lengths to avoid war than men
in similar positions of leadership?
-
Political Science. Seven former heads
of states were included in the original publication
of Architects of Peace. They are: Benazir Bhutto, former
prime minister of Pakistan, the first woman to head
the government of an Islamic state; Jimmy Carter, thirty-ninth
president of the United States of America; F.W. de Klerk
of South Africa, who lifted the ban on the African National
Congress; Mikhail Gorbachev, former president of the
Soviet Union who introduced the reforms of glasnost;
Shimon Peres, former prime minister of Israel; Margaret
Thatcher, prime minister of the United Kingdom and Europe's
first woman prime minister; and Lech Walesa, Poland's
first noncommunist president after 40 years of communist
rule. While each of these former leaders met with considerable
success in terms of their ability to influence social
policy, they all met with formidable opposition from
within their own governments in terms of their political
agendas. Divide the class up into seven teams, and assign
each team the task of researching the political frustrations
encountered by each of these former heads of state,
focusing especially on international relations and efforts
to build enduring peace. After each team has submitted
its report to the rest of the class, identify points
of convergence in the findings, and draw conclusions
about top-down introduction of change in political systems.
-
Rhetorical Analysis. Assign students
the task of analyzing how a select group of the architects
go about propagating their issues. For example, students
might analyze the short essays provided in the individual
architect pages, selecting one architect from each of
the following categories in the Listing of Architects
by Issue[link]: peace through development, peace through
economic justice, peace through science, peace through
religion, and peace through the arts. Students can be
asked to organize their analysis following an Aristotelian
matrix by first analyzing how the architect's character
shapes the argument (ethos), and then by analyzing the
emotional appeal of the rhetoric (pathos) before finally
analyzing the logic of the appeal being made (logos.)
-
Communications and Media Studies.
From rap music to Saturday morning cartoons, mass media
are often criticized as making the world a more violent
place. And yet various media can be powerful tools in
developing sentiments of peace, as demonstrated by Steven
Spielberg's movie Schindler's List or Robert Redford's
The Milagro Beanfield War. In their Architects of Peace
essays, these two men offered divergent critiques of
the impact media has on peacemaking, with Spielberg
pointing out that over 1,250,000,000 high school students
had viewed Schindler's List, while Redford stated, "When
I look about and see what the information age has wrought,
I see a culture rich in materials for pleasure and excess
communication but poor in depth of feeling and imagination-dull
and flat and rich." What is the social impact of
mass media on public awareness of the issues leading
to war? What is the potential for digital media, such
as this website, to raise consciousness in mass culture
about issues of peace? A possible class project for
media studies classes would be to evaluate the Architects
of Peace website, as a formal study, and make recommendations
as to how we might more effectively enter into public
discourse on peace. (We'd love to see the results of
such studies, by the way. Send your findings along to
[ethics@scu.edu])
-
Photographic Critique. Michael Collopy
is renowned for his ability to capture personality within
his portraiture. Class projects combing analysis of
the technical and aesthetic aspects of his work with
biographical information regarding the architects themselves
should be instructive. Have students pay close attention
to the inclusion of the architect's hands in the portrait,
the direction and nature of the architect's gaze, as
well as to elements of composition and lighting. For
in-class critique of the portraits, teachers are encouraged
to compile a digital slide show, using programs such
as PowerPoint, made up of images contained in this site
and relating them to the short biographies provided
for each of the architects.
-
Environmental Philosophy. Nine of
the Architects of Peace (Michel Cousteau; David Brower;
Paul Hawken; Leonard George; Maya Lin; Jane Goodall;
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.; Theo Colborn; Richard Leakey)
are primarily concerned with ecological issues such
as sustainability and environmental justice. Others,
such as Mikhail Gorbachev, are engaged in environmental
causes as secondary concerns to projects in economic
or political development. Few people would disagree
that the environmental consequences of modern warfare
can be extreme, especially considering such weapons
as the napalm bomb, or the strategic use of chemical
defoliants such as "Agent Orange." How do
issues of peace interrelate with environmental issues
beyond that, however? Is the reverence for life that
causes people to turn away from war any different than
the reverence for life that causes people to appreciate
the sanctity of the environment? Class projects and
individual research can be structured around the project
of developing a hypothetical foundation where issues
of peace correspond to issues of environmental concern.
Specifically, what additional values are shared within
the two areas of concern? In what ways are the two areas
interdependent? Are there issues of economic development
that impact both areas of concern equally? How will
solutions in one area have effects in the other area?
-
Studies in Popular Culture. Artists,
writers, composers, performers and others involved in
the fine arts are instrumental in developing a culture
of peace. Notable among the Architects of Peace involved
in these areas are Maya Lin, Carlos Santana, Joan Baez,
Alice Walker, Maya Angelou, Harry Belafonte, Robert
Redford, Ted Turner and Steven Spielburg. Although these
personalities are intensely committed to the cause of
peace, many critics would argue that the momentum of
popular culture is directed toward glorifying violence
rather than non-violence. Is this the case? Class projects
and individual research can be structured around comparing
the efforts of various Architects of Peace listed above
with those of counterparts who might be seen as promoting
a culture of violence. After making such comparisons,
is it possible to hypothesize whether popular culture
is moving toward or away from violence?
-
History/International Relations. Seventeen
of the Architects of Peace have been awarded the Nobel
Peace Prize: Linus Pauling, Jimmy Carter, Jody Williams,
Elie Wiesel, Nelson Mandella, Mikhail Gorbachev, Mother
Teresa, Oscar Arias Sanchez, the Dalai Lama, F. W. de
Klerk, Henry Kissinger, Mairead Corrigan Maquire, Rigoberta
Menchú Tum, Shimon Peres, José Ramos-Horta,
Lech Walesa, and Desmond Tutu. The Nobel Peace Prize
is an award that makes its own history, and a study
of how it has been bestowed over the years will reveal
what conflicts have been of greatest global concern.
Class projects can be structured around the question
of what worthy persons have not been awarded the prize,
and in what ways their contributions may have been more
significant than those who have been signaled out. Likewise,
some who have become laureates-or for that matter, who
have been designated "Architects of Peace"-might
be less worthy of the honor than others. Assign small
groups that task of researching various decades when
the award has been bestowed, requiring them to construct
a revisionist listing on a year-by-year basis of those
upon whom the award should have been bestowed. The revisionist
lists can be presented to the entire class, along with
rationales for the new selections.
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