The Centre for Shared Education at the School of SSESW warmly invites you to a fascinating seminar with Dr Valentina Otmačić, University of Rijeka, Croatia. Open event - all are welcome! For queries, please contact Dr Rebecca Loader (r.loader@qub.ac.uk).

Any space for the positive past? The pedagogical potential of lived experiences of community resistance to ethnic segregation and violence in countries affected by violent conflict

Speaker: Dr Valentina Otmačić is a scholar and practitioner engaged in the fields of peace, conflict transformation and human rights, with a specific emphasis on resistance to identity-based violence and constructive conflict transformation. For over 25 years, Valentina worked as practitioner with UN Agencies and international organizations in several countries, including Lebanon, Colombia, DR Congo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and the USA.

Abstract:  Violent conflicts in so-called divided societies are commonly categorised as ethnic or sectarian conflicts, implying that group identities are at the very root of the violence. Such belief is often reinforced and transmitted to new generations, including by educational systems, through dominant narratives focusing on a violent, negative past. However, in such societies there are multiple communities which resisted ethnic divisions and remained ethnically mixed during and after violent conflicts, despite all the odds. Currently, the experiences of such communities and their narratives of a positive inter-ethnic past are marginalised, silenced or ignored.

This seminar will present the key findings of research in two ethnically mixed communities which successfully resisted ethnic segregation and violence during the 1991-1995 wars in the former Yugoslavia, namely the communities of Gorski kotar (Croatia) and Tuzla (Bosnia-Herzegovina), and will explore the pedagogical potential of such experiences. It will attempt to show how lived experiences of inter-ethnic solidarity and cooperation can be an excellent educational tool to be used in formal and informal education to promote critical thinking about violent conflicts, as well as to support the prevention of future violence.