Kamari Maxine Clarke presents "Metafication: Towards a Theory of Absence in Global Forensics and Mass Atrocity Violence"

The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs Program for Global Health and Medicine, in collaboration with the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, the Jan Knippers Black Fund, and Middlebury College Departments and Programs of Anthropology, Global Health, Black Studies, Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies, and the Center for the Critical Study of Race and Ethnicity warmly invite you to a public lecture by Professor Kamari Maxine Clarke.

The twenty-first century has seen a proliferation of conflict zones characterized by ongoing mass violence, disappearances, and large-scale displacement. In a range of locations today, frequent conflicts, forced disappearances, and mass violence have led to large-scale destruction of human life. However, existing responses have been beset by challenges. This talk explores how citizens are moving beyond state solutions and collaborating with non-state human rights actors to find technological solutions to violence. It analyzes a set of approaches that focus on empowering community members to serve as peacebuilders trained in early detection and early response to conflict. However, it shows how these technologies also bring with them a set of challenges: in particular, the bias written into their algorithms. The talk explores what is occluded by these technologies and offers new possibilities for understanding the nature of violence at the center of such forms of human rights work.

For more information and for Zoom link, visit: go.middlebury.edu/kamariclarke

Location: Zoom Webinar / In-person at the College in Vermont at Robert A. Jones ‘59 Conference Room