Sexual Violence in Conflict Zones: from the Ancient World to the Era of Human Rights

The University of Iowa Bookstore has copies for sale of the recently released book, Sexual Violence in Conflict Zones: from the Ancient World to the Era of Human Rights edited by Elizabeth Heineman.

The UICHR would like to congratulate board member and UI professor Elizabeth Heineman, for the publication of this collection of essays. Essays in the volume span a broad geographic, chronological, and thematic scope, touching on the ancient world, medieval Europe, the American Revolutionary War, precolonial and colonial Africa, Muslim Central Asia, the two world wars, and the Bangladeshi War of Independence.

To learn more about the book please visit the website for the University of Pennsylvania Press. [1]

Sexual Violence in Conflict Zones Teaching Workshop

In May 2007, the University of Iowa Center for Human Rights sponsored a workshop to enable faculty, graduate students teaching their own courses, and secondary school teachers to integrate instruction on sexual violence in conflict zones into their regular course offerings.

Revelations of sexual abuse of prisoners by personnel at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and reports of rape in the ongoing conflict in Sudan have drawn renewed attention to an issue as old as warfare: sexual violence in conflict zones. According to the United Nations, the term sexual violence refers to many different crimes including rape, sexual mutilation, sexual humiliation, forced prostitution, and forced pregnancy. Awareness of sexual violence in conflict zones as a violation of human rights and a war crime evolved in the decades after World War II. Only in the last five years have wartime sexual offenders and their commanding officers been convicted in international courts of law.

The all-day workshop, on May 5, 2007, focused on discussion of pre-circulated readings from human rights organizations, eyewitnesses, and academic disciplines such as law, history, literature, and journalism. Prior research or teaching on sexual violence in conflict zones was not required.

Funding for the Sexual Violence in Conflict Zones conference was provided by Arts & Humanities Initiative of Iowa, UI International Programs' Major Project Fund, UI Center for Human Rights, and The Perry A. and Helen Judy Bond Fund.

The 2006 conference was co-sponsored by the UI Departments of History and Women's Studies, Sexuality Studies Program, Institute for Cinema and Culture, and Women's Resource and Action Council, with an additional contribution from the College of Law.