Contact: Ginny Davis Rhodes College Office of Communicationshttp://www.rhodes.edu(901) 843-3470, 843-3875[email protected]
April 11, 2002
Argentine Nobel Laureate To Speak, Lead PeaceJam at Rhodes
(Memphis, Tenn.)--- 1980 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Adolfo Perez Esquivel of Argentina will speak on "Human Rights and Justice for All" at 8 p.m. Friday, April 19, in the McCallum Ballroom of Rhodes College's Bryan Campus Life Center. Admission is free and open to the public.
The lecture's topic is also the theme for BRIDGES PeaceJam, a conference sponsored by Rhodes, BRIDGES and the PeaceJam Foundation that Perez Esquivel will lead April 20-21. PeaceJam will bring about 300 high school students from Tennessee, Mississippi, Kentucky and Arkansas to the Rhodes campus. The students will work side-by-side with Perez Esquivel, studying skills and attitudes necessary to bring positive change to their communities.
Participants have been studying an in-depth peace curriculum based on Perez Esquivel's life and work. During the conference, the students will develop and present to Perez Esquivel plans to promote peace in their communities. Memphis-area teachers and Rhodes students will volunteer as group leaders for the conference sessions. In addition, the young people will participate in several service projects throughout the Memphis area on Saturday, April 20.
Born in Buenos Aires, the 70-year-old Perez Esquivel has devoted his life's work to the struggle for human rights. He heads the Servicio Paz y Justicia, an organization that promotes fundamental human rights, basing itself exclusively on nonviolent means. The agency coordinates nonviolent movements for all of Latin America.
An architect, sculptor and teacher by profession, Perez Esquivel began his activism against injustice full time in Argentina during the early 1970s, when his country experienced a civil war in which terrorist organizations created an atmosphere of insecurity and fear, committing murders, bomb attacks, abductions and blackmail. Thousands of people vanished without a trace under the cover of complete silence; most were brutally treated and put to death.
Perez Esquivel himself was imprisoned without cause being shown and tortured. Pressure from the Pope and Amnesty International eventually brought his release. An exhibit on "The Disappeared," as the Argentine victims were known, will be on display at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis during May.
BRIDGES is a youth service agency whose mission is to make Memphis a place where all of its young people are empowered to build successful lives for themselves and their communities. Working with Memphis youth since 1922, BRIDGES' focus today is on overcoming racism, illiteracy and educational failure among young people.
Founded in 1996, the Denver-based PeaceJam Foundation is an international education program built around leading Nobel Peace Laureates who work personally with youth to pass on the spirit, skills and wisdom they embody. To date, 11 Nobel Peace Laureates, including Perez Esquivel, the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, form the foundation's Board of Directors. PeaceJam's goal is to inspire a new generation of peacemakers who will transform their local communities, themselves and the world.
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