34 courses with the subject PAX, each shown exactly as we captured it from the college's catalog, with every element we hold. Where the wording looks broken, that is our reading of the catalog, not the college's text.
PAX 507Praxis: Personal and Community Formation (1 SH)
This pass/fail course for MA in Transformational Leadership (MATL) students contributes to creating a foundation for the student’s personal development and supports the development of the learning community that supports students throughout their time at CJP and beyond. Learning in a community is a key brand differentiator for CJP. This course supports that community process while also supporting each student individually. This online course will include significant one-on-one coaching from the instructors, as well as small group and class reflection and learning activities. This course will explore themes of vocation/purpose, community creation, professional development and leadership.
Praxis Project involves the online experience of connecting to a practice community of other transformational leaders and coaching faculty while implementing a project in their organization or home community. A mix of asynchronous assignments and synchronous meetings allow students to engage in course material, engage in collective brainstorming of practice challenges/barriers, view transformational leadership through an emergence lens, and refine leadership skills in complex projects and programs. Praxis Project is designed to be taken alongside another course to help students think through projects, programs, and/or interventions. Throughout the course, students will explore the MasterMind Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 59
The intent and design of Praxis: Capstone is to provide guided reflection in four areas: 1) Being a reflexive practitioner in transformational leadership; 2) Integrating and evaluating theories of change in their project context; 3) Adapting to emergent contexts with critical theory lenses; 4) Revisit and review goals and reflections on vocation explored in PAX 507. Praxis: Capstone involves the online experience of integrating all MATL course materials and experiences in a reflective environment to assist students in mentally and physically documenting their work. A mix of asynchronous assignments and synchronous meetings allow students to reflect on their identities, theories of change, skill sets, challenges and barriers, and critical theory in their dynamic and ever-changing context. Critical theory lenses will guide students in reflecting on their experiences, theories of change, and project(s) as they prepare for their capstone presentations. Praxis: Capstone is a one-credit pass/fail course; whether a student passes or fails is determined by whether a student attends synchronous sessions and whether assignments are turned in on time, and meet all requirements laid out in the assignment’s guidance note.
PAX 516Program Evaluation Through Qualitative Research (3 SH)
This blended course is designed to help undergraduate and graduate students understand and practice the implementation of program evaluation through the methodologies of qualitative research. Historic and contemporary sociological and anthropological approaches (Western and Indigenous) will provide the theoretical and philosophical background for our work, but the focus will be on practical applications of qualitative methodology in evaluation. Students will practice conducting structured and semi-structured interviews, focus group interviews, coding interview transcripts, and will practice designing an evaluation: working with a client, determining appropriate methods, collecting data, analyzing the data, interpreting the data, and communicating the findings. This course complements, but does not take the place of other research and evaluation courses that focus entirely on either research or evaluation. The course format is participatory, experiential and adaptive. Students will conduct an actual professional evaluation of an on-going program; consequently, students will find themselves leading and/or participating in processes with which they have no prior experience. Further, the syllabus, readings and assignments may need to be adapted to meet the changing needs of the program. The course involves a significant amount of group work; each participant is advised to consider that Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 60
PAX 532Formation for Peacebuilding Practice (3 SH)
As individuals working for peace, social justice, reduction of violence, and the possibility of reconciliation, we are the instruments of the work. How can we best prepare ourselves to take constructive action whether in a professional role or in a personal relationship? This course will explore four areas of awareness and accountability essential for effectiveness in our action efforts. These areas of content and engagement, described more fully in the syllabus, are self-awareness, self-assessment, self- management, and self- and community care. In focusing on these four areas, we’ll consider the roles we play, the skills we have and need, and the processes available to us for doing the work. The intensive on-line experience will make use of in-person Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 61
Analysis focuses on understanding the factors that cause conflict and violence and those that support peacebuilding and social justice. Good conflict and injustice analysis skills are a central component of designing effective strategies for promoting social change that transforms conflicts and supports justice. In this course, we will engage with each other and with course materials to develop and refine our skills for analyzing situations of conflict and injustice in order to identify opportunities for transformative action. We will use a variety of analytical models or lenses, including identity (gender, religion, nationality, etc.), human needs, narrative, power, culture, worldview, and others to understand conflict. We will also work with case studies of conflicts at multiple social levels (personal, relational, structural, and cultural) to practice our analysis skills and identify opportunities to take action. Participants will also practice self-analysis skills by paying attention to their own roles and biases in conflicts and how that affects their ability to “see” and describe conflict from different perspectives. The class will also focus on research strategies for gathering and organizing data and developing theories of change as an intermediate step from analysis to designing effective social change. For the final project, participants will select a situation and conduct their own analysis. The course will be taught using a combination of asynchronous (self-paced) activities and synchronous activities. This course is for academic credit only. It requires participation in synchronous sessions on Mondays and Wednesdays May 17 – June 16 and follow-up assignments due in July and August. Course work to be completed by August 20. This course is taught during our annual Summer Peacebuilding Institute and will take place online in 2021 (www.emu.edu/cjp/spi/).
PAX 534Foundations for Justice & Peacebuilding 1 (6 SH)
Foundations 1 and 2 give an overview of social justice and peacebuilding practice and its multi- disciplinary, multi-level aspects. This course, Foundations 1, addresses personal, interpersonal, small group, and organizational-level conflict transformation and social change. Foundations 1 will center on personal formation, basic action research, analysis for understanding conflict and injustice, peacebuilding and justice practice, theories of change, practitioner roles, essential skills and processes in our work, and basic process design. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 62
“‘Research Justice’ is achieved when communities reclaim and access all forms of knowledge to affect change between community voices and those of institutions.” Emancipatory peacebuilders, academics, and broader social justice movements use research to illuminate obscured relationships between power and oppression, cultivate stories, identify theories of change, and document histories and cultures of resilience. However, the dominant Euro-Western research methods and methodologies many practitioners learn often replicate the very paradigms and power relationships those in the justice and peacebuilding field seek to displace. Consequently, only certain forms of knowledge are valued and sought out, which subjugates indigenous and community- based ways of knowing and being. Therefore, this required 3-credit course for all MA candidates equips students with an expansive and justice-oriented qualitative research framework that introduces pathways for research to advance social change. This course is designed to invite all to explore their curiosities through inquiry in pursuit of a world with more justice and peace. [1] DataCenter for Research Justice. (2015). An introduction to research justice [PDF], p. 6. Retrieved from http://www.datacenter.org/new-toolkit-an-introduction-to-research-justice/. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 63
Whether working in advocacy, healthcare, education, government, care-giving, activism, or in any kind of leadership or community building capacity, stressors add up - particularly in the midst (and aftermath?) of pandemic. Research and experience demonstrate that unaddressed trauma often leads to conflict and violence against self or with others, as trauma-affected people act out against others or become self-destructive. STAR combines theory with experiential learning to increase awareness of the impacts of trauma on the body, brain, beliefs and behaviors. The course offers tools for addressing trauma and breaking cycles of violence. STAR’s multi-disciplinary framework draws on several fields of theory and practice to support healthy, resilient individuals and communities: trauma and resilience studies (including neurobiology), restorative justice, conflict transformation, human security, and spirituality. STAR centers participants’ experience and insights, while offering activities, resources, and a theoretical model to support a journey toward understanding and interrupting cycles of violence at the individual, communal and societal levels. Learn more about STAR on the STAR website! View Syllabus section A. View Syllabus section B.
PAX 568Transformational Leadership for Social Change (3 SH)
Complex, dynamic and frequently chaotic environments are the norm for today’s leaders. Few if any leaders have the luxury of predictability or equilibrium. Instead leaders must develop the ability to maximize opportunities and leverage uncertainty. In this course we pair Appreciative Inquiry with Critical Theory approaches to learn about balancing the contradictory impulses of disruption and integration. We will unpack some value-loaded terms: social justice, peace, negotiation, organization, equity, empathy, ethics, reconciliation, sustainability and social change; and conceptualize the “Lead Together” mission of EMU. Together we explore the forward reaching capacities that leaders need in order to thrive amidst the paradox and turbulence of the future. This class is a core requirement for all MATL students.
PAX 570Community Organizing and Nonviolent Mobilization for Social Change (3 SH)
Recent years have witnessed a wide range of community organizing and nonviolent campaigns and movements across the world. Community organizing is fundamentally a project of power building within and among groups of people marginalized from existing power structures. What does it take to create sustainable social change in the face of institutional and political resistance? What does it mean to work towards the vision of a nonviolent world? In this course, we look at the power of people to effect change through social movements using strategic nonviolence, direct action, community organizing, and advocacy. We begin by asking what community is and how power functions and proceed to learn about issues, tactics, and campaigns that have been used in fights for local change over the past century and continue to be used today. We examine the theory, practice, history, and research behind nonviolent campaigns and social movements; revisit and reframe classic debates; explore case studies and our own experiences; practice key assessment, planning, and tactical skills; and apply what we have learned to issues we care about. We work to understand how local concerns and campaigns to address them are situated within larger structures of power and inequality. We also consider how nonviolence needs to synergize peacebuilding approaches to be effective. In addition to engaging in classroom discussions and activities, readings and multimedia resources, and group research and presentations on real-life scenarios, opportunities to contribute to planning and carrying out an action will be built into the learning experience. This includes a weekend trip to Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 65
This course provides a critical examination of the values, principles, and practices of restorative justice. It provides a unique opportunity to explore the philosophy of restorative justice from various perspectives, and as it is applied in various contexts. Our primary starting point is the U.S. criminal legal system and the problems posed by its dominant responses to harm and violence. We examine how restorative justice presents a contrasting philosophy of justice that addresses the needs of multiple stakeholders, draws from faith-based and indigenous approaches, and challenges interpersonal and structural forms of harm. We also explore intersections and applications of restorative justice with Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 64
This course introduces you to the field of global development through examining both the history of the field and the current debates and challenges faced by development practitioners. The purpose is to explore and critically evaluate the basic assumptions underlying the competing theories and current approaches towards alleviating poverty and global inequality. This course approaches the phenomenon of development in its broadest sense as the study of change, with attention to global justice, equity, and the historical links between development, colonialism, and global capitalism. In the course, we will explore what development means, how to measure it, and how to understand attempts to balance between economic, ecological, and equity concerns. The course engages the key propositions that emerge in contemporary development debates, and offers frameworks for evaluating theories, interventions and policies. With attention to power relations, we will consider critiques of the development project sensitive to race, gender, ecology and other political economy traditions, in dialogue with the dominant understanding of development as technical interventions for enhancing the market mechanism. This will provide a foundation for uncovering and assessing social and political structures, institutions, inequalities, and development policies as theories meet practice. [This course is cross-listed with undergraduate course PXD-485.]
Is nonviolence effective for creating sustainable social change in the face of institutional, political, and violent resistance? How is the philosophy of nonviolence connected to nonviolent strategy and tactics? And can nonviolence still be relevant today? In this course, we look at the power of social movements to effect change using strategic nonviolence, including forms of protest and persuasion, noncooperation, and nonviolent intervention and direct action. We examine the theory, practice, history, and research behind nonviolence, and explore debates and criticisms about the efficacy of nonviolent social change. Our work will be grounded in a close study of the US Civil Rights Movement, as well as other social change movements from India to Serbia to South Africa, and recent movements from Occupy to Arab Spring to Black Lives Matter to Environmental Justice. Through case studies and our own experiences, we will practice assessment, visioning, planning, and tactical skills, and also apply what we have learned to issues we care about. As we discuss whether nonviolence is “the way” or “one way” for us today, we will investigate the intersections of nonviolent social change with peacebuilding practices and social justice movements. Along with readings and classroom discussions and activities, we will engage with multimedia resources like film and music, and connect to real-life scenarios through individual and group research and presentations. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 72
Negotiation is the fundamental process by which human beings discern how to resolve differences and move forward together—whether in a family, a local community, an organization, a society, or a world community. Mediation adds a third party to the negotiation process, and has proven remarkably effective in resolving and even transforming certain disputes. This course will train participants to be effective negotiators and to serve as impartial mediators, but will also explore the varying contexts in which these processes take place and the variety of perspectives and worldviews that parties bring to a negotiation or mediation process. For CJP MA in Conflict Transformation students this course satisfies the skills assessment course requirement. Each student will be evaluated by the instructor and by class peers for competency in mediation and negotiation skills.
PAX 612Creative Approaches to Peacebuilding (3 SH)
Creativity and the arts have historically been connected to peace and conflict. Human communities have used creative and artistic techniques to harmonize self, community and nature, to witness and make sense of the world, process and express feelings and emotions, to enact power and agency, to signify the past, reflect on the present and imagine the future. Creativity and arts have also been used to promote violent conflict, and as vehicles of colonization and imperialism. Amidst these multiple roles, peacebuilding practitioners and artists have continuously engaged with creative and artistic creation seeking to foster peace, resist oppression, denounce violence and promote healing, with different levels of impact. The challenges posed by current interconnected crises such as increasing inequality, climate crisis, discrimination, oppressive power dynamics and shrinking social spaces demand creative innovations to respond to violence, ignite justice and cultivate peace. This course investigates creativity in peace and conflict and the roles of arts in peacebuilding. We will explore techniques of creativity for everyday life and artistic approaches, including movement and dance, sound and music, theater, drawing, and contemplative practices, in a participatory dynamic that combines theory, case studies and practice. The methodology is based on hands-on engagement, and invites observing one’s own transformative processes, exchanging experiences and dialoguing with theories, authors and artistic creations through critical and contextual lenses. The course aims at providing a space where participants can explore perspectives on their peace(s) and conflicts and tap into their own creativity, vulnerability, confidence, and power, developing abilities for transformation and peacebuilding. Furthermore, we will discuss potential, limitations and ethical considerations of different initiatives, as well as trauma-responsive facilitation, planning, monitoring and evaluation. The objective is that participants can actively explore techniques and approaches to creatively adapt, incorporate and develop into their own peacebuilding practice. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 74
PAX 634Foundations for Justice & Peacebuilding 2 (6 SH)
Foundations 1 and 2 give a comprehensive overview of justice and peacebuilding practice and its multi- disciplinary, multi-level aspects. Foundations 1 centered on personal, interpersonal, small group and organizational transformation analysis, theory and practice. Foundations 2 focuses on communal, societal and global processes of transformation, with particular attention to the relationship between power and the production of justice and peacebuilding theories and practices. Throughout the two courses, you will be required to understand and integrate ethical application of theory, technical utilization of analysis tools, and systematic processes of planning and implementation for practice interventions across a myriad of sectors in society. In this course, faculty continue to coach students as they further develop their knowledge and skills for dealing with conflict and situations of injustice and building sustainable peace, with increased sensitivity to race and gender as well as history, and political economy. Students work individually and in teams to learn new theories and concepts and to apply these ideas and skills to cases that progress in complexity from the community to the national and global levels (and back again). Throughout the course, we also examine the intersections and overlaps among the local and the global. Students continue to develop their self-awareness as well as their capacity for professional judgment and reflective practice. Students become familiar with theories and frameworks that help explain the causes and dynamics of larger-scale conflicts, injustice and structural violence. They explore the roles of social- movement organizations, practitioner groups and policy engagement for dealing with such situations. Students prepare for future employment by completing assignments that develop professional skills, including but not limited to: communicating complex ideas clearly and succinctly, working in teams on complex projects, researching strategies and moving from analyzing a situation of injustice or conflict to designing and preparing strategies to impact that situation. Foundations 2 is required for all MA in Conflict Transformation and MA in Restorative Justice students. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 67
PAX 635Global Challenges, Local Struggles, and Transnational Solidarities (3 SH)
This course will focus on social and global processes of transformation by exploring global challenges, local experiences and struggles, and transnational solidarities that emerge in response to those challenges. It will be concerned with institutions, relations of power, and the relationship between power and the production of justice and peacebuilding theories and practices. It will pick up where Foundations 1 left off, aiming to add to students’ comprehensive overview of justice and peacebuilding practice and its multi-disciplinary, multi-level aspects. Whereas Foundations 1 centered on personal, interpersonal, small group and organizational transformation analysis, theory and practice, this course will equip students to further develop their knowledge and skills for dealing with conflict and situations of injustice and building sustainable peace. Particular focus will be given to social, state, and political change with increased sensitivity to race, gender, ecology, and other political economy traditions. Particular attention will be given to the colonial legacies and decolonial possibilities in justice and peacebuilding, exploring decoloniality as both an epistemic and a political project. Action and struggle for justice and peacebuilding are always found in peoples’ local, place-based experiences, but to gain understanding in order to effect change, we have to explore their global features. To do this we will examine the intersections and overlaps among the local and the global, including the transnational solidarities that connect local struggles around the world. Students will become familiar with theories and frameworks that help explain the causes and dynamics of larger-scale conflicts, injustice, and structural violence. Students will work individually and in small groups to apply these ideas and skills to cases that progress in complexity from the community to the national and global levels (and back again). Students will also continue to develop their self-awareness as well as their capacity for professional judgment and reflective practice with attention to vocation, values, ethics, faith and spirituality. This course is required for all MACT and MARJ students. Please note: for the 2022-2023 year academic year, PAX 635 plus a 3 credit hour course from an approved list will satisfy the Foundations 2 sequence.
Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience (STAR) Level 2 invites people who have started to bring trauma awareness into their life and work for greater resilience to deepen their knowledge and skills. In Level 2, participants have a chance to: • review and deepen learning around trauma awareness and resilience • grapple with the complex realities and implications of structural and historical harms • practice and deepen capacity for trauma-informed facilitation, and • share plans and questions, while connecting with others who are applying STAR learning in their lives and work. STAR Level 1 provides foundational content for this course. In Level 2, we continue to focus on trauma’s impacts on body, brain, beliefs and behavior; how those impacts often lead to cycles of Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 68
Though peacebuilding definitions differ, the ultimate goal of peacebuilding is to put into place mechanisms for building peaceable societies and relationships. This course explores the aims of peacebuilding, how humanity has tried to bring about peace throughout history, and contemporary approaches. We will especially look at the contributions of civil society peacebuilding, and consider whether it reaches its goals contributing to social peace. We will hear stories from CJP alumni and partners as they explore the promise of peacebuilding in their context, with its successes, challenges, and possible next steps. What is the Promise of Peacebuilding? Are we delivering on that promise? If so, how? If not, why not? The goal of the course is to expand knowledge about contemporary peacebuilding and make connections to people who are addressing violence and injustice in order to build durable peace. The course aims to help us become more familiar with the ways that civil society is contributing to the construction of peace when it has been its most successful, as well as when it has been ineffective at best or harmful at worst. This course is one of the two classes that can fulfil a high-level Conflict Transformation program requirement for MA and GC students. It previously held the PAX 687 course code. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 77
The enneagram is a framework for understanding personal motivations for behavior and it can be used as an analytical and practical tool for helping us understand interpersonal conflict and what to do about it. This course will explore the enneagram, the factors that motivate conflict, how various enneagram types engage in conflict, and what can be done to address interpersonal conflict through knowledge of enneagram types. Whether you are in leadership, working with troubled personal relationships, serving as a practitioner, or working in a helping profession, this course will provide knowledge of the framework and ways of using it to address conflict.
PAX 665Designing Processes for Conflict Transformation (3 SH)
Many of the systems in which we live and work are dysfunctional and mired in conflict. One strategy for transforming them is through deliberative dialogue processes that engage the whole system: whether community, organization or society. Such processes can enable us to respond creatively to our most complex challenges and move us toward more equitable, just and positive relationships and structures. Through this class, we will explore how complexity and identity theories, conflict analysis, and power assessment inform collaborative process design. We ask tough questions about what kind of processes are relevant for cultivating different phases of change and explore ethics underpinning the praxis of process design rooted in awareness of our ‘positionality’ in the system. We will learn about many process methodologies such as Appreciative Inquiry, Courageous Conversations, Emergent Strategies, Narrative Practice, Open Space, Polarity Management, Transformative Scenario Planning, World Café, and others. We will critically explore their underlying theories of change and theories of practice in ways that enable participants to become more creative and astute process designers. This class will be most appropriate for participants who already have some familiarity working with groups and is ideal for those with some facilitation practice experience. This online class is a 3 SH requirement for any students in the GC in Conflict Transformation or MA in Conflict Transformation programs.
PAX 671Power, Difference, and Restorative Justice in Practice (2-3 SH)
For Restorative Justice practitioners, what core competencies support the work of addressing differences in culture and power? Although RJ practices seek to equalize power and difference, they do not eliminate them. In fact, RJ has often been accused of protecting institutions and their representatives by obfuscating harmful power dynamics. This discussion, theory, and practice-based course offers an in-depth exploration of core competencies for working across lines of difference and power. Questions and topics include: organizing and working across lines of difference; addressing issues of power, identity, positionality; the origins of RJ and settler- colonialism; critiques of RJ from transformative justice; distinguishing between conflict and harm; and how RJ work is connected to historical and ongoing institutional harms. Students will develop, practice, and apply facilitation skills and reflective practices to address power dynamics in different contexts. By the end of this course, students will be equipped with the foundational knowledge and practical tools necessary to apply Restorative Justice facilitation in real-world situations and contribute to living and practicing restoratively in their personal, community, and professional lives. This course is a restorative justice elective course developed through the annual Summer Peacebuilding Institute. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 73
This course will introduce participants to the peacemaking circle process and explore: • Foundational values and philosophy of peacemaking circles, • Creating safe, brave, and respectful space for dialogue, • Consensus decision making, • Structure of the circle process, • Facilitation of the circle process, • Practical applications of circle process, • Conflict as opportunity to build relationships, • Problems and challenges in circles. This course will use the peacemaking circle process as the primary form of group work. This course is intended to provide experience in the circle process as well as an understanding of the foundational values and key structural elements for designing and conducting peacemaking circles. The Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 69
Course work undertaken through independent study must be approved by the student’s academic advisor and completed in collaboration with a supervising instructor. Please note: Directed/independent study courses will only be approved for students who have demonstrated the ability to do independent work (and therefore not approved in the first semester of a student’s program). See the registrar or your advisor to learn about independent study options.
Restorative justice originated as a practice-based discipline. Awareness of restorative justice continues to expand the opportunities to identify and address harms and to make amends in all sectors of personal, community, professional, and institutional settings. Whilst considered a ‘practice’ in models such as Victim Offender Conferencing/Dialogue, Family Group Conferencing, and Circle Processes, this course also explores restorative justice principles prevalent in emerging professions, work environments, community, and educational settings. The emphasis of this course is developing yourself as a practitioner. Students will achieve this through active engagement of case studies, developing a resource toolbox, reflective self-assessment, group feedback, instructor feedback, engaging with professionals, and most importantly, practice as a facilitator. For MA in Conflict Transformation or Restorative Justice, this satisfies the skills assessment course requirement if taken for 3 credits and is a required course for all students enrolled in the MA and Certificate in Restorative Justice programs. PAX 571 Restorative Justice is a prerequisite for this class unless special permission granted.
PAX 677Restorative Justice & Whole Systems Approaches (3 SH)
Restorative Justice has largely been applied to addressing interpersonal harms, that is to say, harm that results from the actions of private individuals. Yet many pervasive harms are carried out by governments or corporations - or individuals acting in the course of their formal institutional roles. Such past and ongoing harms include police violence, groundwater contamination, lung cancer, prison abuse, Native American boarding schools, housing discrimination, and civilian causalities in military operations. Moreover, institutional action and inaction can be regarded as contributing to all interpersonal harms or their root causes. This course will examine the relationship between institutional and interpersonal harms and dissect systemic harm as a product of the two. Through case study research and discussions, we will explore the potential role and limitations of restorative, transitional, and transformative justice principles and practices in building institutional accountability for systemic harms. As needed, we will imagine new frameworks and approaches. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 70
The Center for Justice & Peacebuilding is a practice-oriented academic program. The theories of change and the practice skills offered at CJP are meant to prepare individuals for a career in real world settings of complex conflict and injustice. The practicum is a time for learning and preparing for a career through personal involvement in and reflection on initiatives in actual situations. It is also a time to learn new theories and practice skills at the practicum site. Overall this hands on experience, with extensive interaction with people outside the classroom, and in organizations dealing with the subjects of students’ specializations, provides first-time or additional work experience for CJP students. Their experience is critical to employers as well as overall career development. Therefore, being prepared academically and having additional work experience through a practicum strengthens the individual student’s ability and capacity to offer a full range of experience to the people they will eventually work for and serve. In addition to doing an organizational practicum, CJP students may do a research-based practicum (independent or nested within an organization). For more information, refer to the practicum webpage. The practicum is required for MA in Conflict Transformation and MA in Restorative Justice students. In very select cases, a student may be granted permission to pursue a thesis (PAX 683 described below) in lieu of a practicum.
CJP MA in Restorative Justice or MA in Conflict Transformation full-time, residential students are able to petition the Academic Committee for an exception to the general rule that all students will do a practicum (PAX 682). Students will be vetted based on their experience and the quality of their proposal. A maximum of two persons per year will be granted this thesis option. This option is normally available only for those students planning on doing their practicum/thesis in the spring of their second year and for those that will be in residence. An exception to these guidelines will be considered for a student who has proven themselves to be both an excellent writer and a self-initiator. A student can make the case to write from a distance or on an alternate time table if they have: • Demonstrated capacity (at CJP) to complete complex research and writing projects in a timely manner. • Adequate access to Internet and technology to support the process. • Strong writing and editing skills so that there is limited or no need for writing support. Center for Justice and Peacebuilding - 71
Gender being a social construct plays a pivotal role in determining and maintaining social order. Though the fluidity of gender roles is increasing the core expectations of society continue to promote a rigid social infrastructure that not only promotes but also protects gender based discriminatory practices. Caste is an ancient concept of social stratification. It adapts to different concepts and manifest itself in newer forms. The core principles and practices of this system is deeply entrenched in society and dominates popular discourse. In practice, it has found ways and means to justify itself and stay relevant. Its attachment to the politics of identity and domination have been causes for concern over generations. In today’s context it continues to transform itself to promote and continue its dehumanizing practices. This class was offered as an elective course during the 2021-2022 academic year.
PAX 688Justice, Peace and the Biblical Story (3 SH)
The Bible has often been used to justify war and other forms of violence. The biblical story has also been read and interpreted as pertaining to only personal beliefs and behavior rather than communal concerns or social issues. The intent of this course is to explore the biblical story and what it says about issues of violence, justice, and peace. How are people who embrace the biblical story called to apply these understandings to their lives, personally and collectively? How have Christian communities around the world made use of the biblical story as a core component of their efforts to work for safety, emancipation, self-determination, and healing? How can we use biblical narratives in our work to build peace and justice within communities? As we examine these questions, we will center perspectives and traditions of reading the Bible birthed by people experiencing direct violence and oppression. This course is cross listed with Eastern Mennonite Seminary and will be offered on a semi-regular basis.
