10:20-12:00 pm Monday, January 17, 2005 - Thomas Jefferson School of Law
Room 200 Court Yard Building
Narratives of Human Rights Violations and Genocide Then and Now
Professor Sanford Levinson - " 'Torture' or 'Inhuman and Degrading Activity'? Giving a Narrative Structure to U.S. Practice in the Abu Ghraib Prison"
Professor Bryan Wildenthal - "The Legacy of the American Genocide Against the Indians"
Professor Anna Kaladiouk - "A Ukrainian Jew in a French Court: The Sholom Schwartzbard Trial"
Professor Sandra Bermann - "Mourning, Poetry, Justice: The War-Time Writings of René Char"
Alephonsion Deng and Judy A. Bernstein - "A Sudanese Victim's Narrative of the Lost Boys: Human Rights Violations in the Sudan"

"The name Lost Boys came to be when our village was attacked by fierce Arab horsemen. We, little boys, spewed out of the blazing village like a colony of ants disturbed in their nest. We ran in different directions not knowing where we are going. We gathered some fruits for our breakfast and lunch. We, little boys, were so messy, all chaos and cries filled the dark fiercely lightless night."

In 1987, when I was seven years old, my village in Southern Sudan was attacked by government troops. To avoid capture I ran into the night with many other young boys. We wandered for five years fleeing the war, starvation and wild animals. In 1992 we reached a refugee camp in Kakuma, Kenya where I began my education and learned English.
The U.S. Government welcomed many of us Lost Boys of Sudan to America in 2001. My first job was at Ralph's Grocery Store where I worked for nine months. An opportunity came up to be in a Russell Crowe movie where I would learn how to sail a tall ship, fire a cannon and fence. I went to Rosarito, Mexico where I lived for six months with the core group of actors. Now I work in the medical records department of Kaiser Permanente Hospital. My brother, Benson, my cousin, Benjamin and I have written our life story. It is entitled, They Want to Pour Fire on Us From the Sky and will be published by Public Affairs in June of 2005.