Billy Miller’s Peace & Conflict class is raising conciousness about sexual harassment at Principia.
By means of a two-hour Principia Internet Radio (PIR) segment on May 21 and an upcoming short film, to be shown during tenth week, the class has opened up discussion about the issue.
Peace & Conflict is a class at Principia dedicated to creating an environment that embraces and stimulates positive peace. This concept of peace delves deeper than a state of harmony without war (negative peace), to a notion of “working to end all forms of oppression,” as Miller said.
During the quarter, Miller instructs the class to find a topic with firm roots in human rights that is in need of increased awareness on a campus-wide scale. This project enables students to apply the conflict resolution techniques that they have learned to a real life issue.
This spring, the students unanimously decided that they would focus on the subject of sexual harassment. The radio program was formatted as a round table discussion and touched upon everything from conduct constituting harassment to accounts of harassment on campus. Senior Sara Mata said the purpose of the project was to “create dialogue to bring about change.” Senior Alison Cline said, “We are creating awareness.”
None of the ideas or opinions that were shared and discussed during the radio program were presented in an aggressive tone. The purpose of this discussion was education, and as Miller said, the class was not “trying to protest anything or anybody.” Instead of pointing fingers, the members of this class folded their hands and concentrated on the variety of ways to alleviate the problem of sexual harassment on a grand scale, as well as at Principia. We’re not as exempt from the rest of the world as we think we are, said Mata.
This is not to say that Prin’s policies are without room for change. As recent issues on campus have become publicized, it is becoming clear that certain aspects of the policies need to be modified, as members of the class said. Senior Chelsea Sutton said, This is our community. We all have a responsibility to help things.
One of the main issues is the lack of information available detailing Prin’s policies. It is true that each freshman attends a required talk about harassment and that they also receive a summary of what Prin considers sexual harassment. However, the Peace and Conflict class believes that this should not be the extent of the conversation.
A few members of the class admitted that they did not remember the meeting in their freshman year and were unaware of any paperwork on the topic. A couple of local colleges have attached a readily available outline of their sexual harassment policies to their college websites. Students consider this to be a possible resolution to the information issue, as well as a way to raise consciousness.
The film that the class is putting together will be presented in a documentary format. It will emphasize student perceptions and understanding of sexual harassment, as well as personal accounts of sexual harassment from students on campus. These accounts will be shared either by the victim, but if they wish to remain anonymous, a member of the class will share the story in the first person narrative.
Cline said that a great deal of people, both male and female, have already shown their interest in sharing their experiences within the forum of the film.
According to class members, sexual harassment is a serious issue of which members of every community need to be aware. They hope this project will raise the current state of passive understanding to a more enlightened state – perhaps even to the realization of positive peace.
