Syllabus

Learning Cluster Syllabus, Winter Block 2012

CHILDREN'S RIGHTS IN ARGENTINA: GENOCIDE, ECONOMIC CRISIS AND THE SEARCH FOR JUSTICE

Course description and goals
Children comprise a considerably neglected area in discourse of the protection of human rights. Children occupy an ambiguous juridical space, since they are deemed too immature to be able to defend themselves and raise demands. Their rights are often associated with the rights of their biological parents, as children do not participate in politics and cannot vote. Governmental institutions often neglect them. Most agree that children have very little control over their lives and cannot advocate for the type of world that they would like to live in.

The purpose of this Learning Cluster is to provide students with an intensive working knowledge of the changes in the conception and protection of the rights of children in Argentina through the last civic and military dictatorship and the economic crisis of 2001. It aims to understand how these two events compel Argentineans to reconsider the importance of the incorporation the UN convention on the rights of children into the national constitution. The hands-on experience of interviewing human rights activists, government representatives, children that were appropriated during the dictatorship and the grandmothers who never gave up hope of finding them, will be an educative experience for students both intellectually and emotionally. It will force them to reconsider some of their own notions of what constitutes the rights of a child.

The following are some of the initial questions we would like to explore in the Learning Cluster: What are some of most basic rights of children? What rights do children have that protect them from exploitation, abuse, trafficking, and appropriation? Are children capable of exercising choices and if so, should children have the right to participate in political reforms? Which institutions should represent children, if any? What occurred during the genocide in Argentina and the subsequent economic crisis that affects children's rights? How are Argentine youths currently involved in the efforts to preserve the memory of the political, cultural and social genocide? How has the youth mobilized to face current socio-political issues in the country? And most importantly, how can we learn from their experiences?

We have chosen to conduct on-site research because Argentina’s recent past demonstrates unprecedented abuses to the traditional rights of children that are embraced by almost every culture in the world. The last military dictatorship in Argentina enacted a genocide that left thousands dead and disappeared. Citizens, political activists, intellectuals were kidnapped and imprisoned in clandestine detention centers. They were often tortured and killed. Pregnant women gave birth in captivity, and their babies were appropriated by military personnel or sympathizers of the regime. As a result of such abuses, grassroots human rights organization like the Grandmothers of Plaza de Mayo sought the assistance of forensic anthropologists (Equipo Argentino de Antropología Forense, EAAF) and DNA researchers in the United States to create a genetic bank that could help them find their biological grandchildren. Since the late 1980s more than 100 of these missing children have been identified, prompting politicians and members of the legal system to rethink constitutional rights in order to ensure that, even during military conflicts, there are certain rights of children and youth that should be upheld. This painful history has informed the legal debates about the rights of children in Argentina for the last 30 years.

Students will spend the first days in Buenos Aires reading books and articles, and watching films about the issues faced by children (and youth) in Argentina in order to gain a foundational knowledge to aid them in their understanding of the field research. The accompanying faculty has secured a location for class meetings. As part of our field research in Buenos Aires, starting the second week, we plan to interview human rights activists and youth who work in organizations dedicated to the protection of rights of children (see attached syllabus). We will also interview victims of state repression who were taken away after their birth in detention centers and given to military families to be raised under the ideology of the dictatorship. They are around 30 years of age now, and two of them Victoria Donda and Juan Cabandié have recently been elected to the Congress. We also plan to interview filmmakers, lawyers, judges and governmental officials who work to unearth the past and face contemporary problems such as child trafficking. We will visit the genetic bank in Buenos Aires and meet with members of the world-renown EEAF.

Topics and goals
Some of the general topics and goals of the Learning Cluster are:

1. Gain an understanding of the human rights abuses that took place during years of the last dictatorship and the economic crisis. We will research the ongoing trials against genocidal criminals and their impact in national legislation (e.g. the right to identity, Law 23.054)


2. Investigate the youths’ efforts to preserve the memory of genocide and their efforts for reconciliation


3. Research the appropriation of children and that took place during the years of the dictatorship


4. Facilitate and create long lasting relationships between youth activists in Argentina and the students participating in the Learning Cluster to further the cause of the rights of children (and youth)


5. Understand the ways in which children and youth are creating value out of the limitations of their rights, and the ways we can learn from their experiences

Assignments:
4 responses to readings (annotated bibliography, 2 pages each) 45%

Participation 30%

Web development (uploading of photo essays, film clips, newspaper 25%

articles, links to organizations, transcription of interviews, annotated bibliography)

Grading system and Final Project

Upon returning to campus students will discuss the outcome of their research and will collaborate in the creation of a website. This website will be used as a tool to spread awareness on the issues researched in Argentina, and share it with the rest of the campus community during the Learning Cluster Fair (for an example of a website of a previous LC led by Crowder-Taraborrelli go to http://crowderlearningcluster.blogspot.com). 

Disability Issues:
If you require academic accommodations based on a documented disability during this course, please see me early on.

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Allen, Anita Lafrance. Rights, Children and Education. 1979. Print.

Ang, Fiona. Participation Rights of Children. Antwerpen: Intersentia, 2006. Print.

Archard, David, and Colin M. MacLeod. The Moral and Political Status of Children: New Essays. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002. Print.

Archard, David, and Colin M. MacLeod. The Moral and Political Status of Children: New Essays. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2002. Print.

Arditti, Rita. Searching for Life: the Grandmothers of the Plaza De Mayo and the Disappeared Children of Argentina. Berkeley: University of California, 1999. Print.

Bouvard, Marguerite Guzman. Revolutionizing Motherhood: the Mothers of the Plaza De Mayo. Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, 1994. Print.

Browning, Don S., M. Christian Green, and John Witte. Sex, Marriage, and Family in World Religions. New York: Columbia UP, 2006. Print.

Holt, John Caldwell. Escape from Childhood: the Needs and Rights of Children. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1975. Print.

Humphrey, Michael. The Politics of Atrocity and Reconciliation: from Terror to Trauma. London: Routledge, 2002. Print.

Jaroslavsky, Andrés. The Future of Memory: Children of the Dictatorship in Argentina Speak. London: Latin American Bureau, 2004. Print.

Jelin, Elizabeth, and Federico Lorenz. Educación Y Memoria: La Escuela Elabora El Pasado. Madrid: Siglo XXI, 2004. Print.

Kaiser, Susana. Postmemories of Terror: a New Generation Copes with the Legacy of the "Dirty War" New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005. Print.

Koonings, Kees, and Dirk Kruijt. Societies of Fear: the Legacy of Civil War, Violence and Terror in Latin America. London: Zed, 1999. Print.

LeBlanc, Lawrence J. The Convention on the Rights of the Child: United Nations Lawmaking on Human Rights. Lincoln: University of Nebraska, 1995. Print.

Lessa, Francesca, and Vincent Druliolle. The Memory of State Terrorism in the Southern Cone: Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Print.

MacCormick, Neil. Legal Right and Social Democracy Essays in Legal and Political Philosophy. Oxford [u.a.: Clarendon, 1986. Print.

O'Neill, Onora, and William Ruddick. Having Children: Philosophical and Legal Reflections on Parenthood : Essays. New York: Oxford UP, 1979. Print.

Purdy, Laura Martha. In Their Best Interest?: the Case against Equal Rights for Children. Ithaca and London: Cornell UP, 1992. Print.

Roht-Arriaza, Naomi. The Pinochet Effect Transnational Justice in the Age of Human Rights. Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania, 2006. Print.

Rutgers, Catherine. Creating a World Fit for Children: Understanding the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. New York: International Debate Education Association, 2011. Print.

Sumner, L. W. The Moral Foundation of Rights. Oxford [Oxfordshire: Clarendon, 1987. Print.

Verhellen, Eugeen. Convention on the Rights of the Child: Background, Motivation, Strategies, Main Themes. Antwerp: Garant, 2006. Print.

Williamson, David. Birthrights. 2002. Print.

SELECTED FILMOGRAPHY

Cautiva, Gastón Biraben (2004)

H.I.J.O.S: el alma en dos, Dir. Carmen Guarini, Marcelo Céspedes (2001)

La mirada invisible, Diego Lerman, (2010)

The Dignity of the Nobodies, Dir. Fernando "Pino" Solanas (2005)