GENDER, EDUCATION AND HEALTH IN THE POST-COLONIAL WORLD

News – The Bengal
Andrew Crighton
News Editor
“The world we live in today, whether we like it or not, has been transformed, affected by colonial rule.” This remark, spoken by Karni Bhati, set the tone for the 46th annual Frank Church Symposium at ISU March 2 and 3.
The ISU International Affairs Council organizes and hosts the event every spring in order to help increase awareness of international issues and open dialogue with students by having experts from all over the world come to campus.
The event is named after Idaho Senator Frank Church, who held the position chair position of the U.S. Committee on Foreign Relations throughout the Vietnam War.
Every year the event has a general topic of discussion selected by the IAC members. The 2017 symposium carried the topic of “The Post-Colonial State.”
Presenters for this year included Bhati, an Associate Professor at Furman University, Saad Omer of the Emory Vaccine Center and Bonny Ibhawoh, a professor at McMaster University.
Ibhawoh presented the keynote address Thursday night at the Stephen’s Performing Arts Center.
Throughout the event, panels were hosted on various sub-topics of post-colonialism. Such panels included gender, intervention in the Middle East, interregional issues, conflict and global health.
Each panel consisted of three guests who a gave presentation, after which the floor was opened to the audience for a question-and-answer period.
Each day was supplemented with lecture by one of the visiting panelists.
Roger Kangas, a professor at Georgetown University, gave the Joseph Hearst Memorial Lecture on March 2 and Omer presented the Richard H. Foster Lecture on Friday.
Kangas spoke on Central Asia and Afghanistan while Omer discussed global health.
The panel on colonialism itself was presented by Ogechi Anyanwu, professor at Eastern Kentucky University, Bhati and Adam Warren, a professor at University of Washington.
All three presenters chose to speak on education within post-colonial states, and the similarities they ...


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