Human Rights Education Now!

Episode 7: Rosemary Blanchard Part One

May 29, 2023 Human Rights Educators USA Season 1 Episode 7
Human Rights Education Now!
Episode 7: Rosemary Blanchard Part One
Show Notes

In Episode 1, Rosemary Blanchard discusses her early interest in human rights issues and the importance of HRE in early education. She shares her background in civil rights law, and how witnessing extreme poverty on a  trip to Brazil was transformative in shaping her views on HRE. She shares how working with the Navajo nation as a policy analyst helped her to better understand international human rights frameworks, and how assimilation through education is a problematic issue in Navajo education. Rosemary then explains her views on the role of American exceptionalism in hampering HRE’s advance in the US. Rosemary discusses the NCSS HRE Community’s role in advancing HRE; its connections to humanitarian law; the lack of domestic understanding of international human rights in the USA; the impact of Abu Ghraib torture on her work in HRE; and the contradictions between US ideals and practices at Abu Ghraib. Finally, Rosemary shares her belief in the significance of building civil society on respect for human dignity.

Topics Discussed:

  • Introduction to human rights education through civil rights law
  •  Navajo work and its connection to her work in HRE
  • American exceptionalism’s role in hampering HRE’s advance in the USA
  • Insuring encounters through public education with humanitarian law
  • Abu Ghraib and contradictions between US ideals and practices


Full topic listing available for PDF download HERE.

Introduction and Closing Music Credit: “Awakening-Spring” by Ketsa, from the Album Night Vision. Available at the Free Music Archive: https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Ketsa/night-vision/awakening-spring/

This music is used in accordance with this Creative Commons License: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Information about that license is available here https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

Human Rights Education Now! is produced and distributed in accordance with Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 DEED, Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 4.0 International. Information about this license is available here: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/