Peace History Society Biennial Conference

“Peace Across the Ages: Legacies, Lessons, and Change”
November 6–8, 2025 | Berry College | Mount Berry, GA

Thursday, November 6

4:30 PM – PHS Board Meeting (Location TBD)
6:00 PM – Board Dinner (Location TBD)
6:30–8:30 PM – Registration Table Open (Ford Living Room)
7:00–8:30 PM – Opening Reception (Ford Living Room)
Shuttle from Fairfield Inn to Berry College at 6:45, 7:15, 8:15, and 8:45 PM

Friday, November 7

Shuttle from Fairfield Inn to Berry College at 8:00, 8:20, and 8:40 AM
8:00 AM–5:00 PM – Registration (Krannert Center Back Lobby)
8:00–12:00 PM – Coffee (Krannert Ballroom)

Session I: 9:00–10:30 AM

Panel 1: Legacies and Lessons of Intergenerational Peacebuilding in Africa
Krannert 217

Chair and Commenter: Gail Presbey, University of Detroit Mercy
Legacy of the Nigerian Civil War: Historical Lessons for Contemporary Peacebuilding
Oge Samuel Okonkwo, The University of Ghana
The Forgotten Peacekeepers: African Veterans of Nonviolence UN Missions and the Intergenerational Transmission of Peace Ethics
Issac Abiodun Adelekun, University of Delaware
A Missing African Peace? West Africans, Anti-War Activism, and the Global Peace Movement (1928–1964)
Henrike Vellinga, Leiden University

Panel 2: Dodgers and GIs: Antiwar Activism during the Vietnam War
Krannert 324

Chair and Commenter: TBD
An Antiwar Activist’s Stanford Awakening: Mitchell Goodman’s Intellectual Journey, 1967–1972
Matthew Loayza, Minnesota State University, Mankato 
Waging Peace: Dissent, Democracy, and the Vietnam Antiwar Movement
Mitchell K. Hall, Central Michigan University
What Now? The GI Movement and Military Counseling in the Wake of the Vietnam War
Amy Rutenberg, Iowa State University

Session II: 10:45 AM–12:15 PM

Panel 3: Peace in the Face of Atomic Annihilation
Krannert 324

Chair and Commenter: TBD
The Last Peace: Collier’s and Liberal Dreams of Atomic Triumph, 1951
Mike Davis, Lees-McRae College
The Application of the Theory of Groupthink to the Cuban Missile Crisis
Lubna Qureshi, Independent Historian

Panel 4: Pacifism and Politics in Latin American Women’s Movements
Krannert 217

Chair and Commenter: TBD
Twentieth Century Latin American Women’s Movements
Marc Becker, Truman State University
The 1947 Inter-American Congress of Women and Guatemalan Women’s Movements
Patricia Harms, Brandon University
12:30 PM – Lunch and Awards Presentations
Krannert Ballroom

Session III: 2:00 PM–3:15 PM

Plenary Session
McAllister Auditorium

Keynote Speaker – (Name, Title)

Session IV: 3:30–5:00 PM

Panel 5: The U.S. Peace Movement in the Age of Deindustrialization                                         Krannert 324

Chair and Commenter: TBD
Civilian NASA: Organized Labor’s Role in the U.S. Peace Movement, 1970–1990
Sean Raming, University of Notre Dame
“A Desire for Peace Should Not Mean Unemployment”: The Trident Campaign, Peace Conversion, and the Limits of Peace Work in Southeastern Connecticut
Toshihiro Higuchi, Georgetown University
Ron Dellums, the Peace Dividend, and Base Closures in post-Cold War Oakland
David Fitzgerald, University College Cork

Panel 6: Women’s Roles in Peacebuilding and Protests for Change                                         Krannert 217

Chair and Commenter: TBD
South African Women’s Protests against Pass Laws and Internal Borders: Their Relevance for Women at International Borders Today
Gail Presbey, University of Detroit Mercy
The Critical Role of Women in Peace-Building: The Israeli and the Palestinian Peace Movements Model, 2014–2025
Pnina Shuker, Shalem College, Jerusalem
Peace Bodies: Women, Encampments, and the Struggle against Nuclear Weapons during the Cold War, 1979–1992
Janette Aileen Clay, North Park University
Dinner on your own (Berry Dining Hall is open in Krannert Basement)
Shuttle from Berry to Fairfield at 5:30, 6:00, and 6:30 PM

Saturday, November 8

8:00 AM–5:00 PM – Registration (Green Hall Lobby)
8:00–12:00 PM – Coffee (Green Hall Lobby)
Shuttle from Fairfield Inn to Berry College at 8:00, 8:20, and 8:40 AM

Session V: 9:00–10:30 AM

Panel 7: Uncovering Unconventional Peace Narratives                                                         Green 326

Chair and Commenter: Kelsey Rice, Berry College
Unquiet Archives: Public Memory and the Aporetic Sensorium in NFBC Digital Storytelling
John Bessai, Independent Scholar
Boredom and Brutality: Unveiling the Untold Realities of the War in Afghanistan
Dominic J. Markham, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs
Politics of Peace Narratives
Vanja Petričević, Florida Gulf Coast University

Panel 8: Exemplary Women in the Fight for Peace                                                      Green 306

Chair and Commenter: TBD
Kathleen Lonsdale: Living a Life of Integrity in Challenging Times
Deborah Buffton, University of Wisconsin-La Crosse
A Buffer and a Bridge: Mary Emma Wooley at the 1932 Geneva Disarmament Conference
Christy Jo Snider, Berry College
Peace in the Shadow of [Dis]order: Overlapping the Intellectual Life of Adetowun
Olatunde Taiwo, University of Ghana and Olabisi Onabanjo University, Nigeria

 

Session VI: 10:45 AM–12:15 PM

Panel 9: International Coalitions for Peace in the Era of Decolonization Green 326

Chair and Commenter: TBD
Towards a (More) Global History of International Peace Advocacy
Carolien Stolte, Leiden University
Nature’s Violence: The Intellectual Origins of Nonviolence in Evolutionist and Ecological Ashrams
Floris de Ruiter, Leiden University
Forgotten Paths to Independence: Peace, Pacifism, and the Decolonization of the Maghreb
Daniele Paolini, Leiden University

Panel 10: Transnational Anti-Nuclearism at the End of the Cold War  Green 306

Chair and Commenter: TBD
Peace Heroes: Peace Activists Confront the Arms Race, 1977–1987
Henry Maar, California State University, Northridge
The International Campaign to Promote Conscientious Objection Rights in the Soviet Bloc, 1985–1991
Christian P. Peterson, Ferris State University
The Nevada-Semipalatinsk Anti-Nuclear Movement: Embedding the USSR in Networks of Global (Anti)-Colonialism
Kamila Smagulova, Leiden University
12:30 PM – Lunch and PHS Business Meeting
Krannert Ballroom

Session VII: 2:00–3:30 PM

Panel 11: The Diplomacy of Peace
Green 326

Chair and Commenter: TBD
Divide et impera: Peace and War in an Early Modern Maxim
Emanuele Sigismondi, Sapienza University of Rome
Helping to Negotiate a New Law of the Sea Treaty in the 1970s: Lessons for Today’s Peace and Environmental Activists
Ralph Levering, Davidson College
Shifting Affinities: Mapping the Relationship between Weapons Prohibitions and Pacifism, 1860s–1920s
Elena Kempf, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Panel 12: New Approaches to Peace Education                                                                           Green 306

Chair and Commenter: TBD
Peace Across the Ages: Legacies, Lessons, and Change
Joyce Apsel, New York University
Deconstructing Curriculums of Peace: Pathways Towards Countering the Epistemic Violence of Pacifying Pedagogies
Courtney Langerud and Casey Tokita, Arizona State University
TED Talk Peace: An Analysis
Stephen W. Minnema, Independent Scholar

Farewell Remarks: 3:45-4:15 PM
Green 306

Dinner on your own
Shuttle from Berry to Fairfield at 4:00 and 4:30 PM