The UW Center for Human Rights is proud to present six fellowships to students for their human rights work. The recipients, as pictured above (left to right):
Emily Willard received the 2018 Benjamin Linder Justice Award. She will continue conducting research for her dissertation on the involvement of women in the Guatemalan Civil War.
Diana Gabriela Ocampo Ucha received the 2018 Abe Osheroff-Gunnel Clark Award. The funds will allow Gabriela to continue her work at International Human Rights Clinic (housed at the UW School of Law) to defend the rights of immigrants against abuses perpetrated by the US government and private prisons who profit from immigration incarceration.
Bree Bang-Jensen received the 2018 Dr. Lisa Sable Brown Award. Bree will use the funds from the award to support her dissertation research on the way countries decide to exit international treaties establishing norms against slavery and other grievous rights abuses.
Medhanit Abebe co-recipient of the 2018 Peter Mack and Jamie Mayerfeld Award. Medhanit plans to use funds from the award to conduct fieldwork in Kenya on the ways in which laws fail to take into account the particular vulnerabilities faced by women encountering land acquisitions.
Julia (“Clare”) Morrrison received the 2018 Jennifer Caldwell Award. In addition to research projects for UWCHR, Clare planned to travel to Nicaragua to continue her work teaching English and managing education programs in an underserved community center. However, it is no longer safe for Clare to travel because of the current political situation in Nicaragua. Clare will continue to conduct research for the UWCHR, in particular, the collaborative project we have with the Northwest Detention Center Resistance.
Erica Tucker co-recipient of the 2018 Peter Mack and Jamie Mayerfeld Award. Erica intends to construct an archive based on her own family’s experiences as Native Americans whose land was stolen. Ms. Tucker writes, “I attempt to create a family archive alongside the history of the Long Walk of the Diné and a feminist critical discourse analysis of newspaper articles published during the mid-1800s. My family’s oral histories include stories of my great-great grandparents, whose land and livelihood in Canyon de Chelly were stolen when they were forced to participate in the Long Walk. The most important purpose of my travel is to perform interviews with family members who still reside in the region. Many of my elders have passed, but a few remain, and I am honored to have the opportunity not only to visit and hear their stories but to document them as part of a larger, critical work.”