Episode 13: Felisa Tibbitts, Part One

Human Rights Education Now!

Felisa Tibbitts (www.FelisaTibbitts.com) is Chair in Human Rights Education in the Department of Law, Economics, and Governance at Utrecht University in the Netherlands, where she also serves as UNESCO Chair in Human Rights and Higher Education. In addition, Felisa is Human Rights Education Associates (www.hrea.org) Executive Director and co-editor with André Keet of Emancipatory Human Rights and the University: Promoting Social Justice in Higher Education (2024).

In Episode 13, Felisa discusses her initial interest in human rights and Human Rights Education (HRE) and how the Cold War influenced her outlook on the world. She elaborates on her research in Central and Eastern Europe along with her early work in HRE with the Dutch Helsinki Committee. Next, Felisa shares her views on the changes occurring within the field of human rights study in pre-collegiate education, and how ad hoc approaches to HRE remain a challenge moving forward. Felisa then discusses how the lack of a centralized system in the US presents both problems and opportunities, and the challenge of American exceptionalism as an obstacle to HRE development. Felisa addresses globalization and how it may make it more desirable to discuss and apply human rights-based approaches in the USA at the national and local levels. Finally, she explains how rights language is becoming more commonplace in the US, demonstrated by the importance of critical pedagogy and feminist scholarship, as well as her work on three conceptual models for HRE.

Topics discussed:

• Initial interest in human rights and HRE
• The Cold War and impact on world view
• Research and work in Central and Eastern Europe
• Human rights work with Dutch Helsinki Committee
• Changes occurring within the field of HRE
• Lack of a centralized education system and HRE challenges/obstacles
• American exceptionalism and HRE
• Globalization and HRE
• Importance of critical pedagogy/feminist scholarship
• Three conceptual models for HRE

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/