Genocide education has made a profound impact on me
By James Ingram, ST Youth Ambassador Coordinator
Today is Holocaust Memorial Day, where the UK comes together to remember the victims of the Holocaust and subsequent genocides. It also encourages us to reflect and try to learn from genocide and mistakes that were made. As a previous member of the Genocide 80Twenty group and an activist within the genocide education community, I know how powerful this process can be but also where improvements must be made.
Genocide education has made a profound impact on me. Prior to my involvement within genocide education I knew little about genocide. I knew the basics of the Holocaust and the names of subsequent genocide but I treated them as isolated moments of history rather than events that teach us important lessons. Subsequent to my involvement with Genocide 80Twenty, speaking to survivors from varying genocides and visiting Rwanda last summer, I now know how important it is.
Genocide education is more important than ever before. The world is faced with growing extremism, nationalism and xenophobia. Genocide education encourages young people to deal with these threats, teaching them about how society unravels and why we have to unify as people rather than divide.
Holocaust Memorial Day is also a day where we should recognise the contribution that survivors make. Survivors from groups like Survivors Tribune travel the country, often telling difficult stories. They sacrifice their time and energy to help create a new generation of young people that embraces diversity and feels morally responsible to prevent genocide happening again.
Yet work must be done to ensure that genocide education is the best it can be. Greater focus must be placed on positive actors in genocide. I was inspired to become active in genocide education not by knowing the details of the Final Solution but by watching Schindler’s list and meeting figures such as Carl Wilkens and Eric Murangwa. Genocide education must not be done to meet targets, it must aim to encourage young people to create a more inclusive society whether that is being involved in genocide education or just volunteering in the local community.
More opportunities must also be provided to young people to act upon lessons they have learnt from genocide education. Often young people feel inspired to act but have no vehicle to do so. This is why I will be heading up an Ambassador scheme for Survivors Tribune. Its purpose will be to provide an opportunity for young people who want to get involved with genocide education and shape it alongside survivors to make it the best it can be.
So today on Holocaust Memorial Day we should reflect on the lessons of the genocide, recognise the importance of education on genocide and renew the commitment to make sure young people get the best possible experience from it.
James Ingram, 18 years old. Original member and student leader of Genocide 80Twenty which began in November 2014 and I left this year as I have gone to university.
Learning Kinyarwanda helped me fall in love with my country, Rwanda
By Junior Sabena Mutabazi,
Not a lot of people can say their grandmother is their hero and role model but, I can and I do. Like many Rwandans, I was born outside my country, in a Bantu environment where languages were in abundant supply. I remember as a child at my school; if I turned left to a friend, I would speak one language, and if I turned right, I would speak an entirely different language - it was like the Olympics. But, neither of these languages were my mother-tongue, Kinyarwanda.
However, that was at school. At home, after my grandmother had noticed that my brother and I could speak several languages except Kinyarwanda, she passed an in-house ‘law’: Kinyarwanda was to be spoken at all times. At first, my older brother and I thought that we were being punished through no fault of our own; besides, how were we expected to communicate in a language we barely knew? It was a nightmare. In fact, many evenings we remained silent, we did not have a starting point to a conversation. The only way we could find solace was to read books or watch television – all of which were in English.
Thankfully, children are quick learners; gradually, as our grandmother taught us a few words and also made us listen to evening bulletins on Radio Muhabura every night, we also picked up a few words from here and there – in exile, Rwandans were everywhere. So, as a routine, my brother and I would go to school, speak English as well as other languages but, when we got through the front door and inside our home, Kinyarwanda lessons would be in motion, immediately. And after a few years of practice, my brother and I graduated as elementary Kinyarwanda speakers, certified by none other than my grandmother. There was no ceremony, but the reward was the ability to comfortably initiate a conversation and, even strike a joke! I was content with that.
In early 1995, a few months after the Rwanda Patriotic Front / Army had put an end to the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, my brother and I wanted to visit our motherland for the first time. However, before we could set off in the company of a relative, I remember my grandmother holding my hand and telling me: “Junior, when you visit your motherland for the first time, you will also be able to speak your mother tongue. I taught you and your brother Kinyarwanda so that one day, when you return home, those who exiled our people back in 1959 can hear you and other young Rwandans speak Kinyarwanda. When they do, from wherever they will be, they will realise that back then when they looted and burned our homes, killed our families, and drove us into exile, they may have succeeded at breaking our bodies, but they never ever succeeded at breaking our Rwandan spirit. Our culture, language, and traditions remained intact.”
Today, I speak more than four languages including Kinyarwanda. For me, if there is one single factor that can help explain why I have fallen in love with my country time and again, it is the ability to speak my mother tongue. This ability to speak Kinyarwanda, even though I have spent most of my life outside Rwanda, helps me to recognise and give value to my Rwandan identity. It helps me to connect with my people both at home and abroad, and it helps me maintain my culture as well as my heritage. The ability to speak Kinyarwanda has also helped me to maintain important links to family.
Looking forward, I also know that when I eventually decide to return home, Kinyarwanda will be an asset when I look to create or seek employment and even settle in a local community.
Many years ago as a child, I was none the wiser when it came to truly understanding why my grandmother was very strict with me and my brother. I did not fully appreciate the value of speaking my mother-tongue in a foreign country - it was irrelevant in my school life and much of my child life. And besides, I would have triggered the mockery of calling me a foreigner, even though I was nothing but. I found English to be the safest possible language. It was foreign, yes, but it was a colonial language, and we Africans place no stigma on foreign languages as long as they are the native languages of our former colonial masters. Instead, we tend to elevate whoever speaks the most in our societies. But, that’s a story for another day.
Fortunately, my grandmother was there to help me recognise the true value of speaking Kinyarwanda. Now, I am aware that most of the rationale behind speaking Kinyarwanda cannot be linked to monetary value, but for me, there is more to monetary value. There is culture, heritage, history, education, and many more reasons why one’s native language is so important.
Today, from where I am in the diaspora, I know many other people, young as well as old, who wish they had someone of the same resilience and vision as my grandmother to help them or inspire them to connect or reconnect with Rwanda. For me, it was Kinyarwanda back when I was a kid. For you, it could be something entirely different or, the same. But, whatever it is, discover it and, run with it. You will be glad you did.
All things considered, I am not promising smooth sailing journey. Of course, there will be challenges. But, inaction should not be an option. In fact, I am reminded of Dr Martin Luther King who once said that - if you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward. I am forever thankful to my grandmother for the gift of Kinyarwanda!
Email: junior.mutabazi@yahoo.co.uk
Twitter:@Jsabex
Why do we remember?
By JO Ingabire Moys,
Why do we remember? Why does our history matter? I often hear of tales of elderly folk on their deathbeds looking back on their lives searching for memories that will say, ‘My life mattered.’If our memories are the sum of our human experience, how can victims of crime and genocide find meaning beyond their trauma?
I’m not thirty yet but for most of my short life I was defined defined by a singular event that has shaped my personality, my approach to social interaction,my entire worldview. This is not uncommon for people like me, Rwandans affected by the genocide against the Tutsis. In a matter of three months, a nation was changed beyond recognition by mass murder of a people group by their own government. That kind of violence registers not just on the nation’s psyche but on it’s soul. And yet every April, Rwandans take week out of their calendar to remember.
In September 2015, the United Nations General Assembly established 9 December as the International Day of Commemoration and Dignity of the Victims of the Crime of Genocide and of the Prevention of this Crime.
Personally, I think remembering for the victim cannot only be therapeutic, but it is essential in constructing an identity beyond the trauma. By acknowledging the hurt endured, there can be healing. In facing and confronting your persecutors, there’s justice and dignity to be found. The word ‘victim’ often carries negative connotations and unnecessarily so. When it comes to issues of genocide where a people are systematically persecuted, it is vital to acknowledge their plight. When they are silenced, brutalized, oppressed, an essential part of restoring dignity is to address the manner of their persecution and create forums where their voices can be heard again and their stories told.
It is important to remember the perished and with living victims, to look back at their memories and say, ‘Your life mattered.’ Commemoration goes beyond learning from an event in history. It begins the process of writing history free of war and genocide.
Personally, I think remembering for the victim cannot only be therapeutic, but it is essential in constructing an identity beyond the trauma. By acknowledging the hurt endured, there can be healing. In facing and confronting your persecutors, there’s justice and dignity to be found. The word ‘victim’ often carries negative connotations and unnecessarily so. When it comes to issues of genocide where a people are systematically persecuted, it is vital to acknowledge their plight. When they are silenced, brutalized, oppressed, an essential part of restoring dignity is to address the manner of their persecution and create forums where their voices can be heard again and their stories told.
It is important to remember the perished and with living victims, to look back at their memories and say, ‘Your life mattered.’ Commemoration goes beyond learning from an event in history. It begins the process of writing history free of war and genocide.
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