By UW-Stout Office of University Communications
In mid-August, after Milwaukee police fatally shot an armed black man, two nights of protests erupted in the Sherman Park neighborhood there, drawing national attention to a city where racial tension already was high.
Businesses and cars were burned, and four officers were injured as police cracked down on the protestors and made several arrests.
For a first-person reaction to the unrest in the Sherman Park neighborhood, where the author spent time while growing up, click here.
A month later, University of Wisconsin-Stout instructor James Handley stood in front of hundreds of Milwaukee School of Languages students. He was invited to speak to them about responding to conflict in ways that are constructive rather than destructive and that have potential to lead to reconciliation and, ultimately, peace.
“Their community has been shaken by the recent protests. I think, if nothing else, we planted the seeds of nonviolence with this visit,” said Handley, whose talk was titled “Activism and Nonviolence.”
Handley is a senior lecturer in the applied peace studies minor and in geography in UW-Stout’s social science department. He also is a certified nonviolence trainer and at UW-Stout earlier this year held a Kingian Nonviolence training workshop, based on Martin Luther King Jr.’s principles.
Talks in Milwaukee
In mid-September in Milwaukee, Handley spoke to about 600 high school students in the morning and about 800 middle school students in the afternoon. The Milwaukee School of Languages offers language immersion programs in four languages to students in grades 6 through 12.
Handley has been invited back to present a full-day session on Saturday, Nov. 5. Several dozen students and five teachers have signed up so far.
In his talks Handley raised the questions: What is peace, and is it possible to achieve?
“I discussed ways students can use their individual and collective power to bring about positive social change. I explained the meaning of empathy and the role it plays in nonviolent social movements using Dr. King’s words, ‘Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be.’ ”
Based on their reactions, Handley believes he made inroads with students as he discussed the principles and strategies of nonviolence taught by King “and why grounding our action in King’s teaching will help lead to positive change. Students were engaged and at times enthusiastically participated in the discussion,” Handley said.
King once called nonviolent social movements “a powerful and just weapon, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it. It is a sword that heals. At the center of nonviolence stands the principle of love.”
Follow-ups
Several students spoke with Handley after his talk about specific ways they can develop and spread nonviolence in their school and community and how love can be elevated to a powerful social force in the struggle for justice, he said.
Handley also visited classes at Milwaukee School of Languages after his talks for further discussion of nonviolence, especially as it related to the Milwaukee protests. Teenagers, for example, had a 10 p.m. curfew in August after the protests broke out.
“Students expressed their anger, fear and frustration regarding the current social conditions in their community. We discussed the idea that there won’t be justice without a struggle, but the ways in which we choose to wage that struggle will be the deciding factor in whether we are successful or not,” Handley said.
He was encouraged by how receptive students were to his message that nonviolence and informed activism are a viable path to peace and conflict resolution.
“Days like this give me hope that that will happen,” Handley said.
Upcoming Presentations
Along with returning to Milwaukee Nov. 5, Handley has two other training sessions planned this fall.
- On Saturday, Oct. 29, in De Pere, he will talk at St. Norbert College.
- On Friday, Nov. 4, at UW-Stout, he will lead a session with Ainka Jackson, director of the Selma Center for Nonviolence, Truth and Reconciliation in Selma, AL.
Funding for Jackson’s trip is being provided by Students UNITE, a UW-Stout student organization that Handley advises. Jackson also will accompany Handley to Milwaukee on Nov. 5.
In the applied peace studies minor at UW-Stout, students explore the root causes of violence and study nonviolent strategies for conflict resolution. Learn more at www.uwstout.edu/programs/minors/aps/index.cfm.