Disciplinary Frontiers of Human Rights in Higher Education

This groundbreaking book explores the expanding and impactful relationship between human rights and academia, illustrating historical and emerging practices for integrating human rights within scholarship and teaching in a range of disciplines and professional studies. By providing examples of meaningful applications across thirteen academic fields, chapters examine the varied ways that higher education engages with human rights ontologically, theoretically, conceptually, and in practice. Collectively, it also demonstrates that human rights remain essential for addressing twenty-first-century challenges, emphasizing the role of faculty and students in advancing this work. Offering a framework for designing and studying the infusion of human rights within and across disciplines, this work includes a broad range of discussion questions to enrich learner engagement, critical thinking, and practical application. It is a vital resource for instructors, departments, and multidisciplinary centers, as well as anyone engaged in human rights, social justice, peace, and global citizenship education.

Cher Weixia Chen is Associate Professor at George Mason University, USA, and founder of the Human Rights and Global Justice Initiative, where she co-developed its social justice and human rights programs. She is Fulbright Canada Research Chair in Human Rights and Social Justice and a recipient of the University and College Consortium for Human Rights Education Human Rights in Higher Education Award.

Felisa Tibbitts is UNESCO Chair in Human Rights and Higher Education at Utrecht University, Netherlands, and an adjunct at Columbia University and Nelson Mandela University. Felisa was previously a Human Rights Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and a Fulbright recipient. She currently directs Human Rights Education Associates (www.hrea.org).

Jonathan Liljeblad is a Visiting Fellow of the Harvard Law School Human Rights Program. He was previously at Oxford University, where he was Research Visitor at the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights and Academic Visitor at Saint Antony's College. Before that Jonathan was at Cambridge University as Academic Visitor at the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law.