09-02-2025
Speaking to protect, prevent and remember
By Forrest Adams
Her face was intense as her eyes recalled a room full of 6-foot-long tables with skulls on them.
Machete marks were still in the skulls, and Dr. Ellen Kennedy said she began to sob.
'I was overcome by what I saw,' her eyes focused on the present. 'There was a horrific loss of life.'
The interim director at the University of Minnesota Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies will be at the Chanhassen Library this Saturday speaking about international peace building and conflict resolution as part of the library's Great Decisions series.
Rwanda
In 2005, Kennedy traveled to Rwanda, Africa. A professor, now retired, she had been teaching and speaking about the Rwandan Genocide of 1994 since it happened. Experiencing its effects first-hand brought the harsh reality into her life in a whole different way.
'In Rwanda I met a woman named Alice,' she said. 'Alice is an orphan survivor of that genocide. One day in 1994 her mother asked her to go to the next village on an errand to her cousin's house. When Alice returned home, she was the one to discover the bodies of her grandparents, her mother and her father, her 12-year-old sister, and her 9-year-old and 2-year-old brothers. She became an orphan as a consequence of that genocide, like literally hundreds of thousands of other children.'
In that hut full of unidentified skulls, down a dirt path in the jungle, Kennedy's heart was torn. She said, Alice told her, 'You don't need to see this. This isn't your problem. It's our problem.'
The statement was an indictment of the world's response to genocide, she said. It seared into Kennedy's conscience. She returned to continue teaching at St. Thomas University, but on the topic of the Rwandan Genocide she had a renewed sense of obligation and personal responsibility to increase awareness about what had happened.
One day after class a student asked her what could be done by ordinary people. Genocides happen for many complicated reasons. Was there anything immediate that people could do to stop the massive loss of human life? The student wanted to know, and Kennedy is still responding to that question.
World Without Genocide
In 2005 she founded a not-for-profit organization called World Without Genocide ( The organization has a four-fold mission: to protect, prevent, prosecute and remember. The intention is to protect innocent people, prevent genocides from happening, prosecute the perpetrators, and remember the victims.
Her efforts have been recognized locally and nationally. In 2009 Kennedy was the recipient of the Anne Frank 'Outstanding Citizen' Award. She is driven by a mission
'Genocide is a global problem. It's our problem,' she said. 'We believe that knowledge plus action equals power.'
Now retired from the classroom, she herself is like a mobile classroom. She concentrates on educating people about the crises that go on in the world and about steps they can take to make a difference.
'Ordinary citizens can do a great deal,' she said. 'Former President Clinton was president in 1994 during the Rwandan genocide. He said that he could have saved probably a few hundred thousand lives, but he did nothing because he heard nothing from senators or representatives urging him to take action.'
The reason elected officials failed to take action was because ordinary citizens failed to take action, she said.
'We encourage ordinary citizens to contact their representatives. We encourage people to call 1-800-Genocide (436-6243). All you need to know is your zip code, and you will automatically be routed to your representative or senator,' she said.
The charge now for World Without Genocide is to alert people to contact their elected officials about applying pressure to stop the ongoing conflict between Africans and Arabs in Darfur, Sudan. The United Nations puts the death toll in Sudan at roughly 300,000, while up to 2.5 million Darfuris have fled their homes and live in refugee camps throughout Darfur, in neighboring Chad and the Central African Republic.
Great Decisions Discussion
Who: Ellen Kennedy
Topic: Peace building and conflict resolution
When: 1 p.m., Saturday, May 8
Where: Chanhassen Library
