Dr. Barry L. Gan, professor emeritus of philosophy, recently presented a paper titled “Against the Weaponization of Nonviolence” to a three-day online international interdisciplinary conference on nonviolence. 

 

The conference was limited to 25 participants, and contributed papers were peer-evaluated to select participants. In attendance were people from the United States, Mexico, Spain, Great Britain, Italy, Kenya, India, and New Zealand. 

 

The format of the conference was useful: Everyone was expected to read all of the papers in advance, and the one-hour time slots allowed for each presenter were devoted entirely to discussion of the ideas in the various papers. 

 

Gan also led a discussion group with undergraduate and graduate students at Xibei (Northwestern) University in Xi'an, China. The discussion focused on the circumstance of being underemployed upon completion of undergraduate and graduate degrees. The discussion was hosted by XIng Xing Xing, who taught Chinese at St. Bonaventure in 2011-2012.