Remembering the Past or Repeating it: Twenty Years of Scholarship on Rwanda and Ethnic Conflict

• In Event: Ethnic Conflict: Constructing, Deconstructing, and Reconstructing Ethnic Divides

Abstract

2014 marks the twentieth anniversary of the Rwanda genocide. In just over 100 days, the violence between those identified as Hutus and Tutsis claimed the lives of more than 500,000 men, women, and children. The impact of the Rwanda conflict on the international community along with the academy’s increasing focus on cultural and ethnic studies resulted in a considerable body of scholarship on the Rwanda conflict. A comprehensive examination of this body of research, particularly research that has examined ethnicity and conflict, results in identifying common narratives. This examination also describes the resulting influences of this body of scholarship regarding the study of ethnic conflicts.

Author

• Darla Anderson, California State University, Northridge