While at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, LaFayette developed the course entitled:
From Freedom Rides to Ferguson: Narratives of Nonviolence in the American Civil Rights Movement.
Dr. LaFayette at the University of Rhode Island
The Summer Institute at the University of Rhode Island’s Center for Nonviolence & Peace Studies
The URI Center for Nonviolence & Peace Studies was initially conceived in 1998 by a group of three faculty and staff – Prof. Charles Collyer, Abu Bakr, and Prof. Art Stein, who shared a common interest in promoting and studying approaches to addressing conflict through nonviolence. As this concept developed they met and discussed the idea with Dr. Bernard LaFayette, Jr., a renowned civil rights activist who had been conducting nonviolence trainings in Providence. Subsequently, with the support of then URI president Robert Carothers, Dr. LaFayette was appointed as a distinguished scholar at the university.
The vision was broadened to include nonviolence and peace, resulting in the Center for Nonviolence & Peace Studies in 1999. Within a short period of time a number of interdisciplinary faculty and staff members joined as advisory members of the Center and were referred to as Center Conveners and Co-Conveners – Dr. Lynne Derbyshire, Dr. Cynthia Hamilton, Dr. Sylvia Peters, Ms. Gail Faris, Ms. Linda Palazzo, and Dr. Paul Bueno de Mesquita.
Dr. LaFayette at Auburn University
Dr. LaFayette is currently at Auburn University in Auburn Alabama.
Harold Sánchez Estrada and Bernard LaFayette, Jr. (pictured above) will discuss the role of Kingian nonviolence education in prisons on Tuesday, April 16 at 1:00 p.m. in Room 2218 of the Auburn University Student Center.
Mr. Sanchez was deeply involved in Pablo Escobar’s Medellín drug cartel and eventually sentenced to a 40-year sentence in Bellavista prison in Columbia. While in prison, he encountered the nonviolent philosophy of Martin Luther King, Jr. through the educational work of Dr. Bernard LaFayette, Jr. Sanchez subsequently led a successful effort to implement nonviolence training throughout Bellavista, a prison once known for the murder of six inmates per month.
American civil rights icon Bernard LaFayette, Jr. is currently a Breeden Eminent Visiting Scholar in the College of Liberal Arts at Auburn University. LaFayette in recognized internationally for his role in the civil rights movement, and he has trained thousands of people in Kingian nonviolence reconciliation over the last fifty years.
The program is free and open to the public and sponsored by the Caroline Marshall Draughon Center for the Arts & Humanities in the College of Liberal Arts.
For more information, contact Mark Wilson at mwilson@auburn.edu or 334-844-6198.
Dr. LaFayette at SCLC
Dr. LaFayette is currently the chairman of the board of directors for the National Southern Christian Leadership Conference which is an organization co-founded by Martin Luther King, Jr.
The NSCLC lists several courses in Kingian Nonviolence on their website.