Andrea Bruce

Kelman Seminar: Syria Unseen – Living Under the Regime

Herbert C. Kelman Seminar on International Conflict Analysis and Resolution featuring speakers:

  • Andrea Bruce, documentary photographer and Nieman Fellow
  • Donna Hicks, Associate at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs

The theme of the 2015–2016 Herbert C. Kelman Seminar on International Conflict Analysis and Resolution is negotiation, conflict, and the news media. It explores the relationship between the news media and conflict-resolution efforts worldwide and examines how the framing and reporting of conflict influences the public understanding of events. The seminar considers ways to strengthen the capacity to prevent, resolve, and transform ethno-national conflicts. The topics this year include the rise of political Islam, domestic conflicts related to race, the impact of reporting techniques on conflict, the neuroscience of conflict, new threats to national security, and more. Speakers include experts from academia and the media, as well as political actors from conflict regions.

This series is sponsored by the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs; the Nieman Foundation for Journalism; Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School; and Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy.

For more information, contact Donna Hicks at dhicks@wcfia.harvard.edu.

About the Speakers:

Andrea Bruce is a documentary photographer who brings attention to people living in the aftermath of war. She concentrates on the social issues that are sometimes ignored and often ignited in war’s wake.

Andrea started working in Iraq in 2003, following the intricacies and obstacles of the conflict experienced by Iraqis and the US military. For over ten years she has chronicled the world’s most troubled areas, focusing on Iraq and Afghanistan. Currently she is a member and owner of the agency NOOR.

For eight years she worked as a staff photographer for The Washington Post and later as part of the VII Network (2010-2011). At The Post, she originated and authored a weekly column called “Unseen Iraq.” She also worked at The Concord Monitor and The St. Petersburg Times after graduating from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1995.

Her awards include top honors from the White House News Photographers Association (where she has been named Photographer of the Year four times), several awards from the International Pictures of the Year contest, and the prestigious John Faber Award from the Overseas Press Club in New York. In 2010 she received the WHNPA grant for her work in Ingushetia and was a 2011 recipient of the Alicia Patterson Foundation Fellowship.

In 2012 she was the recipient of the first Chris Hondros Fund Award for the “commitment, willingness and sacrifice shown in her work.” The World Press Photo awarded her 2nd prize Daily Life singles for the image ‘Soldier’s Funeral’ in 2014.

Donna Hicks is an Associate at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. She has been involved in numerous unofficial diplomatic efforts  in the Middle East, Colombia, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, N. Ireland, Cuba and more. She has developed the Dignity Model,  a method of intervention that explores the role dignity plays in resolving conflict. She also consults in the corporate setting, health care and education, applying the Dignity framework to create a culture of dignity in the workplace. She has taught her method at Harvard, Columbia and Clark Universities. She is the author of the book, Dignity: Its Essential Role in Resolving Conflict, published by Yale University Press in 2011.