McDaniel Human Rights Forum

Presenting “Monumental Memory: The Contributions of the Living Memorial to Post-Memory in Budapest, Hungary”

McDaniel College in Budapest recently hosted its first Human Rights Conference. The conference was a one day event where students from Budapest, Westminster, and Bratislava presented research from topics ranging from “Multicultural Education in the Biology Classroom” to “Migration and Art Movements.” In addition to listening to the fantastic presentations, I had the opportunity to present my own research on the Living Memorial — a citizen-created memorial that protests the Hungarian government’s memorial in Liberty Square.

The Living Memorial is not a strictly physical structure, and instead is “composed” of people. The Living Memorial focuses on dialogue and interactions in order to form a memory that commemorates survivors and remembers Hungary’s role in the events of 1944. This is a very brief description, but you are more than welcome to read my twenty-page research paper with the complete analysis!

I think my presentation went well. Of course, there were some points where I could have improved, but for my first conference, I was relatively happy with my work.  The most exciting aspect for me was listening to the research from other students. The topics were extremely diverse and I learned more about policies in Europe while meeting students from different universities.

The final conference session was a panel discussion which featured experts from four universities (McDaniel’s own political science professor Dr. Leahy was able to participate with the assistance of Skype!). After the panel, the group headed over to a restaurant which featured an open mic night where we were able to listen to McDaniel students perform.

I think it is fair to say that the conference was a success. Everyone seemed to enjoy the presentations and the atmosphere fostered intriguing discussions throughout the day. Hopefully, McDaniel will continue to host similar conferences and increase the amount of participants each year.

Visit the McDaniel Human Rights Forum page on Facebook to learn more about the event and the presentations.