Genocide

Jared Bray

 Co-Presenters: Individual Presentation
College: College of Business and Public Management
Major: Criminal Justice
Faculty Research Mentor: Sarah Coykendall
 

Abstract:

This research will discuss the history of genocide from antiquity to the present by examining the definitions of genocide, how the term was coined by Raphael Lemkin in 1944, and how it became recognized as a crime by the United Nations General Assembly in 1946. Next, this research will look at how the origins of genocide trace back to the destruction of Carthage, which many people call “the first genocide.” Then, this study will highlight two of the most well-known genocides throughout human history: the Armenian Genocide, committed by the Ottoman Empire against the Armenian people from 1915 to 1917, where 600 hundred to 1.5 million people lost their lives, and the Holocaust, perpetrated by Nazi Germany during World War II where they target mainly Jews and other ethnic minorities, which ended in 6 million Jews and 5 million other victims. Reflecting on the impact these two events have had on the world and how society views these dark times in human history, the events of the Holocaust prompted Raphael Lemkin to coin the term in 1944. Later, it led to the recognition of genocide as a crime under international law in 1946, followed by the adoption of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. In 1998, the International Criminal Court (ICC) was established to prosecute genocide.