UMD News Releases

DULUTH, MN – UMD political science professor Dr. Shannon Drysdale Walsh will be presenting at “Erasures: Gender, Violence and Human Rights, an international symposium on gender, violence, and human rights” at the McNamara Center on the U of M campus October 24 and 25. The symposium will address violence against women as a human rights violation.

Walsh will present “Few Resources, Low Capacity, Weak Will: Overcoming Challenges to Constructing State Institutions that Address Violence against Women.” Walsh completed her research with a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Stipend and is also working on a book, “Engendering State Institutions: State Response to Violence Against Women in Latin America.”

“One major contribution of this book is that it is the first cross-national comparison of responsiveness to violence against women focusing on Central American countries,” explains Drysdale Walsh.

Drysdale Walsh conducts a rich in-depth comparative analysis of Guatemala, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, with additional attention to Honduras and El Salvador. She draws heavily on evidence collected during 18 months of fieldwork and more than 200 in-depth interviews conducted in Central America with actors in the state, civil society, and international organizations between 2007 and 2012.

The National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Stipend Program provides awards for individuals to pursue scholarly work in the humanities during the summer. This is a competitive award, with an average funding ratio of 8% over the past five years.