By Mubarak Awad
Recently, our wonderful volunteer intern supervisor, Jules Slater, shared their pride at the impressive young leaders serving this semester as interns with NVI. Meeting them gives me hope. If you haven’t already seen this page, I encourage you to check it out.
Below, I share some of the important video production work our interns are already doing at NVI.
For years, I urged Michael Beer to update my friend Gene Sharp’s seminal work cataloging 198 Nonviolent methods. Since then the world has changed dramatically with innovations such as the internet and so much more shaping how people express themselves. Michael has just published a book with more than 350 NV tactics. Please watch this short video where our new intern Dassie Spivack interviews Michael about why he wrote this book. The funny thing is he doesn’t even mention that I told him to.
Next we share an exciting clip from Jamila Raqib, Gene’s successor, who tells how he started collecting NV Tactics and why he stopped at 198. He could have easily rounded up to 200, but he always knew this was unfinished work that should be expanded as the field grew. So for all those who somehow get the impression that Gene’s work was written in stone, please watch this clip made by NVI intern Cam Sephehri.
As you know, NVI believes that the world is facing a series of interrelated crises and that nonviolence is the most effective response to many of them. We also are convinced that nonviolence doesn’t just happen, but is greatly enhanced by knowledge of Tactics and by NV Training. Check out this video of former intern and volunteer Annalisa Bell explaining how to use our NV Tactics database.
In addition to spreading the word on the power of nonviolence and Tactics and Training, the other main part of our work at NVI is serving as a backbone organization of the global nonviolent movement. We provide fiscal sponsorship to a variety of cutting-edge groups we believe in deeply. Below, please see new videos produced by Dassie and Cam raising up the work of Holy Land Trust, the Center for Jewish Nonviolence and Solidarity 2020 and Beyond.
Finally, I was proud to be in conversation with my cousin Jonathan Kuttab and NVI’s Co-Director David Hart during the recent bombing of Gaza. While the bombs are not falling now, conditions remain unacceptable. We ask for your help changing the conversation and thus building a better future. We recorded our full conversation and present it below along with several shorter clips you might share with others as an introduction to this ongoing and wholly preventable human-caused crisis.
If you value this work, please donate to help us expand our impact on this beautiful and broken world.