PROFESSOR ABDUL AZIZ SAIDNEWS
2025 Abdul Aziz Said Symposium
The Abdul Aziz Said Chair in Peace and Conflict Resolution is co-sponsoring “The Middle East: Struggles for Justice, Rights, and Peace Amid Mass Atrocities and Military Intervention” on November 19-20, 2025. Through panels, keynotes, and dialogues, the two-day conference examines both how internal dynamics such as authoritarianism and political Islam intersect with external forces and global power structures, and how struggles for peace and human dignity confront these forces.
Mohammed Abu-Nimer Wins Peace Educator Scholar Award
Mohammed Abu-Nimer, the Abdul Aziz Said Peace and Conflict Resolution Chair occupant, has been awarded the 2025 Peace Educator-Scholar Award from the Peace and Justice Studies Association. Congratulated for his “long-standing commitment to the field through teaching, scholarship, and practice which has shaped generations of peacebuilders,” the award recognizes excellence in scholarship and dedication to forwarding peace education and peace studies.
For further information, see
https://www-cdn.american.edu/sis/research/highlights/20251007.cfm
Abdul Aziz Said Chair Events Report Spring 2024-Fall 2024
Professor Mohammed Abu-Nimer completes his first year as the inaugural Abdul Aziz Said Chair in International Peace and Conflict Resolution. The Chair sponsored dialogue sessions centered on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, encouraging students to build skills in compassionate communication. Three panels were held centered on the ongoing war in Gaza; Global Solidarity and Resistance for Justice in Palestine, Palestine: Ecologies of Genocide and Freedom, and Dissent From Within: Ethics and The War on Gaza. The panels discussed nonviolent resistance strategies, highlighted the importance of freedom and self-determination, and the US’s responsibility. Professor Abu-Nimer also moderated a webinar, Libya’s Frozen Conflict and Potential Ways Forward, analyzing Libya’s ongoing political impasse and possible paths toward peace and justice.
To make a donation visit Give to the Abdul Aziz Said Chair in International Peace and Conflict Resolution | Development and Alumni Relations | American University, Washington, DC
American University Establishes the Abdul Aziz Said Chair in International Peace and Conflict Resolution
Professor Abdul Aziz Said’s legacy will live on through a new endowed chair at American University that will advance his innovative peace and conflict resolution scholarship that changed the field of international affairs and carry on the School of International Service’s heritage of “waging peace.” Dr. Mohammad Abu-Nimer has been selected as the chair’s first occupant. Professor Abu-Nimer has a teaching career spanning more than 35 years, including 22 years spent alongside Professor Said, and is an accomplished peace scholar serving in SIS’s International Peace and Conflict Resolution Program. Dr. Abu-Nimer will build on Professor Said’s work promoting peace, leading distinguished research and actively working with policymakers and other stakeholders.
To make a donation visit Give to the Abdul Aziz Said Chair in International Peace and Conflict Resolution | Development and Alumni Relations | American University, Washington, DC
For further details click here.
Springer publishes new book: Abdul Aziz Said: A Pioneer in Peace, Intercultural Dialogue, and Cooperative Global Politics, edited by Nathan C. Funk and Meena Sharify-Funk
The book explores Dr. Said’s pioneering contributions to understanding and promoting peace, intercultural dialogue, cooperative approaches to global politics, and a spiritual ethic of human solidarity. Contents include a biographical chapter, a photo essay, a bibliography, selections from published as well as previously unpublished works, reflections from twenty colleagues and former students, and a foreword by Prof. Mohammed Abu-Nimer.
For further details, see
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-13905-5.
The Abdul Aziz Said Annual Memorial Lecture
The Abdul Aziz Said Memorial Lecture is held annually in the fall at The American University. It is a symposium that focuses on International Peace and Conflict Resolution, Ethics, and Human Rights. The inaugural Lecture was held on 30 November 2022 and the featured speaker was His Excellency Adama Dieng, former UN special adviser on the prevention of genocide and the former registrar of the International Criminal Tribunal in Rwanda.
For further information, please contact Department of Peace, Human Rights, and Cultural Relations at phrcr@american.edu
The Abdul Aziz Said Peace Scholars Program
In Professor Said’s honor The American University’s School of International Service established a program in 2022 to train the next generation of undergraduate students to continue Said’s life’s mission through the study of peace and conflict resolution and interfaith dialogue. This program works with 20 SIS sophomores to enable them to not only more fully appreciate Said’s legacy, but to share in the furtherance of his life’s work and mission. Students apply to this program in the spring of their first year and are required to write an essay detailing what Professor Said’s life and work means to them, to their education goals, and to envision putting into practice his ideals of peace and conflict resolution.
For further information, please contact the Department of Peace, Human Rights, and Cultural Relations at phrcr@american.edu
The Abdul Aziz Said Graduate Scholarship
The Abdul Aziz Said Graduate Scholarship provides financial support to one or more incoming or returning School of International Service graduate students who are affiliated with the School’s International Peace and Conflict Resolution (ICPR) program. Professor Said’s desire was to benefit graduate students from historically underrepresented or marginalized groups who show great promise in their scholastic achievement and/or their commitment to IPCR principles.
For information on donating to the scholarship fund or applying, please contact the Department of Peace, Human Rights, and Cultural Relations at phrcr@american.edu.