Excision, female circumcision, clitoridectomy or infibulation are some of the terms used to denote female genital mutilation, a term included, together with five hundred and fifty more terms, in the “Encyclopaedia of Peace and Conflicts”, directed by Professor Mario López Martínez, which has just been published by the University of Granada. The encyclopaedia refers to female genital mutilation as “a genital mutilation suffered by the female population of certain geographical areas; it is just another sign of the discrimination and social injustice against women all over the world. This practice takes place throughout the length and breadth of the world, but it is very usual in over twenty countries in sub-Saharan and north-eastern Africa and, in a more irregular way, in certain areas of the Middle East and Asia.”
In over 1200 pages, 121 experts from all over the world report terms related to peace and conflicts: from Nobel Prize winners to the Manhattan Project, from totalitarianism to universalism, from the right to development to intercultural education; from the Intifada to war toys; from amnesty to military holocaust, terms and expressions that define human concepts, attitudes and behaviours against conflicts and peace.
According to the director of this encyclopaedia, Mario López Martínez, the aim of the book which has just been published by the University of Granada, in collaboration with the Andalusian Council and the Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, it is a question of analysing and describing concepts and terms rather than defining them.
It is the first encyclopaedia on this matter published in Spanish, and it has already been presented in the conference Amerindian Circle of Peruggia (Italy). These two volumes, in which over five hundred terms relating to peace and conflicts are included –by experts from all over the world—deal with female circumcision, conscientious objection, xenophobia or racism.
This “Encyclopaedia of Peace and Conflicts” is a reference book because of its open nature and its broadmindedness; it is specially aimed to lecturers and teachers, Bachillerato (Higher secondary-education course) and University students and, according to the supervisor of the work and director of the Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, “the aim is to help people to settle doubts and ask themselves more questions, to clear up ideas and come closer to the exciting field of the studies for Peace and Conflicts. This is, the objective of this work is to be a reference book.”
Each of the six hundred terms included in this encyclopaedia appends a bibliography, calls to other words and, sometimes, links to reference web-pages.
According to Mario López, this book is aimed to a wide public, more or less learned, to the systematic reader, to the professional who needs to know quickly what is what and “for those who have time and feel like doing it, because knowledge is a free space to discover more and more. We have tried that the book was enjoyable, with a clear, concise and accurate language, a lot of examples and a narrative, and not only analytic, style.”
Reference: Professor Mario López Martínez
Director of the University Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies
University of Granada
Phone number: 958 248356 / 958-242383 / 650-485827
E-mail: mariol@ugr.es Web: http://www.ugr.es/~eirene/
