From a War Culture to a Culture of Peace: An Interview with Andrew Himes

(Editor’s Note: Today we welcome Andrew Himes, founder and Executive Director of Voices in Wartime, an Education Project dedicated to educating high school and college students about the experience of war. The Project has produced a film (Voices in Wartime) an Anthology of Poetry, and a curriculum for use in high school and college classrooms.)

Q: Was there a particular event that fueled your desire to make the film Voices in Wartime?  What fueled the passion in the film, the anthology and the project, to create a less violent world and to heal the trauma caused by war?

AH: In the beginning 2003, as the Bush administration was on the verge of invading Iraq, I was on the verge of despair. I had protested the war and seen millions of others oppose this bizarre and misguided invasion, but it appeared to be going ahead no matter what was said or done to oppose it. I was one of an international movement called Poets Against the War, which gathered and published over 13,000 poems written in a global outcry against the impending war. But somehow the war proceeded. I decided that we need a different language to help Americans understand the terrible cost and traumatic experience of war.

Q: Is there something about poetry in particular, that allows the actual experience of war, to shine through? Is it the economy of words?

AH: We need the language of poetry and art to talk about matters of the human heart. In political debate, you can use fraud and lies,  fear and false accusations as weapons. I don’t think it’s possible to create a great poem unless you are telling the most powerful truth you know. As Wilfred Owen, the British soldier-poet in the Great War said, “True poets must be truthful.” Poetry tells the personal and human story of war with deep emotion and powerful metaphor.

Q: What is your vision of how the wounds of war can be healed? What is a culture of peace?

AH: It’s not only war’s wounds we need to heal. It’s also the violence in our communities, in our families and in ourselves. Creating a culture of peace requires creating a space for peace within ourselves and a capacity to show kindness toward others. The first step, as the Buddhist teacher Pema Chodron has said, is to notice when we are reacting with fear and anger toward others, and when we are hardening our hearts toward each other. We have to intentionally soften those places in our hearts. Then we can take steps toward peace. Our Education Project is designed to help young people develop awareness of their own perspective so they can understand that other people have different perspectives and different stories.  Awareness of perspective is basic for a true global understanding and can help us create a more peaceful world.

Q: Where is Voices in Wartime going in the future?

AH: Our great challenge now is to make these resources widely available to many thousands of teachers and millions of students across the country. We are completing the project of publishing our curricula on the Internet for free access by students, teachers, parents and others.  These resources are available on our web site at: http://curricula.voicesinwartime.org/.

Q: I understand that you have not served in the armed forces. What is your relationship with veterans? How do they respond to the Voices in Wartime Project?

Veterans are witnesses to war and also victims of war.  I don’t think any group of people can match veterans for a heartfelt desire to create a peaceful world and heal the terrible wounds of war. Vets are going into many classrooms now to tell their stories and help young people understand what that experience is all about. Although I have never been a soldier, I have discovered that virtually every single person in our society has been affected by war. We all live with the legacy of war’s trauma, and we are affected by war in ways most of us are not even conscious of.