Alison Des Forges (née Liebhafsky) (August 20, 1942 – February 12, 2009) was an African historian and human rights activist who specialized in the African Great Lakes region, particularly the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. At the time of her death, she was a senior advisor for the African continent at Human Rights Watch.
Des Forges was born Alison B. Liebhafsky on August 20, 1942 to Sybil Small and Herman A. Liebhafsky. She married Roger Des Forges, a hi...
more
Alison Des Forges (née Liebhafsky) (August 20, 1942 – February 12, 2009) was an African historian and human rights activist who specialized in the African Great Lakes region, particularly the 1994 Rwandan Genocide. At the time of her death, she was a senior advisor for the African continent at Human Rights Watch.
Des Forges was born Alison B. Liebhafsky on August 20, 1942 to Sybil Small and Herman A. Liebhafsky. She married Roger Des Forges, a historian at the State University of New York at Buffalo who specialized in China, in 1964. Des Forges earned her B.A. in history from Radcliffe College in 1964, and her M.A. and a Ph.D. in the same discipline from Yale University in 1966 and 1972. Her master's thesis and doctoral dissertation both addressed the impact of European colonialism on Rwanda.
She specialized in the African Great Lakes region and studied the Rwandan Genocide. She was also an authority on human rights violations in the Democratic Republic of Congo and in Burundi.
Des...
less
