Join the GW Department of Classical and Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations for an enlightening evening as Dr. Patty Gerstenblith shares her expertise on cultural heritage protection in times of conflict.

Cultural heritage has always been at severe risk during armed conflict. Wars from the time of antiquity to the Second World War and the recent and current conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Ukraine have destroyed both movable and immovable cultural heritage and put archaeological sites and collections of cultural objects at risk of theft and looting. This lecture will explore the legal, ethical, and voluntary constraints that have been adopted to protect cultural heritage and in particular archaeological sites from this type of damage and destruction.

Patty Gerstenblith PhD, JD, DHL h.c., is Distinguished Research Professor of Law at DePaul University and Director for its Center of Art, Museum and Cultural Heritage Law. President Clinton and President Obama appointed her as a Member and then Chair of the President's Cultutal Property Advisory Committee in the Department of State. Since 2020, she has served as President of the Board of Directors of the US Committee of the Blue Shield and Chair of the Blue Shield International Working Group on Trafficking of Cultural Objects. Her book, Cultural Objects and Reparative Justice: A Legal and Historical Analysis, was published by Oxford University Press in 2023. The fourth edition of her casebook, Art, Cultural Heritage, and the Law, was published in 2019. She was the Montgomery Fellow at Dartmouth College in 2021, and the Archaeological Institute of America's Charles Eliot Norton Lecturer for the 2023-24 academic year.

This in-person event will take place on Tuesday, October 29 at 7 PM in Funger Hall, Room 108. Don't miss this opportunity to learn from a leading expert in the field!

Note: registration is required to attend.