Students Study Human Rights and Historical Memory at Santiago Center — Syracuse University News

The Syracuse University Abroad Center in Santiago, Chile, is the setting for a semester-long student research project focused on human rights, historical memory and social justice.

The project, conducted by Lender Global student fellows Ohemaa Asibuo and Ayanna Hyatte under the direction of Santiago Center Director Mauricio Paredes, is centered on the 1973–1990 Augusto Pinochet dictatorship, during which more than 3,000 people died or disappeared, 200,000 suffered exile and 27,000 were tortured.

While in Santiago, the student fellows will take the course Dictatorships, Human Rights and Historical Memory in Chile and the Southern Cone, taught by Paredes.

They will also make hands-on enhancements to an exhibition at the Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos (Museum of Memory and Human Rights) that memorializes those who suffered during the Pinochet dictatorship and illustrates how commemorative education can help redress and prevent human rights abuses. The fellows also plan to share their research findings with community audiences in Santiago.

Learning from Experts

Paredes is an expert on Chilean nationalism, internment camps, political memory and Latin American dictatorships—not just as a scholar but also as a former political prisoner of the Pinochet government.

He says the course will offer the fellows an unusual opportunity to discover the serious human rights violations that were committed by the Chilean dictatorship and others, and the ability to confront the issues of victims being forgotten and a veil of invisibility that has sometimes been created about state violence in Chile.

“Their work at the Museum of Memory and Human Rights research center will be with a team of experts in the field and with access to one of the largest databases in Chile for studying these topics. In addition, they will have the privilege to meet with and interview Chileans who are related to or are victims of political violence, which will undoubtedly contribute to the students’ immersion in this painful but necessary experience,” he says.

Program’s Academic Fit

Both Asibuo and Hyatte say the Lender Global program in Santiago fits well with their academic interests. Asibuo, a junior from Accra, Ghana, and Hyatte, a master’s student from Washington, D.C., are both international relations majors at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs.

Asibuo previously studied in South America through the Syracuse University Abroad Buenos Aires immersion. Hyatte, as a former fellow in the Council for Opportunity in Education Keith Sherin Global Leaders program in The Hague, has experience in commemorative education and memorialization to address past injustices.

Lender Global is a collaboration between the Lender Center for Social Justice and Syracuse University Abroad that aligns with the University’s vision of preparing students as citizens, scholars and leaders in a changing global society.

Spring Fellowship Open

The Santiago project will continue in Spring 2026 with a new cohort of study-abroad students building on the research of the Fall 2025 Lender Global fellows.

Students who are interested in the Lender Global fellowship and study at the Santiago Center can apply for the semester abroad in Chile online. The Syracuse Abroad application deadline for the Spring 2026 semester is Wednesday, Oct. 1.

After that date, all students accepted for the abroad semester in Chile will receive more information about applying for the Lender Global fellowship. In the spring semester, the fellowship offers a special opportunity for students having an engineering and/or technical background to support a public installation exhibition that will showcase the research project at a partner museum in Santiago.