2024 Ikeda Forum | Imagining A World Where Peace Is Possible
Join us for our 20th annual Ikeda Forum for Intercultural Dialogue on Saturday, November 2, from 1 - 3:30 pm ET. Named after Center founder Daisaku Ikeda in honor of his untiring commitment to dialogue, this signature event brings scholars from diverse disciplines and backgrounds together to investigate the peacebuilding potential of key ideas drawn from Buddhist humanism. This year’s forum, “Imagining A World Where Peace Is Possible: Engaging Daisaku Ikeda’s Ideas on Dialogue, Youth Empowerment, and Nuclear Disarmament,” features presentations by three speakers: Dr. Lauren Leigh Kelly of Rutgers University, Emma Pike of Lex International, and Dr. Eben Weitzman of University of Massachusetts Boston. Employing the lenses of dialogue, conflict resolution, education, youth empowerment, and nuclear disarmament, they will explore how we can imagine and create a world where peace is possible.
The inspiration for the forum is found in these words of Mr. Ikeda: “Imagination is the wellspring from which hope flows. It is the power of imagination, the power to imagine different realities, that frees us from the mistaken notion that what exists now is all that will ever exist, and that we are trapped inside our problems.”
The forum will also include a pre-event reception with food, icebreaker activities, small group discussions and reflections, a musical performance, and more.
Free admission. Pre-event reception with food begins at 12:30 pm. For everyone’s health and safety, we ask the following: Should you have any COVID-like symptoms, or are not feeling well, we kindly look forward to seeing you at a future in-person event!
Speakers:
Lauren Leigh Kelly is an Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Education at Rutgers. She is also the founder of the Hip Hop Youth Research and Activism Conference, an annual intergenerational learning symposium co-designed and facilitated by high school and undergraduate BIPOC youth. Prior to joining the faculty at Rutgers, Lauren Kelly high school English for ten years in New York where she also developed courses in Hip Hop Literature and Culture, Spoken Word poetry, and Theatre Arts. Her current research focuses on critical literacy, Black feminist theory, Hip Hop pedagogy, youth critical consciousness, and the cultivation of youth agency and activism towards the imagining and building of our collective social futures.
Kelly’s work has been nationally recognized, including receiving the 2023 Nasir Jones Hip Hop fellowship at Harvard University, the 2023 Teachers College Columbia University Early Career Alumni Award; the 2023 Rutgers University Presidential Fellowship for Teaching Excellence; the 2022 National Academy of Education/Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship, the 2021 Save the Kids Hip Hop Activism Scholar-Activist of the Year Award, and the 2020 American Educational Research Association Writing and Literacies Special Interest Group Steve Cahir Early Career Award.
She is the author of Teaching with Hip Hop in the 7-12 Grade Classroom: A Guide to Supporting Students’ Critical Development through Popular Texts, published by Routledge and co-editor of the Bloomsbury Handbook of Critical Hip Hop Pedagogy.
As an undergraduate studying International Relations, Emma Pike was deeply moved by Daisaku Ikeda’s philosophy of peace as a pursuit that begins within each individual, eventually writing her thesis on Ikeda’s philosophy as a model for peace in the nuclear age. As a peace educator and specialist in global citizenship education, Emma is a firm believer in the central role that education plays in building a more peaceful and equitable world for all. Emma holds a Master of Arts in International Relations from the University of St Andrews, a Master of Arts in Development Education and Global Learning from the UCL Institute of Education, and a Master of Education in International Educational Development from Teachers College, Columbia University. In her current role at Lex International, she focuses on strengthening the role of international law, particularly in nuclear disarmament and regulation of autonomous weapons systems. She also engages in public education on these topics, highlighting the power that each individual person holds to effect positive change.
Eben A. Weitzman, Ph.D. is a social and organizational psychologist specializing in the resolution of conflict. Professor Weitzman does organization development, equity and inclusion, and conflict resolution work with organizations in the public and private sectors, including in education, government, law enforcement, social services, business, and labor, in the US and abroad. He has engaged in building interfaith understanding, collaboration and peace in Nigeria with the USAID-funded Tolerance project; among teenagers in Israel/Palestine with the NGO Ultimate Peace; and between federal law enforcement agencies and the Muslim and Sikh communities in Massachusetts through the BRIDGES project. He was the founding Chair of the Department of Conflict Resolution, Human Security, and Global Governance, and long-time director of the Graduate Programs in Conflict Resolution at the University of Massachusetts Boston, where he is also a Senior Faculty Fellow at the Center for Peace, Democracy and Development.
Musicians:
Known for his soulful tone and mesmerizing phrasing, Trevor James Alto Flute Artist Díjí Kay (née DeShaun Gordon-King) has given performances as a soloist and principal flute in Europe, Asia, and throughout the United States. Díjí Kay grew up surrounded by griot traditions and jazz and gospel music. Inspired by the worlds and traditions of his upbringing, Díjí Kay grew passionate about programming that blends them all together to create unique and memorable concert experiences. As he continued to expand his musical versatility, Díjí Kay also went inward to cultivate his spiritual practice. It was through these meditations that he understood exactly how he and his art were meant to serve the greater collective. Díjí Kay moved to Cambridge to pursue a Performance Diploma from the Longy School of Music where he worked with Sergio Pallottelli. During his time in Boston, Díjí Kay has collaborated with Castle of Our Skins, the Celebrity Series of Boston, Shelter Music Boston, and with the American Repertory Theatre’s production of Evita. A graduate of the Longy School of Music and Harvard Ed Portal Pipeline Artist Fellow, Díjí Kay’s work and studies center around synergizing the principles of therapeutic music, sound healing, and vibrational therapy to curate healing and transformative concert experiences.
Jeremiah Cossa is the embodiment of a modern musician - a pianist dedicated to and proficient in a vast array of musical languages, leading an exciting and unorthodox career that spans classical and contemporary chamber repertoire, jazz improvisation, and rock performances. He has performed in prestigious concert halls including Merkin Hall and Roulette Intermedium in New York, jazz clubs such as The Lilypad in Cambridge and Sam First Bar in LA, and iconic rock venues like Ottobar in Baltimore and Chain Reaction in LA. Jeremiah is a core member of the Art Rock band Cordis which Billboard Magazine has said creates “sparkling moments that defy classification” and plays in Parlando, a chamber orchestra based in NYC that has been recommended in the New York Times and reviewed as “off the scale for its integrity and emotional impact” by the NY Classical Review. Jeremiah’s Punk band nurse joy is a fixture of the Boston DIY music scene. Their latest record, “nu-wave” was called “the most indescribable record I’ve ever heard…. And at the same time one of the most addictive” by leading Punk blog Tremendo Garaje and music from it has been played on public-access television and local radio. As a Classically-trained musician, Jeremiah has appeared as soloist on repeat occasions with the Claremont Symphony Orchestra and with the Boston Conservatory Contemporary Ensemble. He has won Pyrenees Music Society’s Winter Festival competition, was 2nd prize winner of the MTNA Stecher-Horowitz Two Piano Competition with duo collaborator Kevin Madison, and received an honorable mention in the Los Angeles Liszt International Piano Competition. Jeremiah is a regular interdisciplinary collaborator and performed the world premiere of choreography to Rachmaninoff’s Suite No. 2 for Two Pianos with the Boston Ballet’s second company. Jeremiah grew up in eSwatini (formerly Swaziland) and started piano there at age 5, continuing to study after moving to California at age 11. He received a B.M. in Piano Performance from Azusa Pacific University in the studio of Dr. Robert Sage, followed by an M.M. at The Boston Conservatory at Berklee, studying with Max Levinson from whom he still receives lessons and guidance. Jeremiah’s music can be heard under his name on music streaming services including Spotify and Apple Music. His latest release is a solo improvisation on John Coltrane’s standard Giant Steps, and is the lead single from an upcoming solo record that juxtaposes music of Bach and Ravel with Jazz improvisations. Jeremiah approaches his kaleidoscopic range of musical experiences with profound gratitude, embracing different musical languages without hierarchy or distinction. He believes in the intrinsic beauty and significance of music in all its forms, recognizing that every live performance offers unique opportunities for artistic expression and connection.
Lyrical Faith is a Black American Educator, Activist and Spoken Word Poet from The Bronx, NY. She has been featured at colleges, universities, and venues across the country and globally. She is the 3rd ranked Woman Poet in the World as of the 2022 Women of the World Poetry Slam, a two-time Bronx Poet Laureate finalist, a multi-time award recipient of citywide and statewide arts agencies, and the 2015 Syracuse University Poet of the Year.
She’s a graduate of the Public Relations program at Syracuse University, a Masters degree recipient of the Higher Education & Student Affairs program at NYU, and a current Social Justice Education Doctoral student at UMass Amherst studying the intersections of arts and activism. Her work has been featured on NPR, Button Poetry, Write About Now Poetry, Huffington Post Black Voices, and News 12 The Bronx.
What is the Ikeda Forum? The annual Ikeda Forum for Intercultural Dialogue explores connections between life affirming philosophies deriving from literary, cultural, and educational traditions in the East and West. It is named after Center founder Daisaku Ikeda in honor of his untiring commitment to dialogue as the surest path to peace.