Since the 1980s, truth commissions have become an important mechanism to confront histories of mass human rights violations, colonization, dictatorship and civil war across the Americas. Despite the creation of many truth commissions in the region– including in Argentina, Peru, Brazil, Guatemala, and Canada–the implementation and impacts of these processes have often been studied in isolation. Colombia is the most recent country to undergo a truth commission process and is at a critical juncture in implementing its findings and developing spaces for reparations and collective memory.

With this sense of urgency and possibility in mind, this conference brings together scholars, archivists, human rights practitioners, and cultural workers, to examine the intersections between truth-telling, historical memory, and public engagement in contexts of political violence across the Americas. As societies grapple with legacies of authoritarianism, civil war, genocide, and state terror, questions of how to acknowledge past atrocities, preserve evidence, and construct collective memory have become critical to processes of democratic transition and social repair. 

In this conference, we are guided by the following questions: How do societies move from silence to acknowledgment? What role does historical practice play in processes of accountability and reconciliation? And how can public history contribute to both remembering violence and imagining democratic futures?