Alison Des Forges

Alison Des Forges was an American 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 PhD in the same discipline from Yale University in 1966 and 1972. Her masters thesis and doctoral dissertation both addressed the impact of European colonialism on Rwanda. Defeat Is the Only Bad News Rwanda under Musinga, 18961931, her dissertation, was published posthumously in 2011. Describing the politics of the court during the reign of Yuhi Musinga, it shows how divisions among different groups in Rwanda shaped their responses to colonial governments, missionaries and traders.

Source: Wikipedia