Syracuse University will host a world peace summit with diplomats and international affairs experts from around the world, also featuring a concert by Matisyahu in October, said Nicole Brown, associate vice president of SU.

The attendees of the summit will include a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

‘This is SU saying, okay, we really need to come up with solutions here that can work in the real world,’ Brown said.

The event, titled, ‘Small Word/Big Divides: Building Bridges in an Age of Extremes,’ will be held Oct. 18 in Goldstein Auditorium. The day will feature two or three panels that will include guests such as Richard Holbrooke, former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. and Dennis Ross, author and diplomat, Brown said. The discussions will be free and open for students to easily come and go.

While the prompts for the panel discussions may be about the Middle East, she said, the issues are similar in nature to those in other parts of the world.

‘We’re drawing all these folks together,’ Brown said. ‘These are not the type of conversations that are talked about and then everybody forgets what was said.’

Panelists will be exploring which solutions for peace work and which do not, she said.

The concert will be held the night of Oct. 18 at the Landmark Theater featuring Matisyahu, Kenny Muhammad, the Human Orchestra, and State Radio, Brown said. Tickets for the concert are currently available to students at the Schine box office and go on sale to the public Tuesday morning.

‘The concert, in some ways, mimics the theme of what’s being talked about,’ Brown said.

SU asked University Union Concerts to help with putting on the concert portion of the summit, said Helen Koutsourades, UU Concerts public relations director. By asking the students to help, SU is fulfilling Chancellor Nancy Cantor’s scholarship in action campaign.

Published on September 16, 2006 at 12:00 pm