CAS CONNECT 2017

OSU’s Own Nobel Nominee Alumnus Dambach could win Peace Prize vote in October “Chic” Dambach came to OSU to play footbal l . He left searching for non-violent solut ions to conf l ict resolut ion. PHOTO COURTESY OF OSU ATHLETICS O klahoma State University alumnus Charles “Chic” Dambach gave a TEDx talk earlier this year in Washington, D.C., sponsored by Johns Hopkins University, enti- tled “Exhaust the Limits: Why Not Peace?” Dambach, an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins and a former president of the Alliance for Peacebuilding and National Peace Corps Association, began by quoting Pindar, an ancient Greek poet. “O my soul, do not aspire to a mortal life,” he told the audience, “but exhaust the limits of the possible.” It’s Dambach’s work exhausting those limits that has earned the OSU graduate (bachelor’s degree in speech communication and rhetoric, ’67) a nomination for the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize. “I got involved in peace activism at OSU back in the 60s, but what I do now isn’t quite activ- ism; it’s what we call peacebuilding,” Dambach says. “What we do is go into active conflict environments, where the adversaries on both sides are all tied to a conflict. We try to work with them, to help find a non-violent way to resolve whatever the differences may be.” Dambach’s journey began in Stillwater, as a lineman on scholarship for Cowboys head coach Phil Cutchen. Being drawn to OSU for football ultimately kept Dambach out of the draft: He earned a medical exemption after separating his shoulder five times during his playing career. “I played a little, but I was never any good,” Dambach jokes. “I like to say that the biggest mistake the Cowboys ever made back then was giving me a scholarship.” Dambach eventually left the team after events opened his eyes to social justice issues and racism, spurred by a career-ending injury. He rebounded by becoming involved with the debate team, in student government and in anti-war activism. As a member of the OSU debate team, Dambach participated in a debate concerning U.S. foreign policy, leading him to research the beginnings of the Vietnam War. 28