You know an instructor is excellent when on the first day of class, the lecture hall is so packed, it’s hard to find a seat. With about 160 students in his Peace and Conflict Studies 10 lecture alone, Dr. Darren C. Zook is most definitely a Campus Celebrity. He is funny, humble, passionate, and open-minded; truly an instructor that every student seeks.
Though he began his undergraduate career as a mathematics major, Dr. Zook ended up pursuing a PhD in history at the University of California, Berkeley.
“When it came time for graduate school I realized I did not want to be a mathematician. Don’t get me wrong — I still love mathematics and still read math-related stuff all the time. But I also realized that math was not going to satisfy my deep interest in issues of justice, and so I switched fields,” Dr. Zook said. “[I] chose history because it has a way of looking at things that really strives to capture the bigger picture.”
He now teaches in the International and Area Studies and Political Science departments at UC Berkeley, and travels the world conducting research.
“I always knew I wanted to study things that were different from everything that was familiar to me growing up. My family never really had the means to travel outside the United States, and so I always had this curiosity about how the rest of the world looked and how other people lived.” Dr. Zook said. “Along the way I’ve had some very non-academic jobs — unloading parcel trucks on the night shift, for instance — and I think it has really given my research a firm grounding in reality that academia often lacks.”
Caption: “I love going to other places, and there are many parts of the world where I feel comfortable enough to feel right at home. But every time I come back to the Bay Area, it just feels like the place where I was meant to be,” Dr. Zook said. “Every time I walk across campus, it strikes me how beautiful it is, and there’s one part of campus where you catch a glimpse of the Golden Gate bridge, and every time I see it, it really takes my breath away. I even love the fog — the way it flows in across the bay, and the way it mists through the trees.”
Topically Dr. Zook has focused on questions of justice and injustice — specifically studying human rights, international law, economic inequality, and other related issues. Geographically, Dr. Zook has engaged in research in various parts of Asia. These areas include India, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Cambodia, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Burma, Japan, China, Mongolia, South Korea, and North Korea.
“I think every place I go impacts me just as much but in different ways. Every time I spend time in a new place, I feel like I leave there a different, and hopefully better, person,” Dr. Zook said.
His explorations have indeed taken him to many areas of the world — some perhaps a little more unconventional.
“The trips to North Korea were particularly interesting, of course, because it’s a place that most people don’t get to. I was able to get my hands on a treasure-trove of documents while I was there, which was unexpected because you can’t do formal research in North Korea,” Dr. Zook said. “Perhaps the most unexpected thing in North Korea was a dinner with my two minders (security escorts) where we ended up telling jokes all evening, and trying to explain to each other what made them funny. I actually know quite a few North Korean jokes now.”
A prime example of a success story when it comes to discovering the world, Dr. Zook has taken the initiative to combine work and adventure by conducting research through first-hand experiences. When asked if he has discovered anything about the world that he would like more people to understand, he provided a very humbling answer.
“I think many people have a tendency to romanticize things. I’ve been to Bali many times, for instance, and everyone thinks of Bali as this complete spiritual utopia. Most of Bali is really a giant traffic jam with overpriced shops and restaurants and the artificial utopia of resort hotels,” Dr. Zook said. “But that’s the part to realize — learning to see past the romanticized parts and yet still find something redeeming in every place you are.”
Caption: A picture from Rapa Nui (Easter Island). “I’m always drawn to the little things that many people overlook, such as in this case a local artist who painted two Rapa Nui children on the side of a house…takes us way beyond the statues people always think of with Rapa Nui and reminds us of the people who still live there and make up Rapa Nui culture,” Dr. Zook said.
A promoter of benevolence and compassion, Dr. Zook is popular among students because of his genuine desire to better the world through a deeper understanding of people.
“I love the differences we have all around the world, but we are also strikingly the same, in good and bad ways. You discover that there are wonderful people in every place you go, and you also discover there are horrible people,” Dr. Zook said. “I think I am most inspired not by the great names of the world, but by the nameless people you never hear of — the ordinary folks who struggle through some horrific situations in ways that make you wonder if you have the strength to do the same.”
Of course, working the field of justice is not an easy task — especially in a world as volatile as ours.
“When you work on issues of justice, you realize just how much injustice there is in the world. It’s everywhere, and it can feel like a losing battle all of the time,” Dr. Zook said. “That sense of discouragement can be from big issues and small. It’s there all the time, and half of my job is to find a way to deal with it and not let it distract me from the work at hand — to make things a bit better in whatever way I can.”
Many students here — especially on the UC Berkeley campus, where there is a history of protesting for social justice — desire to better the world. However, they are often faced with opposition, with the comment that they are “too idealistic.” Dr. Zook has some advice for these students.
“The advice is really a warning: if you want to make the world even a slightly better place, it’s the toughest job you’ll ever have and it’s a life-long project,” Dr. Zook said. “I always find inspiration in this quote: ‘If you expect to find the answers to your questions in your lifetime, you aren’t asking big enough questions.’”