Robert Maguire, Jr.'s Resume (Last updated November 16th 2008)

Optolink:

• "TPO Eyes the Future" August 2008
  

The Charleston Mercury:

• "The Taiwan Issue: A Ripple in the Strait" April 24, 2008
  

• "How China Plays the War on Terror" December 6, 2007
  

• "Appeasing China has No Guarantees" October 25, 2007
  

• "Learning There is No Mainland" September 13, 2007
  

• "A Day in the DMZ" July 19, 2007
  

• "The Caveman in the Kitchen" June 7, 2007
  

• "Two Thousand Years of Scholarship" April 26, 2007
  

• "The Dynamics of Conflict" March 29, 2007
  

• "A New Home in New Tokyo" March 1, 2007
  

• "Trying to Make Sense of Contemporary France" April 13, 2006
  

• "From Paris: A Lowcountry Native's View of French Riots" November 22, 2005
  

Pajamas Media:

• "New Taiwanese Leadership = An Opportunity for U.S." March 26, 2008
  

The Tiger (Clemson University):

• "Study abroad fair deserves attention" September 24, 2004
  

• "A Great Escape! Just not from studying..." September 17, 2004
  

The East-West Center's Summer Institute for International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights on Asia-Pacific Transitional Justice and Peace-Building:
In 2008, I was one of thirty out of over a hundred applicants accepted East-West Center's Summer Institute Asia-Pacific Transitional Justice and Peace-Building held in Bangkok in conjunction with Mahidol University and UC-Berkeley. As one of the program's youngest participants (the average age being late thirties, early forties), I had the opportunity to share with and learn from people who, in many cases, had been practicing human rights law and activism since before I was born.

The two-week seminar brought together participants from South East Asia, New Zealand, Europe, and the United States who specialize in the fields of human rights, international humanitarian law and transitional justice. Over two dozen presentations were given by

• UN judges, special rapporteurs, and defenders working in Yugoslavia, Cambodia, Timor Leste, North Korea and Rwanda
  

• experts from various Human Rights organizations and universities like the International Crisis Group, UC-Berkeley's War Crimes Studies Center, and the Mindanao Commission on Women
  

• officials from international bodies like ASEAN and the United Nations.
  

The subjects of these presentations ranged from investigations into the role of identity in violent conflicts in Mindanao (the Philippines) and the Patani region (Thailand) to detailed descriptions of the various international courts trying alleged war crimes in Cambodia, Timor Leste, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone.


Taiwan Thinktank's seminars on transitional justice and referendum laws in Taiwan:
In Taiwan, I've attended two seminars held by the Taiwan Thinktank at both of which then-President Chen Shui-Bian gave the commencement speech. The first conference was on transitional justice:http://www.taiwanthinktank.org/ttt/servlet/OpenBlock?Template=Article&lan=en&categoryid=59&articleid=787&BlockSet= in Taiwan, discussing how to manage allegedly stolen assets acquired by the KMT during the martial law period. The second was an analysis of Taiwan's referendum laws with special emphasis on the then-upcoming UN referendum in 2008.


The Breakfast Club:
I often participated in the monthly meetings of the "breakfast club." These meetings are put together by Dr. Jerome Keating, a professor and writer in Taipei, and is meant to give those interested a chance to discuss issues important to Taiwan. Each meeting has a guest speaker, ranging from Taiwanese politicians and scholars to high-level White House adviser Steven Yates and Asia specialist John Tkacik. These discussions are very intimate, usually only involving only about a dozen people or so.

2008 Webby Awards Honoree - The Webby Awards is an international award honoring excellence on the internet. In 2008, my website, The Only Redhead in Taiwan, was selected as an honoree, a distinction that is awarded to work that scores in the top 15% of the nearly 10,000 entries received from all 50 states and over 60 countries entered into the Webby Awards.

LIFE Scholarship (freshman, junior and senior year at Clemson University)

Dean's List 2002-2003

Sigma Tau Delta - National English Honors Society

French - professional proficiency

I use French on a daily basis speaking with my wife, whom I met as a student in France. Though I have less interaction and practice using French now than I did living in France, I am still very comfortable reading and speaking French. Writing in French is challenging and time-consuming, but I can still write documents that are coherent and effective.


Chinese - Limited working proficiency

I have now had nine months of in class Chinese instruction with an additional six months of personal study, aided by my wife and her family, who are native Mandarin speakers. Do to certain financial constraints in Taiwan, I have not always been able to pursue university classes, but even when the opportunity was not there, I took to reading children's books in Mandarin and practicing with my wife and her family. At present, my comprehension is at a level where every day conversation is natural, though not easy, and my speaking is more fluent. At present, I am completing the last of my low-level courses at Chinese Culture University, completion of which assumes I have a good grasp on all of the basic concepts of Chinese grammar and the ability to utilize them as a foundation for communication and advancement in Mandarin.

When I was twenty, I took my bike to Ireland and rode by myself more than four hundred miles during three weeks. This was my first time abroad, and it was also what got me hooked on traveling.

Over the five subsequent years, I've lived abroad four times and traveled to over fifty cities in nearly twenty different countries in Europe and Asia.

These travels have been invaluable to me not only due to the new experiences traveling tends to impart but because over the years I have made friends from many different countries around the world who have invited me to visit their country and welcomed me into their homes. As a result, my travels in recent years have served to give me a much better understanding of these countries than I would have had wandering the streets of a foreign country with a travel guide in my hand.

Below is a list of only the countries where I have stayed with friends and their families, not including the countries in which I have lived, and the amount of time spent there:

Sweden (two weeks), Thailand (three weeks), Italy (7 days), Belgium (3 weeks), Poland (7 days), Korea (7 days), Japan (3 days)

In addition, these are the countries I've visited either on my own or with friends who are not citizens of that particular country:

Denmark, Holland, Scotland, England, Spain, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Czech Republic, Switzerland, Ireland and Austria

http://www.pida.org.tw/welcome.asp

I translated the French version of the Swiss watchmaker's website into English.

I was an ESL teacher for children between six and fifteen years old.

For three summers, I was a bike taxi (pedicab) operator in Charleston, giving rides around downtown Charleston.

Four nights a week, I attended two hour study halls to answer any questions students had in regards to their English assignments.

I participated in this program for high school students, involving restoration and maintenance at national historic sites—Fort Summer, Fort Moultrie, and the Charles Pinckney House.

When I was eleven, I started a neighborhood landscaping business and maintained it for eight years, averaging over twenty clients per summer.

Sigma Nu Fraternity

Big Brothers, Big Sisters
Habitat for Humanity
Charleston Soup Kitchen