Hate studies is an interdisciplinary academic field focusing on the causes, effects, and prevention of manifestations of hatred, such as microaggressions, hate speech, hate crime, terrorism, and genocide, that target individuals based on hostility towards their race, religion, ethnicity, nationality, sexual orientation, gender, social class, disability, or other perceived conditions or identity categories. It may interest scholars, academic researchers, practitioner-experts, human rights leaders, policymakers, NGO/INGO leaders, and many others. Origins Hate studies developed from the civil rights movement in the United States. The interdisciplinary Institute of Hate Studies was founded at Gonzaga University, a Jesuit Catholic institution located in Spokane, Washington, in 1992, and the Gonzaga Institute for Action Against Hate was founded in 1998 to "fight hate through education, research, and advocacy", as a response to growing concerns about increasing levels of hate crimes, hate groups, and online hate speech, with the aim of facilitating an interdisciplinary study of the causes, effects, and prevention of hate in society. The institute began to publish the annual peer-reviewed Journal of Hate Studies in 2002, and Gonzaga University has hosted three "International Conferences on Hate Studies" in 2004, 2011, and 2013. Other universities have added similar courses to their curricula, and the field of hate studies has now expanded globally. In 2014 the University of Leicester launched the "Centre for Hate Studies," which grew out of the "Leicester Hate Crime Project". The centre's continuing professional development program provides training on hate crime commission, prevention, and victimization, based on academic studies, policy, and victim statements. In 2018 Bard College founded the Bard Center for the Study of Hate, with Ken Stern as its director. Since 2013, the International Network for Hate Studies (INHS), has arranged a global forum for academics, policy experts, and practitioners to share knowledge and research findings about hate crime and related issues. Their website states that the study of hate "needs a multi-disciplinary and international focus as well as one which examines local and jurisdiction-specific causes and responses." The Network hosts an online blog, an online library for researchers, and various collaborative workshops, and organizes an international conference every two years, the first of which occurred in 2014 at the University of Sussex School of Law. In 2014, Palgrave Macmillan began to publish the "Palgrave Hate Studies Series". Scope Kenneth Stern, an American attorney and an author, defines hate studies as "inquiries into the human capacity to define, and