There is a very strong focus on the actions of the United Nations and how various International political discourse has affected its operations both internally and in the performance of its basic missions. One of its most important operations deal with the critical aspects of InterCultural Communications, and it is here we I will start a series of articles which take facts directly from various organizations, and most importantly blogs and bloggers.
To start....As per their website:
On Cultural Diversity: Cultural Diversity has been at the core of UNESCO’s concerns since the Organization came into being 60 years ago. The adoption of the UNESCO Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity (2 November 2001) confirmed yet again the Organization's commitment to the "fruitful diversity of… cultures" in a spirit of dialogue and openness, taking into account the risks of identity-based isolationism and standardization associated with globalization.
Given that cultures embrace literature and the arts as well as ways of life, value systems, traditions and beliefs, the protection and promotion of their diversity presents special challenges: notably defending creative capacity through the multitude of its material and immaterial forms and ensuring that all peoples live together peacefully.
Ambassador Louise Oliver addressed the Executive Board of UNESCO on October 3. Her remarks are published on the website of the U.S. Permanent Delegation to UNESCO. After expressing support for the medium term strategy, she said:
However, despite the hard work of the drafting group and its excellent co-chairmen, we think that the C5 (report with the proposed program and budget) is still overly ambitious. Certainly we are pleased that the C5 includes expected results for UNESCO’s initiatives, but is it really possible for the Secretariat to achieve those results in only two years, especially if we insist that their work is of high quality? More .....click to bog itself...end of blog....
Note:Included in this blog is some additional information which on the surface seems important. Nonetheless, and with respect to to what is entailed, there is still strong evidence that there are those within this institution who forever will have a real sense of their initial mission.
Then, and as part of that mission there is Science and Communications.
National reviews of science, technology, and innovation are designed to help chart a course that encourages systems of scientific inquiry and broadens the engagement of scientific evidence in the policymaking process. The methods used for these reviews have varied between countries and among the agencies involved. To learn from past experiences, in April 2003 some 60 representatives from 12 developing countries and international organizations discussed the impacts of previous science and technology reviews, studied how ongoing national assessments had been designed and were being implemented, and collectively deliberated on how future reviews might be enhanced. The organizations represented at the workshop included the World Bank, Sida, UNCTAD, OECD, and the Institut de recherche pour le développement (IRD). The summary of that meeting was published jointly by UNESCO and the IDRC in 2003. (PDF, 66 pages.)
Note: In the experiences of helping International Students / Scholars within Western, New York who were mainly from developing countries, the very concept of an institution reaching out to them to give them the advantage of science and scientific knowledge, as every developed nation already has, to applied to their respected societies is look at just as important as food itself. This plus the ability to establish lines of communications, to enhance the further application of science by such technological innovations such as the Internet, an important cultural component to society development, to those area of additional knowledge, whether it be science or simply social or cultural, assist in very strong terms their future devlopment and thus giving more and broader options in which to choose their future. This aspect, choice is interrelated to self - determination, and with that connection, one is able to see the real overall mission of UNESCO in this role.
UNESCO's Chief of International Cooperation in Higher Education and Manager - UNESCO Chairs, Dr. Sonia Bahri (at left) visits the Women Studies Program at Boston University. She shares the news that the UNITWIN (University Twinning) Network on Gender, Culture and People-centered Development becomes official in September--- the sole UNITWIN now based in Massachusetts! With her (left to right) are Dr. Brenda Gael McSweeney, initator of this UNITWIN Network; Dr. Barbara Gottfried, Women Studies Program faculty; and Maryam Shahsahebi, WSP program manager.
By Shiwali Patel, Boston University 2005 graduate, former Community Educator for Adults and Adolescents at the DC Rape Crisis Center, current law student at Washington College of Law at American University.
It’s an unfortunate reality that sexual violence is widespread to the extent that one in three women worldwide will be a sexual assault survivor. I’ve learned about sexual violence in depth at Boston University (BU) as a women’s studies student and at the DC Rape Crisis Center (DCRCC) where I was a community educator in Washington, D.C. for almost two years. As a student I researched global sexual violence and learned about the horrors faced by many women and children in war torn regions where rape is often used as a tactic of war.Also, to connect more with the issue, I researched campus rapes in the United States and shockingly discovered how so few survivors of rape are supported by their schools.
Another reality I came to understand more clearly as a student and an advocate was societal belief in damaging myths about sexual violence.Adults, adolescents, college students and children have expressed to me, in different ways, many false assumptions about rape.These include: sometimes women are at fault for being raped because “of wearing a short skirt,” “of being too sexual,” “of being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” “men can’t control their sexual urges,” or that “she really wanted it then, but changed her mind and cried rape afterwards.”After listening to this, I would scream in my head thinking, but what if she wanted to wear that skirt? Does this mean that I can’t go anywhere in clothes that I like to wear without being blamed if I’m attacked? How about the many stories I’ve heard about women not reporting? What about children?How are they asking for it?The people who spread these myths disregard the implications of what they are saying- that it’s not the rapists fault for rape, that the victim is to blame, that men and boys aren’t raped, and that rape is just about sexual gratification. All of these are false and in reality, rape is a violent act that is used to overpower and humiliate its victims.
Note: From various aspects, and much which deals with the implementation and practice of InterCutlural Communications, the ciritcal terms of how one labels Developing Countries amd Developed Countries becomes even sharper when dealing with a focus on women, and the essential female sexual right to say " NO! ".
Then, with this in mind, the real issue of choice becomes more clear, and how integrating ideas, technology, communications, and relevant social knowledge of awareness clearly exposes the divider barrier, or image between " developed " and " developing " nation or society.
And finally come the environment...
Thursday, September 28, 2006
The Danube Delta Biosphere Reservation This astonishing realm of waters is home for three hundred bird species and numerous fish species - over 45 -, from sturgeons to carps and perches, while the 1150 plant species range from lianas creeping on tree trunks in oak forests to water lilies. It is no wonder that UNESCO designated the Danube Delta as a "Biosphere Reservation". The Danube Delta Biosphere Reservation holds a triple international protection status: Biosphere Reservation, internationally nominated by the UNESCO Committee "Man and the Biosphere", International Wet Area nominated by the Ramsar Convention Secretariat, and World Natural Heritage Site recognised by UNESCO.More...
Note: This is where I indicated comments.
It is so very true, and many here in America should likewise take more serious note, that everything is indeed in the eye of the beholder. In developed countries we see things from our advantage view point, and with better access to what made our societies successful within present modern dynamics.
Yet, and what we have missed is that in developing countries they had to developed more successful societies inoder to survive, and thus they have, and at times a more solid social base than we, in which any information or outreach of additional knowledge is more crucial, as its not their taxes - which the money in which the United Nations benefits from by contributing nation's taxes - but the very future and stability of their societies which is to them the more imperative. They really don't give a damn about the politics, nor the present discourse which goes on in America about the UN, they need more to survive itself.
The issues isjust as important to those International Student Scholars who are here in The United States, and this article brief, is one way in this academic body can approach their individual campuses, and the further need for the promotion of International based social and cultural programs.
Click on http://groups.google.com/group/international-students-scholars-network/web/education-intro-on-unesco - or copy & paste it into your browser's address bar if that doesn't work.
