Life in Lagos – Part I

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MuralsEngage Lagos

My latest journey took me to Lagos, Nigeria, the most populous city in Africa, where I worked with a community to create a collaborative public mural for the facade of a police station in Ikeja. UR4Africa, a social enterprise dedicated to fostering creativity and unique African content amongst youth and young adults, hosted me during my two week stay in Nigeria. I met Shola, the organization’s founding director, and Abraham, one of her very valued mentor colleagues, at the airport. The organization was originally ‘United Reels for Africa’ as Shola is a filmmaker and the backbone of her mission...

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Baseball Diplomacy: World Baseball Classic 2017

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The 2017 World Baseball Classic took place from March 6-22.

The Meridian Center for Cultural Diplomacy, with support from the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, is curating an exhibition highlighting U.S.-Japan baseball diplomacy that will debut in June. Baseball is arguably the most popular sport in Japan – the island nation is home to the largest professional baseball league outside of MLB in the United States. While the FIFA World Cup continues to be the most-watched sports event in the world, and professional basketball maintains its popularity overseas, baseball, “America’s pastime,” has been left relatively in the dark with regards to its international recognition. After being cut as an Olympic...

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Lady Liberty and Mother India

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Siliguri

This is the first blog in a series highlighting Meridian’s programs with India, both domestic and abroad. Each month a different department will select and share a project that represents our work with the world’s largest democracy. The series culminates in June with Meridian’s third annual cultural diplomacy forum, this year focusing on India.

Indian Women by Joshua Song

March 8th marks International Women’s Day, a global call to action for all to support women’s rights and gender equality. We use this day to remind us of the great amount of work still yet the be accomplished in respect to these issues, including wage parity, political representation, trafficking, and abuse. A complex case study, India is a nation with its fair share of triumphs and difficulties in respect to women’s rights. Women have held the posts of president and prime minister in India, yet the country remains lowly ranked in the Global Gender Gap Report.

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UNESCO’s Announcement of New Intangible Cultural Heritage Is a Great Chance to Think about New Steps to Protect the World’s Properties

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New additions to UNESCO's list of intangible cultural heritage

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) announced the addition of 16 new sites to its Intangible Cultural Heritage list on December 1. This gives us a great opportunity not just to celebrate new additions but to think about how to protect them. These 16 new sites are literally from all over the world: Europe, Asia, South America, the Middle East, and Africa. As a Japanese intern, I was personally glad to see that “Yama, Hoko, Yatai float festivals in Japan” was on the list. This tradition encompasses 33 festivals in 18 prefectures throughout Japan, showing the...

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The Everyday Olympics of Rio de Janiero

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The workships in Rio took place from March 23-24, 2016.

This guest blog by Dave Loewenstein, the selected artist for ECA’s Community Engagement through the Arts Brazil program, first appeared here. For the prequel to the story, read about his experience in Vitória.

In a picture postcard
How would the dream of Rio compare to actually being there, especially at this moment? My first impression matched if not exceeded my expectations – the awe inspiring beauty of how human settlement is tucked in between those lush green mountains that appear like teeth sprouting from the maw of a sun bathing dragon.

Looking down at Copacabana Beach from the top of Pão de Açúcar (Sugarloaf Mountain)
Looking down at Copacabana Beach from the top of Pão de Açúcar (Sugarloaf Mountain)

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