U.S. Cultural Diplomacy and the Islamic World

The Chez Nous Reston Salon's January meeting presents:

U.S. Cultural Diplomacy and the Islamic World, with:

Ambassador Cynthia Schneider, Director of the Art & Cultural Program at The Brookings Institution, professor of Diplomacy at Georgetown University, former U.S. ambassador to the Netherlands and a Rembrandt expert.
http://www.brookings.edu/opinions/2009/0313_doha_schneider.aspx

            The Nobel  Prize winning  novelist from Nigeria  Wole Soyinka observed that  arts  and culture  tend  to humanize,  while  politics  tends  to  demonize the other.  Nowhere is this statement more evident than in the relationship between the United States (and the west) and Muslim majority communities around the world.  Nearly  a  decade after  September  11th,  a lack of understanding and a preponderance of  negative  stereotypes still divides  the U.S., and the  west,  from  the larger Muslim world. 

            Cultural diplomacy, or “the exchange of ideas, information, art and other aspects of culture among nations and their peoples to foster mutual understanding”, has the potential to change this depressing situation. In the heyday of Cultural Diplomacy, during the Cold War, jazz music trumpeted American ideas and values around the world.  This model of sending  American artists  abroad  to  perform  worked  brilliantly in the past,  but  budget  realities,  an inter-connected  world, and  new  foreign policy  challenges all contribute to the  need  for a  new  cultural  diplomacy model.

            Now  hip hop  music,  local forms of  American  Idol  such  as  Afghan Star,  as well as  American  films and  television  series communicate ideas  -- good  and bad --  about  the  west, and  form  connections  with  other  cultures.  In  addition,  though,  indigenous  forms  of  arts  and culture  shed light on issues and  challenges  facing other societies. 

Artists  hold  governments accountable and  push  the  boundaries of  freedom  of  expression.  Around  the world,  in  countries as  divergent  as Iran, Belarus, and China,  artists and  thinkers  risk prison and  even  death for their ideas.

            This  lecture will explore the rich,  largely untapped  potential of  cultural  diplomacy  to make an impact in  some of  the  greatest foreign  policy  challenges  facing the  United States.

Tickets: $35 include generous buffet.  No lecture-only tickets.

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