" More U.S. World Heritage Sites?"

View of Yosemite
Image Credit: Johannes Brenner

Ted Alvarez has written an article on Backpacker.com welcoming the new Interior Department submissions for consideration for the World Heritage List.

Last year, the Interior Department developed a new list of potential UNESCO World Heritage sites to submit to the committee in hopes of inclusion. Also, after allowing our contribution to the World Heritage fund to drop to zero in 2001, we've finally upped our donation to $700,000 last year.

New nominees for World Heritage sites include the Petrified National Forest, White Sands National Monument, San Antonio's Franciscan missions, the ancient Native American Serpent Mound and Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks in Ohio, Civil Rights movement sites in Alabama, and the buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright. They would join current U.S. World Heritage sites like Olympic National Park, Yellowstone, Yosemite, Redwoods, the Statue of Liberty, the Everglades, Independence Hall, Wrangell-St. Elias, and Mammoth Cave.

Read the full article.

Upcoming: World Digital Library

In a significant step in expanding the availability of global materials and resources, UNESCO and other partners will unveil the World Digital Library (WDL) April 21, 2009, at a reception at UNESCO headquarters. The materials will come in many media forms in an effort to share knowledge from a diverse group of voices and to promote international and intercultural understanding. Further, these materials will also be completely free and offered in multilingual formats in order to most effectively share information with the global community.

The idea for the WDL originated from a June 2005 speech delivered by Librarian of Congress James H. Billington to the U.S. National Commission for UNESCO. Since then, the project has developed into an initiative drawing more than 32 partners and interest from around the world. A progression of the WDL project can be found here.

Content in the library will include items gathered from global educational institutions and libraries, and descriptions of each item alongside videos and other materials for selected items hope to ignite interest in cultural artifacts and events. Materials will be easily searchable:

See the prototype and concept videos here

WDL is looking for others to become involved! Surveying what has been done, identifying important collections for WDL, and developing plans to build capacity all need institutional support and collaboration. For more information on how to become involved, see the WDL involvement page.

The Second Forum of the Alliance of Civilizations

On 6-7 April 2009, the second Forum of the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations will be held in Istanbul, Turkey. In addition to high-level plenary debates, the event is intended to feature:

• An international platform for participants to develop joint initiatives and launch new programs.

• A range of project-specific working sessions, which will provide an interactive, inclusive convening space for policy-makers, international organizations and civil society groups to share lessons on best practices and develop joint work platforms.

• A unique 'Marketplace of Ideas' that will showcase some of the most innovative and successful grassroots projects with the purpose of transcending cultural divides and building peace.

Go to the Forum website.

The Alliance of Civilizations (AoC) was established in 2005, at the initiative of the Governments of Spain and Turkey, under the auspices of the United Nations. The AoC Secretariat, which is based in New York, works in partnership with States, international and regional organizations, civil society groups, foundations, and the private sector to mobilize concerted efforts to promote cross-cultural relations among diverse nations and communities, and in particular between "Muslim" and "Western" societies.

The Alliance works in four program areas to support such projects. These areas are: youth, media, education, and migration.

At a political level, mainly through role of our High Representative President Sampaio, former President of Portugal, the Alliance works to establish platforms for dialogue among political, religious, media and civil society personalities who are prepared to use their influence in advancing the Alliance of Civilizations’ objectives.

The Alliance has developed memoranda of understanding with a number of partner organizations, including UNESCO, the Arab Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ALESCO) and the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ISESCO).

The Alliance of Civilizations Group of Friends community is vital to the AoC’s implementation process. The Group of Friends consists of representatives of States, UN agencies, and other international organizations and bodies that have demonstrated active interest in and support of the Alliance.

Surprisingly, there is no representative of the United States Government listed among the Group of Friends. Perhaps this is something that the Obama administration can rectify.

The Alliance of Civilisations International Network of Foundations brings together foundations working to build trust and cooperation among religions, cultures and peoples. The Network includes U.S. foundationsL the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the Doris Duke Foundation for Islamic Art, as well as many of the most important foreign foundations.

The Global Voices Book Challenge

April 23rd is a symbolic date for world literature for on this date and in the same year of 1616, Cervantes, Shakespeare and Inca Garcilaso de la Vega all died. The date has been chosen by UNESCO and the United Nations for the annual celebration of World Book and Copyright Day.

The Global Voices Book Challenge is as follows:

1. Read a book during the next month from a country whose literature you have never read anything of before.
2. Write a blog post about it during the week of April 23.

UPDATE: Tag your posts with #gvbook09 so we can find your posts.

Read more about the Book Challenge!

Become a World Heritage Junior Ranger!

Wally the U.S. World Heritage Wolf invites kids from 8 to 14 to become World Heritage Junior Rangers. You can do so at home by completing five interesting activities available at

THIS WEBSITE!

If you can, get you parents to take you to visit the many World Heritage Sites which are U.S. National Parks and complete their respective Junior Ranger programs

The U.S. Reasserts Interest in World Heritage Program

Source: "U.S. Revisits Its World Heritage Roots," Melinda Burns, Miller-McCune, March 28, 2009.

"for the first time since 1995, the U.S. Department of the Interior nominated two new sites for inclusion on the United Nation's World Heritage List of places of "outstanding universal value," a kind of Nobel Prize in the world of preservation. The two sites are George Washington's Mount Vernon estate on the Potomac River, and the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands.......

"Since 2005, following a lapse of six years, the U.S. has been a member of the 21-nation World Heritage Committee, selecting and monitoring sites and making management recommendations. In 2007, the National Park Service became an associate member of the World Heritage Alliance, a partnership with the travel services company Expedia, Inc. to promote the sites."

In the early 1970s, under then-President Richard Nixon, the U.S. was the chief architect of and the first country to sign the World Heritage Convention, an international treaty administered by UNESCO that encourages all countries to protect places of exceptional ecological, scientific or cultural importance.

Read more!

UNESCO Non-Alligned Countries Meet

There is a report in Diario Granma, in Spanish (Havana, March 25, 2009), on a recent meeting of the Non Aligned Nations of UNESCO. The follow is extracted from that article:

The participants in the meeting reaffirmed the priorities given to South-South cooperation on education, cultural diversity and human rights. The meeting also identified as important UNESCO fields of action:

• New information and communications technologies
• The effects of the global economic crisis on education
• the defense of linguistic diversity and
• the support of the Palestinian peopls.
  

In the plenary meeting, chaired by the Héctor Hernández Pardo (Cuban Ambassador to UNESCO and president of the Group, Farouk Hosni was presented as the candidate of the Arab nations in the October election for the new Director General of UNESCO.