Cultural Diversity Day 2021

Happy Cultural Diversity Day 2021

Why does cultural diversity matter?

Three-quarters of the world’s major conflicts have a cultural dimension. Bridging the gap between cultures is urgent and necessary for peace, stability and development.

Cultural diversity is a driving force of development, not only with respect to economic growth, but also as a means of leading a more fulfilling intellectual, emotional, moral and spiritual life. This is captured in the culture conventions, which provide a solid basis for the promotion of cultural diversity. Cultural diversity is thus an asset that is indispensable for poverty reduction and the achievement of sustainable development.

At the same time, acceptance and recognition of cultural diversity – in particular through innovative use of media and Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) – are conducive to dialogue among civilizations and cultures, respect and mutual understanding.

Origin and purpose

In 2001, UNESCO adopted the Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity. and in In December 2002, the UN General Assembly, in its resolution 57/249, declared May 21 to be the World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development, and in 2015, the Second Committee of the UN General Assembly unanimously adopted the resolution on Culture and Sustainable Development A/C.2/70/L.59, affirming culture’s contribution to the three dimensions of sustainable development, acknowledging further the natural and cultural diversity of the world, and recognizing that cultures and civilizations can contribute to, and are crucial enablers of, sustainable development.

The day provides us with an opportunity to deepen our understanding of the values of cultural diversity and to advance the four goals of the UNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions adopted on 20 October 2005:

• Support sustainable systems of governance for culture
• Achieve a balanced flow of cultural goods and services and increase mobility of artists and cultural professionals
• Integrate culture in sustainable development frameworks
• Promote human rights and fundamental freedoms

https://www.un.org/en/observances/cultural-diversity-day

ICDAY's Virtual Event : World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development

Why cultural diversity matters | Michael Gavin | TEDxCSU

"This talk was given at a local TEDx event, produced independently of the TED Conferences. Michael Gavin, associate Professor of human dimensions of natural resources researches biological diversity, and discusses the importance that history, language and tradition have in the preservation of culture."

Cultural Diversity: The Sum of Our Parts | Hilda Mwangi | TEDxUCSD

"In this talk, Hilda Mwangi discussed cultural diversity as it relates to our ever-changing world. She shares her life story, and how her experiences forge her identity as a sum of her parts."

How Culture Drives Behaviours | Julien S. Bourrelle | TEDxTrondheim

Julien argues how we see the World through cultural glasses. By changing the glasses you can change the way you interpret the World.

The Silent Burn Project #AKC20

The Silent Burn Project | Day 1 | #AKC20 from Akram Khan Company on Vimeo.

The Silent Burn Project | Day 02 | #AKC20 from Akram Khan Company on Vimeo.

The Silent Burn Project | Day 03 | #AKC20 from Akram Khan Company on Vimeo.

The Silent Burn Project | Day 04 | #AKC20 from Akram Khan Company on Vimeo.

The Silent Burn Project | Day 11 | #AKC20 from Akram Khan Company on Vimeo.

The Silent Burn Project | Day 12 | #AKC20 from Akram Khan Company on Vimeo.

The Silent Burn Project | Day 20 | #AKC20 from Akram Khan Company on Vimeo.

Architects of Stillness

The Architects of Stillness | A Message from Akram and Mavin from Akram Khan Company on Vimeo.

SI Leader Lab 2019

Great to learn of another promising initiative of SI outreaching from Scandinavia 😉

 #Gender_Equality 

Kindly do check details below, within links and may good forces be on your side.

Consider applying before May 7th/2019

The programme will bring together young leaders from the MENA region, South Asia and Sweden who are working with civil society organizations or networks in the field of gender equality. 

Applicants should be between 22 and 32 years old and have a good command of English. Citizens of the following countries can apply: Algeria, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Nepal, Pakistan, Palestine, Sri Lanka, Syria, Tunisia and Yemen.

https://si.se/en/

https://sweden.se/society/gender-equality-in-sweden/

https://sweden.se/

Everyone a Changemaker

To form and lead this community of communities, Gallardo had to possess what Drayton calls “cognitive empathy-based living for the good of all.” Cognitive empathy is the ability to perceive how people are feeling in evolving circumstances. “For the good of all” is the capacity to build teams.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/08/opinion/changemaker-social-entrepreneur.html?smid=tw-nytopinion&smtyp=cur

By David Brooks

Bill Drayton invented the term “social entrepreneur” and founded Ashoka, the organization that supports 3,500 of them in 93 countries. He’s a legend in the nonprofit world, so I went to him this week to see if he could offer some clarity and hope in discouraging times. He did not disappoint.

Drayton believes we’re in the middle of a necessary but painful historical transition. For millenniums most people’s lives had a certain pattern. You went to school to learn a trade or a skill — baking, farming or accounting. Then you could go into the work force and make a good living repeating the same skill over the course of your career.

But these days machines can do pretty much anything that’s repetitive. The new world requires a different sort of person. Drayton calls this new sort of person a changemaker.

Changemakers are people who can see the patterns around them, identify the problems in any situation, figure out ways to solve the problem, organize fluid teams, lead collective action and then continually adapt as situations change.

For example, Ashoka fellow Andrés Gallardo is a Mexican who lived in a high crime neighborhood. He created an app, called Haus, that allows people to network with their neighbors. The app has a panic button that alerts everybody in the neighborhood when a crime is happening. It allows neighbors to organize, chat, share crime statistics and work together.

To form and lead this community of communities, Gallardo had to possess what Drayton calls “cognitive empathy-based living for the good of all.” Cognitive empathy is the ability to perceive how people are feeling in evolving circumstances. “For the good of all” is the capacity to build teams.

It doesn’t matter if you are working in the cafeteria or the inspection line of a plant, companies will now only hire people who can see problems and organize responses.

Millions of people already live with this mind-set. But a lot of people still inhabit the world of following rules and repetitive skills. They hear society telling them: “We don’t need you. We don’t need your kids, either.” Of course, those people go into reactionary mode and strike back.

The central challenge of our time, Drayton says, is to make everyone a changemaker. To do that you start young. Your kid is 12. She tells you about some problem — the other kids at school are systematically mean to special-needs students. This is a big moment. You pause what you are doing and ask her if there’s anything she thinks she can do to solve the problem, not just for this kid but for the next time it happens, too.

Very few kids take action to solve the first problem they see, but eventually they come back having conceived and owning an idea. They organize their friends and do something. The adult job now is to get out of the way. Put the kids in charge.

Once a kid has had an idea, built a team and changed her world, she’s a changemaker. She has the power. She’ll go on to organize more teams. She will always be needed.

Drayton asks parents: “Does your daughter know that she is a changemaker? Is she practicing changemaking?” He tells them: “If you can’t answer ‘yes’ to these questions, you have urgent work to do.”

In an earlier era, he says, society realized it needed universal literacy. Today, schools have to develop the curriculums and assessments to make the changemaking mentality universal. They have to understand this is their criteria for success.

Ashoka has studied social movements to find out how this kind of mental shift can be promoted. It turns out that successful movements take similar steps.

First, they gather a group of powerful and hungry co-leading organizations. (Ashoka is working with Arizona State and George Mason University.) Second, the group is opened to everybody. (You never know who is going to come up with the crucial idea.) Third, the movement creates soap operas with daily episodes. (The civil rights movement created televised dramas with good guys and bad guys, like the march from Selma.)

I wonder if everybody wants to be a changemaker in the Drayton mold. I wonder about any social vision that isn’t fundamentally political. You can have a nation filled with local changemakers, but if the government is rotten their work comes to little. The social sector has never fully grappled with the permanent presence of sin.

But Drayton’s genius is his capacity to identify new social categories. Since he invented the social entrepreneur category 36 years ago, hundreds of thousands of people have said, “Yes, that’s what I want to be.” The changemaker is an expansion of that social type.

Social transformation flows from personal transformation. You change the world when you hold up a new and more attractive way to live. And Drayton wants to make universal a quality many people don’t even see: agency.

Millions of people don’t feel that they can take control of their own lives. If we could give everyone the chance to experience an agency moment, to express love and respect in action, the ramifications really would change the world.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/08/opinion/changemaker-social-entrepreneur.html?smid=tw-nytopinion&smtyp=cur

SCEWC 2017

Smart City Expo World Congress 2017 ::: SCEWC 2017

Society - Advancing the Health and Wellbeing of People in Cities

Cities play an essential role in shaping human health. Indeed, there is evidence to support positive connections between the physical environment and people’s wellbeing. Still, the risks of adverse impacts such as air pollution, congested traffic and equity issues in terms of access to healthcare are poorly developed. What are the basic services to be provided in a digital society? What kind of tools are needed to improve urban health?

Safe Cities - Securing the Digital City: Cyber threats and Responses

As cities embrace digital infrastructures to improve the overall quality of life, new potential cyberattacks due to numerous vulnerabilities may arise. This influences how cities design, implement and maintain their cyberdefences. Distributed ledger technologies offer considerable promise. How can public safety organizations learn to leverage these technologies appropriately? What role can self-assessment tools play in securing the digital city? Keywords: blockchain; cybersecurity; data protection; distributed ledger technology; endpoint security; IoT Security; Low-Power-Wide-Area Network (LPWAN); smart contracts; privacy

Governance - Standards for Smart Cities

In a path towards smarter cities, standardization plays a key role by supporting the widespread adoption of common approaches and ensuring consistent outcomes as well as compatibility among technologies and services. Yet cities are complex and multi-dimensional systems, thus no single standards organization can provide everything needed. How can the standards world better collaborate to serve the needs of cities and their citizens to tackle common challenges?

Plenary Session - Keep Cities Moving: Towards New Mobility Models

Changes in urban mobility no longer follow traditional patterns and policy makers need to deal with an increasing number of alternatives, often supported by digital technologies that respond flexibly to users’ needs. How can urban transport policy better leverage new and emerging mobility choices in cities? How can city leaders better translate current user behavior towards transport to provide sustainable travel and keep cities moving?

Data&Technology - Rethinking Urban Infrastructures in the Digital Age

The infrastructure that cities provide has evolved as needs changed and opportunities arose. Today, sensors check air quality, roadway cameras help with traffic flow and new energy systems have come to fruition. This evolution has the potential to have the greatest impact, as long as it involves citizens and leverages their creativity and innovation. How can local governments rethink urban infrastructures so that they better serve city dwellers?

Sustainability - Affordable Housing and Sustainable Living

Housing affordability has turned into the topic du jour in media as prices have shot up dramatically in many places while gentrification -which occurs when wealthier people arrive in an existing neighborhood and causes changes in the community-, alters the face of cities. What measures urban leaders need to take to promote sustainable living and preserve diversity, a characteristic that make cities so dynamic and desirable in the first place?

Web Summit 17

Web Summit 2017

Web Summit 2017 - Day 1 - Centre Stage - When the machines outsmart us.. from Web Summit on Vimeo.
Max Tegmark, MIT physicist and researcher, president of the Future of Life Institute and the author of the new NY Times Bestseller "Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence" presents the most provocative ideas from his book. Will machines outsmart us on all tasks within decades, as many industry leaders believe? If so, how can we make humanity flourish rather than flounder?

Max Tegmark
President, Future of Life Institute

Web Summit 2017 - Day 1 - Centre Stage - Will AI save us or destroy us? from Web Summit on Vimeo.
Will artificial intelligence spell the end of humanity? Let's ask two robots. Einstein and Sophia will debate what AI truly means for those of us made out of flesh and blood.

Professor Einstein Robot
Robot, Hanson Robotics

Sophia the Robot
Chief Humanoid, Hanson Robotics & SingularityNET

Ben Goertzel

Chief Scientist, Hanson Robotics & SingularityNET