International Education Week

In celebration of International Education Week, program directors will be promoting their study abroad programs at Indiana University-Purdue University in Indianapolis.

An information table will be on the second floor of Cavanaugh Hall on the IUPUI campus from 15-18 November, where students can find out more information about programs traveling to India, China, France, Germany, Dominican Republic, South Korea, Greece, Canada and many more.

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Unintentional Intolerance

Steve Robbins (pictured) will discuss "Unintentional Intolerance: What Nice People Need to Know" during a 3 p.m. event 17 November in 93 Auditorium at Eli Lilly and Company's corporate headquarters in Indianapolis.

Dr. Robbins, a diversity expert, notes that "cognitive flexibility and behavioral adaptability are necessary for navigating a 21st century world". A reception follows his presentation.

The event is sponsored by Lilly India Network, Eli Lilly Asian Network, Chinese Culture Network at Lilly, Middle Eastern Network at Lilly and the Asian-American Alliance of Indiana. For reservations, please send an email; deadline is 8 November.

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Heartland Film Festival Runs Through 23 October

Heartland, the annual 10-day celebration of international film, includes movies from Australia, Brazil, Canada, India, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, Russian Federation, Rwanda, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom, Uzbekistan (and the United States).

For more information, including a schedule, go online.

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Indiana Looks to Grow India Connection

Some Indiana business and community leaders say enhancing economic ties with India could mean big business for the state, reports Inside INdiana Business. Thursday (23 September), Indianapolis law firm Barnes & Thornburgh LLP convened a meeting with more than two dozen Indian executives and Hoosier business leaders representing technology, energy, education and manufacturing. The goal is to help increase business between Indiana and the Asian nation.

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IU Professor Studies Justice System in India

Jayanth Krishnan (pictured) will serve as project director for an intensive study on the lower judiciary in India, according to the Indiana University Maurer School of Law. Krishnan is professor of law, Charles L. Whistler Faculty Fellow and head of the India Initiative at the Maurer School's Center on the Global Legal Profession.

The research Krishnan is overseeing is being supported by a $261,000 grant from the Ford Foundation to the National Centre for Advocacy Studies (NCAS), a non-governmental association based in the state of Maharashtra. Partnering with Krishnan and NCAS will be the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) and Jagori Grameen, located in the northern state of Himachal Pradesh.

Krishnan and his colleagues will conduct a pilot study of district courts in Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Himachal Pradesh in order to arrive at a preliminary understanding of what is happening in these forums. The study will also include an analysis of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) forums in India.

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Ballard Jets Off to India

Mayor Greg Ballard says the Indianapolis is "perfectly positioned" to be an economic development partner with India, according to Inside INdiana Business. He is leading a trade mission to the country starting tomorrow (23 April), which will include trips to the cities of Hyderabad, Mumbai and New Delhi.

Ballard says sister city agreement will be signed with officials from Hyderabad, which he says is considered the IT capital of India.

Hyderabad, with a metro area population of 6.3 million, is the financial, economic and political capital of the state of Andhra Pradesh.

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The Myth of the Moderate Taliban

Vikash Yadav, assistant professor of political science at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in New York and 1991 graduate of DePauw University, will return to his alma mater on Wednesday (14 April) to deliver the Walker Horizon Lecture in Political Science.

Dr. Yadav will discuss "The Myth of the Moderate Taliban" at 4:15 p.m. in the Pulliam Center for Contemporary Media's Watson Forum on the Greencastle campus. The presentation is free and open to all, reports the DePauw news bureau.

Professor Yadav published the book Risk in International Finance in 2008. He has also written articles on India's relations with the International Monetary Fund and on ways to make international financial organizations more democratic and representative of the voices of the poorest countries.

His current research project examines India's grand strategy in Afghanistan as well as shifting conceptions of sovereignty, security, and identity in the greater South Asia region.

A history major at DePauw, where he graduated cum laude, Yadav went on to earn his Master of Arts degree at the University of Chicago in 1993 and his doctorate at the University of Pennsylvania in 2002. He was also the Queen Elizabeth Visiting Scholar at St. Antony's College at Oxford University.

Prior to joining the Hobart and William Smith faculty, Dr. Yadav taught at Bryn Mawr, Mt. Holyoke and the American University in Cairo.

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I.U. Law Students Head to India

Six students at the Indiana University Maurer School of Law at IU Bloomington have been selected for summer internships in India as Milton Stewart Fellows in the law school's Center on the Global Legal Profession. This program offers students experiences in a variety of settings, including law firms; rights-based, non-governmental organizations, and the Indian Solicitor General's Office, reports the IU News Bureau.

All of the Stewart Fellows (pictured, left) will be second-year students at the Maurer School of Law in the fall of 2010. Following an intensive acculturation session in May during which they will be introduced to India's legal system, they will spend a good portion of the summer working in New Delhi.

The 2010 Stewart Fellows are:
* Nicholas Dau-Schmidt, who will serve as an intern at the law firm of J. Sagar Associates
* Zachary Holladay, who will intern at Jagori, an NGO focused on empowering the rights of women in India
* Erin Mihalik, who will spend her internship at the Self Employed Women's Association-Bharat, an NGO focused on empowering the rights of women in India
* Erica Oppenheimer, who will work for Amarchand & Mangaldas & Suresh A. Suroff & Company, India's largest law firm, followed by an internship at the Indian Solicitor General's Office
* Jillian Rountree, who will be employed by the Clarus Law Firm
* Renee Turner, who will serve as an intern at The Dalit Foundation, an NGO focused on empowering the rights of the lowest castes in India, followed by an internship at the law firm of Lalit Bhasin & Company.

The NGO internships have been made possible through a partnership with the Unitarian Universalist Holdeen India Program; the NGO interns will also be designated as Holdeen Scholars.

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Lilly's Transfer of Technology to South African Company

Eli Lilly & Company has announced the US$1 million milestone payment to Aspen, a pharmaceutical manufacturer, as part of the joint collaboration on expanding access to medicines to treat multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), according to Aspen Pharma.

The milestone is part of a Transfer of Technology agreement between Aspen and Lilly, initiated in 2003 under the umbrella of the Lilly MDR-TB Partnership, a global project to tackle the growing MDR-TB epidemic. Aspen is based in Johannesburg, South Africa.

The collaboration involved the transfer of Lilly’s drug manufacturing and packaging technology to enable Aspen to manufacture two essential anti-TB drugs. Lilly provided manufacturing know-how, access to technical experts, and other assistance to assure the quality and sustainability of the manufacturing processes.

The partnership with Aspen represents one of four similar partnerships Lilly holds with pharmaceutical manufacturers based in high burden countries where MDR-TB is most prevalent. These additional partnerships are between Lilly and SIA International (Russia), Shasun Chemicals and Drugs (India), and Hisun Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd (China).

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IUPUI Co-Sponsoring Biocomputing Symposium in India

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis and the National Institute of Technology Calicut (pictured) in India are partnering to increase international research opportunities among life and computer science scholars, reports Inside INdiana Business. Both institutions have co-founded the first International Symposium on Biocomputing to take place 15-17 February in Calicut City. Lecturers and presenters representing 14 countries will focus on bioinformatics and biotechnology.

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Lotus Festival: World Music & Arts

The Lotus World Music & Arts Festival, set for 24-27 September in Bloomington, has so much going on it's hard to settle on just one aspect.

For example, here are just some of the performers scheduled to appear:

# Rahim AlHaj / Friday
Virtuoso Iraqi oud

# Bajofondo / Saturday
Electrotango from Argentina

# BLK JKS / Saturday
Psychedelic, Afro-futuristic rock from South Africa

# Cara Dillon / Friday, Saturday
Irish traditional song

# Forro in the Dark / Saturday
Northeastern Brazilian party music

# Hanggai / Saturday, Sunday
Folk music from Inner Mongolia & China

# Huun Huur-Tu & Carmen Rizzo / Friday
Electronica meets throat-singing from Tuva

# Kinobe & Soul Beat Africa / Friday, Saturday
Ugandan song, dance, & drumming

# Srinivas Krishnan & Madras Broadcast / Saturday, Sunday
Indian fusion

# Little Cow / Thursday, Friday
Ska/rock/funk/Gypsy fusion from Hungary

# Los de Abajo / Friday, Saturday
Salsa, punk, and rock from Mexico

# The Megitza Quartet / Friday
Roma and East European world fusion

# Occidental Brothers Dance Band International / Friday
Central & West African dance music

# Orchestra of Tetouan / Friday, Saturday
Traditional vocal & instrumental music of Andalusia & North Africa

# Parno Graszt / Thursday, Friday, Saturday
Hungarian Gypsy music

# Salaam / Saturday
Middle Eastern & North African traditional music

# Väsen / Thursday
Contemporary instrumental folk music from Sweden

# Vishtén / Saturday, Sunday
Acadian traditional music, song, and dance

# Watcha Clan/ Friday, Saturday
Global fusion from France

# The Zolfonoon Ensemble of Iran / Saturday
Classical Persian

Did you know that the festival honors Lotus Dickey (1911-1989)? The folk singer, songwriter, and musician from rural Orange County, Indiana, wrote tunes and songs that drew from his family and community, as well as from country singers and fiddlers he heard on the radio. Each year, the Lotus World Music and Arts Festival honors Lotus Dickey's memory with a set of music or an interactive workshop that introduces new audiences to his music and the old-time traditions of the United States.

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"Our Agenda is Now on the World's Agenda"

A conference on "World Poverty, World Trade" subtitled "A Critical Phenomenology of World Trade Regulation: Our Agenda is Now on the World's Agenda", will be held 18 and 19 September in the Ballroom of the Walb Student Union at Indiana University-Purdue University in Fort Wayne.

The conference schedule includes presentations on Bolivia, Algeria, China, Mexico, Sudanas and India as well as examinations of the role of the World Trade Organization. In addition to faculty from the IPFW campus, speakers are coming from as diverse places as Saudi Arabia, Switzerland and the AFL-CIO.

The international conference is being organized by the IPFW Institute for Human Rights and is co-sponsored by the IPFW Philosophy Department, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Office of Research and External Support, the Doemer School of Business and Management, IPFW Student Government, and the City of Fort Wayne. For information contact Professor Clark Butler, Department of Philosophy, 260:481-6364.

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Center on Global Legal Profession

A new center at Indiana University Bloomington will develop research and training materials to assist current and future attorneys in their understanding of international legal systems. The launch of the Center on the Global Legal Profession, based in the Indiana University Maurer School of Law in Bloomington, was announced Saturday (8 August) in New Delhi, India. The venue was a conference on how globalization is affecting the practice of law and legal education co-sponsored by the IU Maurer School of Law and the Jindal Global Law School.

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Asian Festival at Valpo on 4 April

Asian culture will be celebrated during an event organized by Valparaiso University students featuring the diverse food, music, languages and culture of the world's largest continent.

“Taste of Asia,” sponsored by Valpo's Asian American Association, will take place from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. 4 April in Harre Union on the campus in Valparaiso. The event is open to the public and tickets may be purchased for $2 at Harre Union Welcome Desk.

Samples of food from the Middle East, India, China and Mongolia will be served periodically throughout the event, and students will perform songs from India and the Philippines, a Middle Eastern scarf dance and a skit about Saudi Arabia.

Several interactive activities also will be available, including henna body art and a booth where people can have their name written in different languages, including Arabic and Hindi.

For more information, send an e-mail to Jessiemarie White, or call the Harre Union Welcome Desk at 219:464-5415.

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Purdue to Hold Business Forum on China, India

A symposium examining business opportunities and challenges in China and India will be held 28 March at Purdue University's Burton D. Morgan Center for Entrepreneurship in Discovery Park at West Lafayette, reports Inside INdiana Business.

The Consul General of the Consulate of the People's Republic of China in Chicago, Ping Huang will be the keynote speaker.

The Confucius Institute, Discovery Park, Global Engineering Programs and the Center for International Business Education and Research (CIBER) at Purdue are sponsoring the event.

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Three Women "On a Mission"

Jayne During, Donna Thomas and Molly Lawton were profiled in December's issue of Indianapolis Woman by managing editor Rebecca R. Bibbs.

During, a native of Ghana, has created Kuaba Humanitarian Foundation to benefit the people of Zimbabwe. Thomas has helped build churches through Christian Vision Ministries of Carmel in Mexico, China and India, and has visited 75 countries. Lawton works with Carmel-based Mission to Ukraine Crisis Pregnancy Ministry.

Slumdog Millionaire: It's Not What You Think

A gem of a movie is playing in a few Hoosier cities this week. Taking place (mostly) in Mumbai over a period of about 15 years, it recounts the tale of Jamal Malik, an illiterate Muslim "slumdog" who ends up (in 2006) on the Indian version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire".

It's told in an intricate intercutting of present-day and flashback. The director, Danny Boyle, "uses this extraordinary premise to paint a kaleidoscopic portrait of a society built around survival of the fittest, where betrayal is commonplace and greed and corruption lie just around every corner." (TIFF'08)

To quote from a review in the Los Angeles Times, "As Jamal describes the specific incidents that led to his being able to answer each of the quiz show questions, he is simultaneously telling several stories, tales of the link between brothers, the never-ending battle with poverty, the lure and pitfalls of crime and the rapid modernization of India."

If you want a little insight into the horrific incident in Mumbai a couple of weeks ago, not to mention a glimpse of a vibrant city that one of the lead characters calls "the center of the world", see Slumdog Millionaire now; don't wait to rent it when it comes out on DVD! One of the places it's playing this week is Keystone Landmark Theater in Indianapolis.

UPDATE (11 January 2009):
BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – "Slumdog Millionaire" lived up to its underdog theme at Sunday's Golden Globes, sweeping all four of its categories, including best drama and director for Danny Boyle....
"Slumdog Millionaire" also won best screenplay and musical score, firming up its prospects for the Academy Awards. The film features a generally unknown cast in the story of an orphan boy in Mumbai who rises from terrible hardship to become a champ on India's version of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire," all the while trying to reunite with a lost love from his childhood.

See the whole story here.

UPDATE (23 February 2009):
A ‘Slumdog’ Kind of Night at the Oscar Ceremony
By MICHAEL CIEPLY and DAVID CARR
The New York Times
Published: February 23, 2009
“Slumdog Millionaire” won eight Academy Awards, including the prizes for best picture and director.

Our Thoughts are Concentrated on Mumbai

Here in Indiana we're anxiously awaiting good news from our friends in Mumbai.

One place to monitor the news is here.

Partnerships in India, China are Purdue's Goal

Purdue University President France A. Córdova embarked on a two-week trip today (1 November) to build partnerships in India and China, reports the Purdue News Bureau.

Córdova's trip, a year in the planning, will include time in Bangalore, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Hong Kong, and will feature visits to educational institutions and businesses as well as meetings with alumni, parents and major donors.

Purdue has the second-largest number of international students (5,479) of any public university in the United States. Purdue's students come from more than 120 countries, and the largest number of those students - 1,256 - come from India. Students from China are Purdue's second-largest population, with 975 on campus this fall.

In Bangalore, Córdova will meet with key city and country leaders at the Indian Institute of Science and with officials at Infosys Technologies. She also will travel to the General Electric Technology Research Center to review a nanomaterials partnership opportunity and other projects in General Electric's global research division.

At Cummins India in Mumbai, a five-year memorandum of understanding will be signed between Purdue, Cummins Inc. and the Cummins College of Engineering for Women. The college and company, which has its main headquarters in Columbus, Ind., have partnered with Purdue since 2003 to send Indian graduates to the West Lafayette campus for master's and doctoral studies. The memorandum calls on the three to expand these efforts, particularly with research and development; student and faculty exchange; a fellowship program; and support for mechanical engineering curriculum at the Indian campus.

In addition, Córdova will meet with officials at IIT Bombay, the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, the University Institute of Chemical Technology and the S.P. Jain Institute. Córdova will visit a pharmaceutical manufacturing plant in Hyderabad and a cellular and molecular biology research facility.

In Hong Kong, Córdova will discuss joint research efforts, student internships and research fellowships with officials at the Applied Science and Technology Research Institute Inc. She also will discuss partnerships and research with Alexander Tzang, deputy president of Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and Paul Chu, president of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

Alumni receptions will be held in Bangalore, Mumbai and Hong Kong, providing opportunities for alumni as well as parents of current students to meet Córdova.

Shared Beauty: Eastern Rugs & Western Purses

Though beaded purses were fashionable through the 19th and early 20th centuries, they became extremely popular in the 1920s as an integral part of the flapper-era costumes, greatly complementing the period’s beaded evening dresses. A wide variety of patterns were depicted on these bags, including flowers, trees, birds, animals, landscapes and other popular motifs.

However, some of the most fashionable designs were copied from the patterns of Persian, Turkish, Caucasian, and Indian carpets and textiles.

In "Shared Beauty: Eastern Rugs & Western Purses", an exhibition at Indianapolis Museum of Art continuing through 8 March 2009, beaded bags are displayed alongside rugs with similar patterns. This juxtaposition explores the motifs common to these objects, provides a closer look at Orientalism, and investigates the influences of Eastern art on Western art, fashion, and culture.