Hello, I'm Jim Hilgendorf. Welcome to America's Dialogue.
America's Dialogue grew out of a desire to create a national platform for dialogue on specific important issues facing us today,
The first America's Dialogue was America's Dialogue I, on the issue of nuclear weapons, which centered around a video we produced and mailed out to discussion groups all over the country in April, 2007.
Next came America's Dialogue II, a similar project on health care.
In the first part of 2009, my brother John and I traveled around the country to twenty-one universities to interview over 200 students about their views of what was really important to them about the future of our country, now that we had a new President. This was America's Dialogue III.
Now we are entering a new stage for America's Dialogue - the creation of an international platform, involving the youth of the United States and the youth of other countries.
NOW BEGINNING:
AMERICA'S DIALOGUE IV
INTERNATIONAL
YOUTH FORUM
First Project:
KAZAKHSTAN
__________
Before I began this project on Kazakhstan, I had no knowledge of the country or its people at all. I began by interviewing Mrs. Byrganym Aitimova, a most gracious woman, and the current ambassador to the United Nations from Kazakhstan. We spoke and recorded an interview via Skype.
Her advisor, Gauhar Abdygaliyeva, then helped me contact Kazakhstan students around the world, and I videotaped them on Skype also.
I came to know the new emerging country of Kazakhstan through the words of these young Kazakhstan students, and it has been a wonderful experience for me personally.
I learned so much, and I hope you will too by listening to these voices of Kazakhstan's future. The history and culture of Kazakhstan have much to teach us.
This is only the first of a series of youth forums we will be developing. We are creating a platform to hear from the youth of the world.
Professor Steven Shankman is the UNESCO Chair for Transcultural Studies, Interreligious Dialogue, and Peace at the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon, U.S.A.
Established in September, 2008, the Center for Intercultural Dialogue facilitates collaboration between the University of Oregon and 19 other Chairs worldwide in UNESCO's Intercultural Dialogue Program.
One of these Chairs is located in Kazakhstan.
For more information on the Center for Intercultural Dialogue, check out their website.
TO HEAR FROM THE
STUDENTS OF KAZAKHSTAN,
