Attack On Asian Students Gives Birth To Dialogue
BLOOMINGTON, IN -- A "dialogue-in" will be a highlight of Indiana University Bloomington's third annual Diversity Day, a campus-wide celebration on March 23 centered on the theme "Conversation: Diversity, Ethnicity and Internationalism." Carolyn Calloway-Thomas, IU professor of communications and culture and chair of the IU Bloomington Diversity Committee, said the recent events in Egypt, Libya, Tunisia and Yemen, the anti-Semitic vandalism and an attack on Asian students last year in Bloomington were catalysts for the event. There will be discussion on the challenges of the triple, inextricably-linked factors of diversity, ethnicity and internationalism at the Bloomington campus. "It is worth asking questions such as, 'To what extent is IU moving toward interculturalism? What is the nature of the civic climate at IU Bloomington? Are administrators, faculty, students and staff achieving what we wish to be and do in the areas of diversity, ethnicity and internationalism?'" Calloway-Thomas said. Administrators, deans, faculty, students and staff will participate in lively and robust dialogues, using roundtable discussions as vehicles for addressing some of the crucial questions that confront the campus today in the area of intercuturalism. "Above all, as regards interculturalism, members of the IU Bloomington Diversity Committee want to know where are we and what remains to be done," Thomas explained.
