CaribbeanSeminar　 Intercultural Contacts and Creation of New Cultures - from Caribbean　Perspectives

Date: 15:00 - 17:00, September 12, 2002
Venue: Kobe University, Faculty of Cross-Cultural Studies
Presenters:
1. Keynote Speaker: Professor Rex Nettleford (Vice Chancellor, the Univ. of the West Indies, Jamaica)
The Caribbeanﾕs Creative Diversity: the Defining Point of the Regionﾕs History
2. Prof. Jerome Egger (Dean of Department of History, Suriname National Senior　High Teachers Education School)
　　Multi-Cultural and Multi-Lingual, but not Falling Apart: The Case of Suriname

Co-Host Organizations: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan and Japan Foundation

Contact: Yoshiko Shibata (yoshibat@kobe-u.ac.jp)
Tel/fax: 078-857-8248 (home), 078-803-7481 (office)

Concept: Since the arrival of Christopher Columbus in the late 15th Century, the Caribbean region has experienced various intercultural contacts among native Indians, Europeans, Africans, Indians, Chinese, Indonesians (Javanese), people from the Middle East, etc. Although the image of easygoing harmony is widespread outside the region, the Caribbean region has gone through a number of complicated vicissitudes, out of which people managed to create unique multi-cultural/racial societies that we now recognize as "Caribbean Culture." The presenters are expected to speak from Caribbean perspectives on how the making of such societies has become possible in the region and on how these experiences could contribute to creative solutions to global ethnic conflicts. This Caribbean Seminar at Kobe University will be held as a part of the Caribbean Fair, which was agreed, at the 1st Japan-CARICOM Ministerial-Level Meeting in November 2000 in Tokyo, to be held in Japan in fall 2002.