Living In A Shrinking World – Sharing our Future TOGETHER!

Mark Harris, President Emeritus of ELS Education Services and Berlitz, was the speaker of the third programme of the annual series arranged by the United Nations Academic Impact. The lecture series called ‘The J. Michael Adams Lecture and Conversation Series’ is named after the late President of Fairleigh Dickinson University, and of the International Association of University Presidents.

Cristina Gallach in her opening remarks, welcomed Mr. Harris stating, “Mark has dedicated his career as an educator and a leader to advance the cause of multilingualism which, in the United Nations, is an integral part of fostering cross-cultural understanding and tolerance.”

In his presentation, Mr. Harris pointed out that one of the solutions to helping displaced persons is language! Unfortuantely, media has been instrumental in spreading xenophobia. He stressed that sad, but true, our world is shrinking not because of poverty, or hunger, but because of people not tolerating people.

In his address, he told four stories: a story about xenophobia and three stories about hope and displaced persons. These stories painted a clear picture of the rough road that the persons involved walked in order to create a decent life for themselves, instead of a stateless and homeless life.

The Ambassador of the Permanent Mission of India to the United Nations, H.E. Mr. Syed Akbaruddin, shared a wonderful aspect regarding some parts of India where openess is more a way of life, where they speak what is called HUGME – Hindi, Urdu, Gujrathi, Marathi, English! It is with no wonder that about 100 students, from Indian background studying at different universities in the US, were present to support the value of language in breaking walls and building bridges.

You are invited to watch this inspiring event  here