Last week, the American Center in New Delhi organized an interactive session for a young group of professionals and students from India with Ms. Heather Smith, President of the American non-profit, Rock the Vote. This was a unique opportunity for the participants to interact via digital video conferencing with Ms.

Nye has been one of America's leading political scientists, and a peacenik who has lectured on almost anything in relation to diplomatic politics except the arts. Now he has reached them at the international culture summit in Edinburgh, where he will debate "the role of arts and culture in deepening relationships between culture and nations".

China has pushed Confucius Institutes — subsidized Chinese language schools — and expanded some of its domestic media in hopes of exerting more influence over global culture. Despite pouring billions of dollars into these and other programs, they haven’t really worked...If China really wants to boost its soft power, it should be making video games.

Huang is one of the 24 Chinese students who were brought to Bibb county through the Confucius Institute to teach Madarine in primary grades. At Heritage, all students in pre-kindergarten through 3rd will learn Madarine this year.

Brands from Brazil are capturing global attention and allegiance, while their Asian counterparts among the 'BRIC' countries, China and India lag behind, writes Jerry Clode, who leads cultural insight in Asia-Pacific for brand-development consultancy Added Value.

A significant factor helps these brands: Pakistanis love to emulate the west by buying and importing western brands. We do not wear products made in our own country, as they are widely – often unjustifiably – perceived to be inferior in quality. This is a mental state the Pakistani consumer finds difficult to shrug off: we think a global brand is far superior to one of our own.

Six teams from the Taiwan Kitefliers Association will visit Taiwan's diplomatic allies in the Pacific region to promote the country's popular folk art and boost cultural exchanges...Between August and October, the teams will visit Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, and Fiji to showcase their kite-flying skills and teach locals how to make and fly kites.

The first weekend in August proved to be one huge celebration for the Caribbean country of Jamaica. While the success of Usain Bolt, Yohan Blake and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce at the 2012 Olympic Games might have garnered most of the attention, the country was already firmly in the process of celebrating a rather more important milestone: fifty years of Jamaican independence.