Our interest in hosting international visitors comes from our own experiences abroad. My husband, daughter and I returned to the U.S. in 2012 following my two decades as an Associated Press correspondent on three continents. People welcomed us in their hometowns around the world. Even now when we vacation, we meet strangers who offer menu recommendations in Brazil or Slovenia, or who help us navigate subways in Moscow or Tokyo. 

Extraordinary bonds are forming on seemingly ordinary Saturdays as students and newcomers from Syria, Turkey, and Iraq spend the days conversing in Arabic and English at the Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations Cultural Exchange Support Initiative (NMC-CESI) at U of T. The NMC-CESI acts as a resource for Syrian refugees and other newcomers from Arabic-speaking countries to improve their English

When Aigul Saiapova decided to take up a political science course at New York University - Abu Dhabi, she did not expect to be propelled into a digital world. The 19-year-old Russian recently finished an i-Diplomacy class led by Tom Fletcher, a former adviser to three British prime ministers. [...] The course, which started last month, focuses on the way digital technology is reshaping the interaction between states

Six hundred people came to USC to hear scholars and experts talk about the challenges of electoral politics everywhere, and especially in Armenia. [...] Their message resonated with the capacity crowd at USC’s Bovard Auditorium who interrupted with applause more than a dozen times during the Celebrity Diplomacy program hosted by USC Institute of Armenian Studies.

Back in November 2014, Michael Weiss and Peter Pomerantsev published an insightful report called “The Menace of Unreality: How the Kremlin Weaponizes Information, Culture and Money.” The main argument was that ‘truth’ no longer matters and the key objective is to deliberately distort the truth and sow confusion. The report earned immediate attention in Brussels—including in NATO circles. 

Social media heavyweights like Facebook and YouTube have been working with the U.S. government and other international partners as they look to take a more active role in combating terrorist propaganda and other extremist messages that have gained traction online. Officials from the popular social network and YouTube parent Google addressed the issue here at a recent tech policy conference.

Leaders of several American companies have announced plans to hire, house or otherwise support people affected by President Trump's sweeping freeze on people seeking asylum in the U.S. or traveling from seven largely Muslim countries. [...] Starbucks Chairman and CEO Howard Schultz says his company plans to hire 10,000 refugees in the next five years in the 75 countries where it does business.

When it comes to living in a democracy, Nato Thompson argues, nothing affects us more directly and more powerfully than culture. Culture suffuses the world we live in, from TV to music to advertising to sports. And all these things, Thompson writes in his new book, Culture as Weapon, “influence our emotions, our actions, and our very understanding of ourselves as citizens.”