sao paulo
For obvious reasons, many Paulistanos still consider this megacity’s decrepit old center a no-go zone. Carjacking and kidnapping gangs preyon motorists at stoplights. Squatterscontrol dozens of graffiti-splattered apartment buildings. Sinewy addicts roam through the streets smoking crack cocaine in broad daylight.
In April 2013, I had the opportunity to accompany the Hawaiian slack key guitar ensemble Keola Beamer and Jeff Peterson, with Moanalani Beamer, as tour manager as the group toured Brazil with the U.S. Department of State's American Music Abroad program.
Every year, select students from the USC Master of Public Diplomacy program at USC Annenberg travel abroad to conduct field research, which furthers the study of public diplomacy and international communications. This year, the Class of 2014 selected São Paulo, Brazil for its unique position in world politics.
Revellers in Rio have joined a whirl of festivities as carnival fever took hold, the world's biggest street party putting firmly aside lingering protests over corruption and the cost to Brazil of hosting the World Cup. With the football extravaganza now just three months away, flamboyantly dressed metropolis residents indicated that, for the moment, they had spent enough time demonstrating and wanted to let loose instead.
In early February, 7 USC Master of Public Diplomacy students embarked for São Paulo, Brazil. We arrived with just a day to get acclimated to the city before our meetings began on Monday. As students of diplomacy, the logical choice for a research trip to Brazil might be Brasilia. As the capital, it hosts the country's diplomatic corps and would certainly make a worthy case study of how diplomacy works in Brazil. While traditional diplomacy will always be worth pursuing, we are not going to Brazil to study it.
Each year the second year students in the USC Master of Public Diplomacy program select a location abroad to conduct new research that can further the study and practice of public diplomacy. This year, the Class of 2014 selected Sao Paulo, Brazil for its unique position in world politics. Brazil is currently transitioning from a regional and hemispheric power to a global one.
At least 1,000 demonstrators protested in Sao Paulo on Saturday against the World Cup that Brazil will host later this year in a demonstration that devolved into violence late in the night. On its Facebook page, the Anonymous Rio protest group billed “Operation Stop the World Cup” as this year’s first act against the soccer tournament.
Dancers perform the ballet "Concerto de Bach" at the Saint Peter's Theater in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Oct. 12, 2013. A ballet was staged as the opening show of the China Cultural Month here on Saturday. More than 150 artists from China will present the local audience with a series of cultural feasts such as ballet, acrobatics and art exhibitions from October to December, 2013 in Brazil.