On the cultural legacy of the Cold War:Sino-US educational exchange(1949−1990)

The Cold War affected the Sino-US educational exchange between 1949 and 1990.During those years,preparation for educational exchanges,personal contact and cross-government relations characterized the three periods of the exchanges.However,even though the relationship had developed very fast,it was by no means smooth sailing.These exchanges served as a political barometer and also acted as a conduit between the two when diplomatic relations were non-existent.It eased the tension when the relationship between the two countries had problems.The 40 years of exchanges were a win-win situation for both sides and one of the valuable cultural legacies that came out of the Cold War era.

How the Yue Yi lun Was Lost： Calligraphy, the Cultural Legacy, and Tang Women Rulers

Abstract Dating back to at least the Han dynasty, calligraphy has been a powerful object of culture and a medium of elite education, document preparation, and character evaluation. Discourses surrounding rulers and calligraphy form an important sub-strand in materials on calligraphy, and these accounts often depict calligraphy as a vehicle capable of reflecting a ruler＇s moral character. This paper explores narratives that blame early Tang women power-holders, in particular, the Taiping and Anle Princesses, for borrowing and subsequently losing precious calligraphic items that were considered the authentic work of Wang Xizhi. The analysis focuses on the ways in which the different narratives describe the physical movement or location of the Wang Xizhi pieces in relation to contemporary rule and factional politics. The narratives interpret the calligraphic manuscripts as an example of the cultural inheritance, to which the ruler should properly relate in particular ways. In this way, the fate of the Wang Xizhi artifacts is understood in terms of the complex relationship between imperial power and the court＇s cultural legacy.

Women Empowerment in the Arab Region： Between the Anvil of Illiteracy and the Hammer of Passive Representative Bureaucracy

This paper emphasizes on enacting comprehensive mainstreaming institutional mechanisms to promote the role of women in socio-economic development in the Arab region. Sustainable development could never take place unless both the government and civil society are committed towards women empowerment and gender parity to achieve gender mainstreaming. However, cultural legacy, with its socioeconomic and political dimensions, is envisaged as the most challenging impediment. There are three critical areas of concern of substantive nature, which are high rates of women illiteracy, passive representative bureaucracy, as a result of underrepresentation at decision-making levels, as well as gender disparity. To investigate women empowerment challenges in the region, the study first presents the multifaceted hurdle of cultural legacy and identifies the relevant social, economic and political challenges from a multidisciplinary perspective. Thereafter, it looks at two inseparable issues facing women in the Arab region, illiteracy and underrepresentation at decision-making levels. The study, then, indicates the pressing need for policy changes to fill up the massive gender gap existing in the majority of Arab States, where not only a description of gender disparity profile of the Arab region is presented but also a comparative outlook vis-a-vis global trends is highlighted. Finally, the research identifies the indispensible roles of both the government and civil society to address key challenges in synchrony. It does not only call for placing women empowerment among the top priorities on the agenda of policy-makers in setting development plans, but also reiterates the significant role of civil society institutions in the areas of illiteracy eradication, civic education, and women fights advocacy. In this context, a framework of recommended policy actions is presented in an attempt to set effective women empowerment mechanisms to achieve gender mainstreaming and hence contribute to sustainable development.

A Critical Regionalism in the Golf Architecture:A Masdar’s‘Eco-city Project’

This article echoes Kenneth Frampton’s critical regionalism to address maintaining the values of the past into the present.For Frampton,architecture design is regionally infused due to essentially dealing with“specificity and locality”,however,remains reluctant to adopt a“universal technology”.A Masdar City’s design represents a valuable case due to casting light on the complexity embedded in intertwining the modernist technologies and a regional architecture.The case study’s analyses cited here suggest that the design of the present evolves from this complexity witnessing a deviation from a“universal technology”and a local architecture.A vernacular style of architecture has been blamed because it stitches together the“globe”and the“local”.A universal technology has been also witnessed here which yields support for the vernacular approaches embedded in a traditional architecture.What Frampton’s critical regionalism appears to overlook are the vernacular approaches that in the analysis of this article embrace a model of the design principles for the“tectonics”to be realised.The key argument brought forward in this article concerns Frampton’s critical regionalism that yet lacks a realistic approach to produce a sense within a local context,thereby needing in its theory to neatly twist the vernacular approaches with a critical regionalism’s synthesis.