UNESCO Courier articles from February 1994

UNESCO Courier archives from February 1994

Yves Coppens talks to Francis Leary. (palaeontologist) (Interview) (Interview)
February 1, 1994... A palaeontologist of international reputation, Yves Coppens is professor of palaeoanthropology and prehistory at the College de France (Paris). He has carried out extensive fieldwork which has led to the discovery of many fossil hominids and the...

The gift of tongues.
February 1, 1994... The world's peoples have devised ingenious strategies for communicating across linguistic and cultural boundaries MORE than 5,000 different languages are currently spoken in the world, with a very much larger number of dialects. Many of them...

Babel revisited.
February 1, 1994... Linguistic diversity is a resource whose value has been widely underestimated IN the biblical story of the Tower of Babel, the descendants of Noah tried to build a tower leading to heaven, but God frown on their presumption and sabotaged the...

Nigeria's choice. (language policy)
February 1, 1994... The thorny questions facing a nation 400 languages as it seeks a common medium of communication DEVELOPING nations, in general, rarely consider language questions a priority unless problems arise in connection with the implementation of...

Can Angkor be saved? (Angkor Wat, Cambodia) (Greenwatch)
February 1, 1994... BENEATH the aircraft's wing at sunset, the broad marshy moat dotted with white egrets, the three rectangles of covered galleries, the terraces and the five high, sculpted towers of Angkor Wat are all tinged pink. We are privileged to be flying...

The World Conservation Union: an alliance to care for the earth. (Greenwatch)
February 1, 1994... THE World Conservation Union (IUCN) has its headquarters in a light, airy building set amid maize-fields near the shores of Lake Geneva in Switzerland. This influential body, set up jointly by UNESCO and France in 1948, brings together 62...

Language death in Siberia.
February 1, 1994... Many of the world's languages today face extinction. The story of Siberia's minority peoples is a telling example of the threat to cultural diversity WHILE cultural change in many parts of the world is usually spontaneous, in Russia it has...

The chicken and the banana. (languages in Santa Cruz Islands)
February 1, 1994... SOME of the world's most unusual languages are spoken in the Santa Cruz Islands, a volcanic archipelago located between the Solomon Islands and the islands of Vanuatu (formerly the New Hebrides) in the southwestern Pacific. The languages, which...

Of gifts and gaffes. (Chinese immigrants in Australia)
February 1, 1994... For Chinese immigrants in Australia, overcoming cultural differences can be just as nerve-wracking as learning a new language A Chinese woman who has lived in Australia for more than twenty years recently told me the following story. Shortly...

The spirit of Granada. (symposium on Israeli-Palestinian relations) (Commentary)
February 1, 1994... UNESCO is proud to have organized last December in Granada (Spain), an international symposium at which Israeli, Arab and European intellectuals met to discuss the intellectual aspects of the Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation process. Among...

The way to coexistence. (collective security) (Archives)
February 1, 1994... In 1935, as the dictators were tightening their grip on Europe, the International Institute of Intellectual Co-operation organized a conference in London on the theme of collective security. One of the participants was the English historian...

The royal palaces of Abomey.
February 1, 1994... "The shark who does not fear the cayman! The king who saved Dahomey from dishonour Is the Master of the Universe who will fulfill the country's hopes!" EACH day at dawn Panlingan, crier of the court of Gezo, king of Dahomey in the first...