UNESCO Courier articles from May 1997

UNESCO Courier archives from May 1997

The liberating power of words. (interview with poet Aime Cesaire)(Interview)
May 1, 1997... Aime Cesaire, who was born in Martinique in 1913, is one of this century's major writers. In his poetry, plays and political activities he has waged a lifelong struggle to restore dignity to colonized peoples. First and foremost a poet, here he...

Reading the landscape.(Cover Story)
May 1, 1997... Deciphering an age-old language inscribed in the world around us There is always an interaction between people and the places where they live and move and have their being. Wherever you are, on familiar or unfamiliar ground, other people have...

Thresholds of divinity. (Japanese gateways)
May 1, 1997... Symbolic gateways in the Japanese landscape mark the boundary between the realm of human experience and the world of the gods No visitor to Japan can fail to be impressed by the many torii - simple yet highly remarkable gateways - which adorn...

Sicilian flights. (natural and man-made stairways)
May 1, 1997... In Sicily the eye is constantly drawn upwards by natural and man-made stairways that etch the urban and rural landscape Pantalica in Sicily's Iblei mountains, its necropolis and troglodytic villages with their thousands of niches hewn from the...

Colourful language. (use of colors to beautify and communicate)
May 1, 1997... In the Dominican Republic, vivid colour schemes enliven everyday life with a host of political and sporting allusions For the people of the Dominican Republic creating colourful surroundings is almost second nature. The dominant colours they...

Say it with flowers. (flower gardening in Cypriot houses)
May 1, 1997... The first-time visitor to Cyprus is likely to be struck by the way in which the natural world - with all its contrasts, wisdom and perfection - is recreated inside the islanders' houses. The microcosm of the Cypriot house - traditional or modern,...

What's in a name? (names bestowed on places by European explorers)
May 1, 1997... Early European explorers to Chile's south coast symbolically annexed the places they discovered by giving them European names The Yahgan were a people living in Tierra del Fuego ("land of fire") who used to ply up and down the coast in their...

The world network of biosphere reserves.
May 1, 1997... Biosphere Reserves are geographical areas considered typical of the balanced relationship between people and nature. As of April 1997, 337 Reserves, located in 85 different countries, have met the required criteria for this designation laid down...

The responsibility of scientists.(Science and Society, part 3)
May 1, 1997... Knowledge is always good: it is its applications that can be harmful or even evil. A hammer can be used improperly as an instrument of aggression; so at another level can atomic energy. But we must be careful not to allow only the negative...

The island of Mozambique. (with related article)
May 1, 1997... Arab, Indian and Portuguese architectural influences are blended in the port of Mozambique. Once a trading post on the sea route from Europe to the East Indies, this is[and harbour was placed on UNESCO's World Heritage List in 1991. The little...

Gardens of the Far East.
May 1, 1997... In the early eighteenth century English landscape gardeners began to rebel against the straitjacket of French classicism. They were weary of gardens divided into symmetrical blocks by rectilinear paths punctuated with statues and fountains,...

Ethiopia's azmari minstrels.(Interview)
May 1, 1997... * Are all three of you genuine azmaris? Ejigayehu Shibabaw: No, the only azmari is Weres Egeziaber. He only performs traditional music, whereas Fantahun Shewakochew Mekonnen and I sing and play other kinds as well. A real azmari has to play...

Aleko Konstantinov: Happy and glorious.(Obituary)
May 1, 1997... Still going strong a century after his creator's death, a hero of Bulgarian literature who stepped out of the pages of fiction into real life. It is a rare occurrence for a hero of literature to leap off the page, turn his back on the writer...