Contemporary African artist Eric Adjetey Anang, internationally renowned for the Ghanaian ‘fantasy coffins’ he and generations before him have created, has spent the fall 2017 semester as artist-in-residence at the UI Museum of Art. He will join UI faculty and African art scholars on the December 7 WorldCanvass in a program called “Art & the Afterlife.” WorldCanvass will take place from 5:30-7 p.m. at MERGE, 136 South Dubuque Street. The program is free and open to the public. Please come early for a pre-show catered reception from 5-5:30 p.m.

The number of newly arriving international students declined an average 7 percent in fall 2017, with 45 percent of campuses reporting drops in new international enrollment, according to a survey of nearly 500 campuses across the country by the Institute of International Education.

University of Iowa students abroad, international students at UI will be recognized during International Education Week

Ah, studying abroad. I’d often dreamt of what my experience studying abroad would be like—although, ironically, my dreams always lacked any of the actual studying part. I really didn’t spend too much time fantasizing about what classes would be like in a foreign country; I think part of me must have assumed that business courses are the same everywhere. And generally speaking, we do learn the same things: financial and managerial accounting, basic economics, statistics, etc. However, the way in which courses are structured and taught is a bit different.

I first met Shibasaki Tomoka, the Akutagawa Prize-winning writer and our Japanese participant in the 2016 International Writing Program, in Tokyo a few months before she arrived. When we were deciding where in the metropolis to meet, I casually mentioned that I am a fan of retro Japanese coffee shops, and Tomoka replied that she is, too. Coffee culture has a long and proud history in Japan, and if you know where to look, you seldom have to go far to find coffee shops that play jazz or classical music, or that prepare rare, ancient beans using cloth filters or bubbling mad-scientist siphons or other systems not yet dreamed of (or perhaps long since forgotten) in Seattle or anywhere else in these United States. Like many scholars of Japanese culture, I pride myself on being a flâneur of Tokyo and urban Japan in general, with a detailed mental map of the landscape of its major cities, and in Tomoka, I found a kindred spirit. I thought I would propose a place, but Tomoka replied to my message with the name of an old coffee shop in Ueno that she likes. On the second floor of a building not far from the station, right there adjacent to the old black market on a street I have walked down maybe fifty times, is an elegant old coffee shop aglow with brass and steam. How could I have missed it?

News. Fake news. Disinformation. Fact-checking. Sourced news. Unverified sources. Social media incursions by foreign nations. Cleverly disguised mass propaganda that masquerades as a heartfelt message from a friend…….who knows what to believe anymore when even undeniably true facts are in dispute? This question was at the heart of the WorldCanvass discussion about “Journalism and a Free Press in the Age of Fake News.”

International Programs invites you to attend "Hawks Like Me," a study abroad information session.  This event will take place on Thursday, November 16, 2017, from 5:00-6:30 p.m. in the IMU Minnesota Room #347.

When I left campus, I decided I wanted to take a taxi back to my apartment. I asked my RA how to say the address and then I was off!

If you have heard Michael Buble’s Home, you will understand what this blog is about. These past couple weeks have been full of ups and downs. I am now just settling into a routine and trying to keep my living space clean. I go to campus every day except for Monday, which is when I do my laundry.

My roommate’s name is Tin Lin. She attends Boston College and majors in Applied Psychology and Human Development. I thought I would give you a different perspective on study abroad through someone else’s experience.