Event by BBG/GWU: Iran’s Blogosphere and Grassroots Voices: Risks and Rewards of Engagement (Updated)

image Iran’s Blogosphere and Grassroots Voices: Risks and Rewards of Engagement

Date: Monday, April 12, 2010
Time: 9:00a – 12:30p.
Location: George Washington University, Jack Morton Auditorium, 805 21st St NW, Washington, DC 20052 
Co-sponsors: Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) & Institute for Public Diplomacy and Global Communication (lPDGC), George Washington University (GWU).

RSVP by e-mail to ipdgcbbgiran@gmail.com, or by phone to the BBG Office of Public Affairs at 202-203-4400.

Please contribute your thoughts, before and during the conference, to our global online discussion:

http://www.gwu.edu/~ipdgc/events/iran-blog/index.cfm (homepage)
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/pages/Irans-Blogosphere-and-Grassroots-Voices-Risks-and-Rewards-of-Engagement/108225475873166?ref=ts
(Facebook)
www.twitter.com/ipdgc
(Twitter)

The agenda is below.

9:00 a.m.            Registration and Refreshments

9:30 a.m.            Welcome

Sean Aday, Director, IPDGC, GWU

D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, Board Member, BBG

Introduction

Frank Sesno, Director, School of Media and Public Affairs, GWU

Keynote

Dr. Azar Nafisi, Author of Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books and Things I Have Been Silent About; Executive Director of Cultural Conversations, School for Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University

Panel 1:  The New Media Landscape in Iran

Mohamed Abdel Dayem, Middle East and North Africa Program Coordinator, Committee to Protect Journalists

Hida Fouladvand, VOA Persian News Network TV

Mohammad Tabaar, Adjunct Professor, GWU

Moderator: Ivan Sigal, Executive Director, Global Voices

Break

Panel 2:  Prospects for a Grassroots Dialogue

Geneive Abdo, Fellow, Iran Analyst, The Century Foundation

Nikahang Kowsar, Cartoonist, Journalist and Blogger

Sonya Reines-Djivanides, Director, Track II Mediation Unit, Search for Common Ground

Moderator: Sean Aday, IPDGC

Online Moderator

Golnaz Esfandiari, Senior Correspondent, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Prague

The conference will examine the powerful effect of new media and social networks in today’s Iran. It will also explore what opportunities may exist, even in the face of growing political tensions, for citizen diplomacy and people-to-people connections to grow and develop.

12:30 p.m.          End