Writers and Cultural Diplomacy: A Core Mission of the IWP

Cultural diplomacy, formal and informal, has been among the core missions of the IWP since the program's founding in 1967. The U.S Department of State has been a supporter of this mission alongside the University of Iowa and many private arts foundations, both state-side and overseas.

Cultural Diplomacy on the Ground

  • IWP Director Christopher Merrill writes—“Dividing Lines”: On Poetry and Diplomacy, 2021
  • A systemic analysis can be found in the 2005 report Cultural Diplomacy: A Linchpin of Public Policy.
  • How should the U.S. government participate in international cultural exchanges—if at all? A note on Huffington Post.
  • "What role should the state have with respect to culture and the arts?" we ask a number of our alumni, under the rubric Periscope, along with a few other questions.
  • In this brief promo from 2012, Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs Ann Stock explains the interest of the U.S. Department of State in the IWP.
  • Collaborations can be an ideal form of cultural diplomacy. In a work session with a group of young people in eastern Iowa, organized in the fall of 2012 by the Iowa Youth Writing Project, IWP writers both taught and learned from young writers as part of a project titled "Iowa: Face to Face." The project, funded by grant through the University of Iowa's Provost Office and the Office of the Vice President for Research, is highlighted in the following video, courtesy of the Creative Corridor.
  • Building a literary bridge across a cultural chasm: IWP commissioned the first-ever translation of Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself," one of modern America's  foundational  texts,  into Persian. Framed by a historical and a literary commentary, it was  published on the digital platform WhitmanWeb,  the first of a dozen more translations into other languages.
  • In Tangiers (Morocco), a border zone between Africa and Europe, ten writers from vastly different backgrounds and places, probed the pervasive, ubiquitous, unmooring of identities.

Happening Now

  • We regret the passing, on April 11, 2024, of the distinguished Romanian author and critic Dan Cristea, who served as the editor in chief of the Luceafărul de Dimineață cultural monthly. In addition to being an alum of the 1985 Fall Residency, Cristea received his PhD in Comparative Literature at the University of Iowa.

  • Our congratulations to 1986 Fall Residency writer Kwame Dawes, who has been named the new poet laureate of Jamaica.

  • Congratulations to our colleagues Jennifer Croft and Aron Aji, who are among those serving as judges for the National Book Awards this year, in their case in the category of translated literature.

  • Ranjit Hoskote’s speech at the 2024 Goa Literary Festival addresses the current situation in Gaza.

  • In NY Times, Bina Shah worries about the state of Pakistani—and American—democracy.

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