The Bookmark: Asian Cultural Council

The Asian Cultural Council (ACC) is an organization that supports cultural exchange between the countries within Asian and between the United States and Asia.  The organization’s headquarters is in New York City, but they also have offices in Hong Kong, Manila, Taipei and Tokyo.  Nearly 6000 artists from across Asia have been supported by the ACC since its creation in 1963.  The ACC supports projects across an extensive spectrum of performing and visual arts including, but not limited to, archeology, arts criticism, dance, music and theater.  In addition to supporting performing and visual arts, the ACC also supports educational and cultural institutions that are doing work that is considered particularly important to the cultural exchange between Asia and the United States.

The Bookmark: The Pew Hispanic Center

As the Hispanic population in the United States gets larger and larger, their impact on our way of life and our future as a nation will become more pronounced.  The Pew Hispanic Center, a nonpartisan research organization, conducts research on a variety of topics related to the Hispanic populations including their demographics and their views on social policy.  Additionally, the Pew Hispanic Center studies changes in their socio-economic status and compares their educational background with other ethnic groups.  The Hispanic Center also studies the immigration patterns of Hispanic sub-groups and remittances that Hispanic Americans send home to their families.  Finally, in addition to all the research that this institution does, they publish their results in a way that is easily understood by most people. 

The Bookmark: National Multicultural Institute

The National Multicultural Institute is an organization that is dedicated to strengthening and empowering organizations and businesses by helping them to diversify.  They do this by assisting their clients in creating goals and then meeting those goals using what they call a Diversity Action Plan.  This organization work closely with specific companies and organizations, but they also hold workshops that anybody can attend.  Their next conference is called the Navigating Differences in a Changing World: Dialogues on Diversity, Culture and Identity.  Finally, this organization also organizes workshops that are relatively inexpensive that can address specific issues.  The upcoming workshop is about Human Trafficking.  In short, this organization is very involved in increasing awareness about issues concerning diversity in the workplace.

The Bookmark: Countries and their Cultures

The website Countries and their Cultures is a dictionary of multicultural groups and definitions.  It gives definitions for virtually every multicultural group in the United States from Acadians to Maltese Americans to Yupiat and Yemeni Americans and gives a brief description of what part of the world each group of Americans is from.  Additionally, users can find cultural information for many of the population groups around the world.  It is a great resource if an individual wants to know more basic information about the culture of any group in the world for whatever reason that person may have.  Finally, it’s a great resource for individuals moving to a new town and to educate librarians on the culture of multicultural people who live in their community.