This is a Special Correspondent Episode and part of Rebecca Picard’s #CulinaryDiplomacy series.

“Develop communication skills, develop the skills of organizing, leadership, teambuilding {etc] that allow for project management… to support outcomes, not outputs.”

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Ambassador ERTHARIN COUSIN is a distinguished fellow of global agriculture at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.  She served as executive director of the World Food Programme 2012-2017, leading the world’s largest humanitarian organization with 14,000 staff serving 80 million vulnerable people across 75 countries.

In 2009, Cousin was nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate as the US ambassador to the UN Agencies for Food and Agriculture in Rome. In this role Cousin served as the US representative for all food, agriculture, and nutrition-related issues. Cousin regularly represented US interest in global leader discussions, including prime ministers, foreign and agriculture ministers, academics and business executives, regarding humanitarian and development activities.  Cousin helped identify and catalyze US government investment in food security and nutrition activities supported by the USAID Feed the Future program.  Cousin convened foreign media tours resulting in millions of conventional as well social media impressions.

A Chicago native, Cousin is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Chicago; the University of Georgia Law School, and the University of Chicago Executive Management Finance for Non-Financial Executives program. Cousin has received honorary doctorate degrees from universities around the globe.  She has been listed numerous times on the Forbes “100 Most Powerful Women” list, as the Fortune “Most Powerful Woman in Food and Drink,” on TIME’s “100 Most Influential People” list, and as one of the “500 Most Powerful People on the Planet” by Foreign Policy magazine.

 

 

 

This is a Special Correspondent Episode and part of Rebecca Picard’s #CulinaryDiplomacy series. http://media.blubrry.com/womenindiplomacy/content.blubrry.com/womenindiplomacy/Rebecca_Picard_guest_ep_2.m4a

 

The Better Plate Community Columbus is a nonprofit founded to promote cross-cultural exchange through food-related community events. They are the first US-based satellite of Über den Tellerrand. They organize community events to encourage refugees, other immigrants, and the settled population to meet together over food. At these events, people from several different cultures cook, share, and discuss some of their favorite dishes. These events are donation-based to allow as many people to attend as possible.

They also coordinate refugee and other immigrant-led cooking classes. These cooking classes are led by excellent home cooks are who are passionate about food. They meet in home or community kitchens, work together to cook a meal, and then eat together. The Better Plate Community Columbus is committed to offering our classes at affordable prices and offer financial assistance.

 

MARGARET CHINN is co-founder of Better Plate Community Columbus and currently serves as Secretary of the Board. She likes trying new recipes and getting others involved in the fun. Professionally her background is in social work, teaching, and math.

 

 

AMANDA WARNER is a co-founder of Better Plate Community Columbus and is currently serving as president of the board. 

While cooking has been an ongoing passion for Amanda, recent travels sparked a deeper interest in how food can be used as a point of connection between individuals and communities. From 2014 – 2016, Amanda traveled with her husband and young son, working, playing, and eating their way through more than twenty countries on six continents. Amanda took cooking classes as she traveled, experiencing directly how food helped her connect with others and learn more about their cultures. Towards the end of the trip, she attended several events at Über den Tellerrand kochen, an organization in Berlin that organizes events designed to bring refugees and the settled population together over food. This inspired the idea to begin something similar when she returned to Ohio.

Professionally, Amanda is a consultant, instructional designer, and web developer who partners with international NGOs to design and develop interactive learning experiences (www.amanda-warner.com). She also volunteers at a local refugee resettlement agency.

KUUKUA DZIGBORDI YOMEKPE was born in Ghana and immigrated to the U.S. in 1996. She holds a BA and an MA in English from Ohio Dominican College and the University of Dayton respectively. She was a Bay Area transplant while she worked on her Masters in Theological Studies. She graduated with distinction and was awarded the Marcella Althaus-Reid award for Best Queer Essay in her graduating class. She is ABD in her MFA program at the California Institute of Integral Studies. She brands herself the perpetual student. Within the span of her life, she has inhabited multiple roles, most of which seem to have nothing in common except that the majority have something to do with education. Her adult working career began in Daycare and After-School programming and continued to Student Affairs/Residential Life work first at the University of Dayton, and later on, at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana. While a graduate student at the Pacific School of Religion, she served as the Earl Lectures Coordinator for the annual Earl Lectures in Berkeley, CA. She’s worked several odd jobs at various times in between, but the most notable of them all was when she worked as a Quality Control Inspector and general warehouse worker at Red Envelope, inspecting, packing and fork-lifting people’s orders. None of her degrees mattered then; it was all about quality and making the numbers. Kuukua characterizes herself as a memoirist, essayist, and writer of social commentary. She is the author of several essays and prose poems. Some of her essays have been anthologized in: African Women Writing Resistance (UW Press), Becoming Bi: Bisexual Voices from Around the World (BRC), and Inside Your Ear (Oakland Public Library Press). Her essay, “The Audacity to Remain Single: Single Black Women in the Black Church,” was anthologized in Queer Religion II (Praeger Publishers). She writes for Spoonwiz, The Feminist Wire, and Musings. She has her hands in three projects currently: The Coal Pot, a Culinary Memoir celebrating her Ghanaian roots, Musings of an African Woman, her blog which features a collection of personal essays about immigration and assimilation, and a foodie magazine. Her scholarly and writing interests lie at the intersection of race and skin color, African culture, Black women’s bodies, expression of voice, and non-conformance and performativity. Kuukua is a writer, dancer and culinary artist, proud to be an African woman and a politically queer woman of color.  She avidly feeds a voracious travel bug that occupies the hinterlands of her soul, so is often found wandering various parts of the world.  Currently, she has returned to the Empire and is weathering the so-called liberal New England serving as Residence Director at a small college. She is struggling with liberal people’s attitudes, the bemused stares and the inability to wear her hoodies.

BIDISHA NAG, founder, owner and instructor at Create Your Curry draws inspiration from her family and friends, and from her diverse and varied experiences.  Growing up, Bidisha traveled internationally for years, sailing with her marine engineer father, mother and sister to faraway lands. She grew up in a family that practiced radical hospitality and always had a place for family, friends, and even strangers. Bidisha’s personal journey as an immigrant woman in the United States to pursue doctoral studies culminated in a PhD in Cultural Geography.  The PhD dissertation also became an exploration of finding hope and voices in experiences of other female migrants from India. Bidisha was able to connect with the women’s experiences as she wove the stories and journeys of women “across the black waters” with deft understanding of the ambivalence of acculturation and assimilation.

 

Through her own journey of immigrating to a foreign land and making it her home, Bidisha has found her niche at the connection of cultures.  She enthusiastically embraced the new experiences, new sights, and of course, new food, while being firmly rooted to her own culture and traditions.  Friends and acquaintances, new and old, of varying ages, gender, races, and ethnicities were always welcome at her home to savor the warmth of the Nags’ generous hospitality and of course, nourishing healthy homemade food. 

 

True to the roots of her culture, Bidisha believes sharing food is a way to build relationships, and bridges across differences.  Food is not only to feed the body, but also to feed the soul as it has been identified repeatedly as the “single great unifier” across cultures.  Be it comfort food, or food for celebration, or to mark festivals and special occasions, Bidisha’s creations fuse eastern traditional cooking with western ingredients. The hallmark of Create Your Curry is to share the knowledge of Indian cooking and cooking methods.  Even if the knowledge is new, and methods are unfamiliar to some, Bidisha demystifies Indian cooking by blending her techniques with fresh, locally sourced ingredients to create meals that are healthy, tasty and provides nourishment for the body and soul. The purpose of Create Your Curry is to share knowledge, share traditions, share cultural aspects of Indian food as a means to break the barrier and the fear of the unknown.  True to its label of being a great unifier, Create Your Curry celebrates differences by bringing together people from diverse walks of life as a means to building relationships, building community, one meal at a time.

 

Special Correspondent Guest Host

REBECCA PICARD is an MA graduate in International Policy & Development from the Middlebury Institute for International Studies in Monterey, CA. She is committed to intercultural communication, bringing the female voice to male-dominated spaces, and international exploration.

Rebecca is also interested in all things food. Working in restaurants for 10 years steeped her in a passion for culinary diplomacy. She believes in food as a means for cross-cultural understanding, communication, and cooperation that can bridge divides and create peace. Viewing culinary diplomacy through the feminist lens, Rebecca sees women at the center of food movements and diplomacy, and their voices need to be heard. Connect with her on Linkedin.

 

 

This is a Special Correspondent Episode and part of Rebecca Picard’s #CulinaryDiplomacy series.

“Become aware of how you’ve been socialized because that will affect how you manage your career. To create your own career, you have to have agency and strength and the confidence in who you are… and an idea of where you want to go.”

 

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KELSEY MAHER is an East Coast native, who now resides in California taste-testing her local taquerias. In 2015, she completed her MA in International Education Management at the Middlebury Institute in Monterey, CA. Prior to her graduate studies, Kelsey lived and worked in several post-Soviet countries combining her language lessons with cooking lessons. She is dedicated to fostering cross-cultural communication through food. Kelsey’s professional work includes regional marketing and programming for agricultural non-profits.

 

Check out The Culinary Citizen!

 

Special Correspondent Guest Host

REBECCA PICARD is an MA graduate in International Policy & Development from the Middlebury Institute for International Studies in Monterey, CA. She is committed to intercultural communication, bringing the female voice to male-dominated spaces, and international exploration.

Rebecca is also interested in all things food. Working in restaurants for 10 years steeped her in a passion for culinary diplomacy. She believes in food as a means for cross-cultural understanding, communication, and cooperation that can bridge divides and create peace. Viewing culinary diplomacy through the feminist lens, Rebecca sees women at the center of food movements and diplomacy, and their voices need to be heard. Connect with her on Linkedin.

 

Meet a few of our Special Correspondents to learn more about the #WomeninDiplomacy audience as we discuss our passion for International Relations and the challenges young professionals face in building our careers.

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MOTUNRAYO SHAFAU  •   Linkedin  |  Twitter  •  Alma Mater: Sciences Po  •  Currently nerding out about: the power of strategic communications in international relations

 

 

SPANDANA SINGH  •  Linkedin  |  Twitter  •  Alma Mater: University of California, Berkeley •  Currently nerding out about: technology and its impact on global affairs

 

 

SARAH HEYWOOD  • Linkedin  •  Alma Mater: Australian National University  •  Currently nerding out about: linguistics and language policy

 

 

ANA VERGARA  •   Linkedin  •  Alma Mater: University of Minnesota  •   Currently nerding out about: human rights, mental health, immigrants, and refugees

 

 

Learn more and meet future Special Correspondents here!

 

“Jump in. Check your assumptions constantly and don’t be afraid to break the mold.”

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Professor Campbell cycling at the 2004 Olympic Trials

Dr. ROOK CAMPBELL is an adjunct professor of political science, communication, and diplomacy at the University of Southern California. Rook serves as Director of Research for Fields of Green, a partnership between USC Sports Business Institute and USA TODAY Sports. They are the author of Staging Globalization for National Projects: Global Sport Markets and Elite Athletic Transnational Labour in Qatar (International Review for Sociology of Sport, 2010).  Rook’s current book manuscript is entitled Global Governance of Sport in a Digital Age: The Political Economy of Sport Integrity Regulation.

 

 

Check out Cabinet 48 and follow Professor Campbell on Twitter at @Cabinet48.

“It’s hard when you’re a woman, and you may feel you have to be twice as good. Be fearless, perseverant, don’t be afraid to speak your mind… and come with new ideas. A great leader will… want to be surrounded by talented people, no matter their gender.”

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ALEXANDRA DANS joined the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in 2013 and is based in ICANN’s Engagement Center in Montevideo, Uruguay. She previously worked for the Latin American and Caribbean Internet Addresses Registry (LACNIC) and the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). She holds a Communication and Political Science Degree from the University of Montreal and a Master of Science in International Communications from the University of Quebec, Canada. In addition to her native Spanish and French, she is fluent in English and is conversant in Portuguese.

You can follow Alex on Twitter @alexdansopina!

“As we say in Iceland: ‘jump into the deep pool’ and challenge yourself.”

— Ambassador Anna Jóhannsdóttir

“Don’t underestimate what you can bring to the table. The value of your perspectives based on your knowledge and your life experiences, that is the essence of the importance of diversity in the workplace.”

— Gudrun Þorbjörnsdottir

“You should contribute with all that comes with being a woman…. When you really step into your power, that’s when things start to happen.”

— Svana Adalstensdottir 

 

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Iceland has been a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) since its foundation in 1949. Membership of the Alliance and the Defense Agreement with the United States of America has been the two main pillars of Iceland’s security policy. With the changing security environment and the transformation of NATO, the contribution of Iceland to the Alliance has undergone major change. While having no standing army, Iceland contributes to NATO operations with both financial contributions and civil personnel.

In its work within the Alliance, Iceland inter alia puts emphasis on NATO’s role in disarmament, arms control and non-proliferation, including nuclear issues; the common values of the Alliance, i.e. respect for democracy, rule of law and human rights; collective defense and the importance of solidarity, the transatlantic link and the indivisibility of security. Iceland also stresses the important role of NATO in implementing Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security; the High North and supports the notion that the Alliance should continue to be open to all European Countries that share the values of the Alliance as well as fulfill its conditions for membership.

Follow all the action at @IcelandNATO.

Ambassador ANNA JÓHANNSDÓTTIR represents Iceland at NATO headquarters in Brussels. She has previously served as Foreign Policy Adviser to the Prime Minister of Iceland and to Iceland’s Ambassador to Palestine. She was Director of the EU Department at the Iceland Ministry for Foreign Affairs and has lead the Iceland Crisis Response Unit, deployment of personnel to  NATO, UN, EU and Nordic missions, and coordinating Iceland’s international crisis and peace operations. The Ambassador was also Counsellor in the Permanent Mission of Iceland in Geneva where her main responsibilities were overseeing free trade negotiations and international trade agreements, as well as human rights and humanitarian issues within international organizations in Geneva. Prior to this, she was  First Secretary, External Trade Department at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs where she was an advocate for Iceland to the EFTA Court in several cases. For the first chapter of her career, the Ambassador was an Attorney to the District Court, GAJ Law Firm Ltd. She holds a law degree from the University of Iceland (Candidatus juris, 1994), a masters degree in European Law from the University of Edinburgh (L.L.M. 2000), and a masters degree in Public Administration from the University of Iceland (2015).

 

GUðRÚN ÓSK ÞORBJöRNSDOTTIR is an Officer for NATO and Multilateral Affairs in the Political Affairs and Security Policy Division at NATO. She holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Iceland in Political Science and Gender Studies, and a Masters in Human Security from Aarhus University in Denmark. Her previous work includes integrating gender perspectives into military planning and operations as a member of the Office of the Gender Advisor in the International Military Staff at NATO, as well as supporting projects to enhance gender equality and women‘s empowerment for UN Women.

SVANA ADALSTENSDOTTIR has worked for the Icelandic Foreign Service since 1998. From 2015-2016 she served as a VNC working for the Special representative for Women Peace and Security at NATO and is head of Consular services at the MFA in Reykjavik. She is married to a scientist and Entrepreneur Julius B. Kristinsson and they have 4 four grown children and two grandchildren.

 

 

 

“It’s not that you need to dress impeccably every time, every day, but there is definitely some power in paying attention to what you’re wearing and how you’re showing up … not for other people, but for yourself.”

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CATHERINE CASSIDY has unique blend of business, operations, sales, merchandising and personal styling experience.With over 14 years of experience in the Fashion Industry and an undergraduate business degree from USC, she founded Ustyled. Her corporate experience is with Nordstrom, Robinsons May and BCBG.

In 2008, she launched Ustyled, a style company focused on serving professional women.  She was recently featured in the Washington Post, on Today.com and is a sought after speaker on empowering women in business through what she calls ‘Style Power.’ Catherine resides in Washington, D.C. and Ustyled serves clients all over the US and abroad.

Sign up for Ustyled’s Style Power Program!

“Don’t be afraid to carve out your own path. The world today is changing so fast that… we should believe in ourselves to create opportunities. Trust in the value of what you are able to bring to the table.”

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MALGORZATA (GOSIA)  SMIESZEK works as a researcher in the Arctic Centre, University of Lapland since 2013. She is a doctoral candidate at the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Lapland and a fellow of the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC) since 2014. She is the alumna of the Jagiellonian University (Poland), University of Vienna (Austria) and the College of Europe in fields of international relations and European studies.In her research she focuses primarily on issues of Arctic governance, the Arctic Council, questions of science-policy interface, science diplomacy and scientific cooperation in the region. She has taken part in a number of projects including the EU-funded “Strategic Environmental Assessment of Development of the Arctic” (2013-2014), “Goals and instruments of Polish Arctic policy” for Poland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2014-2015) and “Finland’s Arctic Council chairmanship in the times of increasing uncertainty” for Finland’s Prime Minister Office (2016-2018). Gosia was also the co-organizer of the 4th China-Nordic Arctic Cooperation Symposium and in summer 2016 she participated in the Young Scientists Summer Program at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) as well as in the science diplomacy course organized by the American Association for Advancement of Science (AAAS). At present she is the co-chair of the IASC action group on communicating Arctic science to policy-makers.

Check out more of her work here and follow Gosia on Twitter @gosiasmieszek!

“We would probably be happier if we accept that there will not be balance. Nobody gets 100% all the time. It’s a matter of making sure that you carve out enough time for the things that matter to you most…. and I don’t think that will be the same at different moments in your life.”

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ROSA BROOKS is a groundbreaking national security expert. She currently serves as Associate Dean for Graduate Programs at the Georgetown University Law Center.

As a senior fellow at New America, Rosa works with the ASU Future of War project, writing about the changing nature of warfare, the changing role of the U.S. military and need to rethink core assumptions about the laws of war.

Rosa served as Counselor to the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy and as Special Coordinator for Rule of Law and Humanitarian Policy in the Pentagon from 2009-2011. During the Clinton and Obama Administrations, she also served as a senior advisor at the US Department of State. In 2011, she was awarded the Secretary of Defense Medal for Outstanding Public Service.

Her articles and essays have appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and dozens of other newspapers and magazines, and she is a frequent television guest, with appearances on the Charlie Rose Show, the Rachel Maddow Show, the Today Show, Meet the Press, and Erin Burnett OutFront.

She received her A.B. from Harvard, a master’s degree from Oxford, and a J.D. from Yale Law School.

Stay up to date at rosabrooks.com and follow her on Twitter @brooks_rosa.

Get your copy HERE! 

Rosa’s book is also available as an audiobook on iTunes and Audible!

Featured Photo SOURCE: The Duke Chronicle February 23rd, 2016

For Fathers Day, Kelsey Suemnicht invited her Dad, Gene Suemnicht, to co-host an episode combining their passions of Geology and Diplomacy!

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“We’re not going to meet [global] challenges effectively, if we’re ignoring 50% of the population.”

— Dad

 

Check out our amazing panel of women working at the forefront of Geology and Diplomacy:

LORI BETTISON-VARGA, PhD, served six years as President and W.M. Keck Foundation Presidential Chair at Scripps College in Claremont, California. There, she enhanced the visibility of the college, implemented policies to foster greater transparency and community engagement, initiated strategic planning for diversity and sustainability, and inaugurated a comprehensive capital campaign. She is now President and Director of the Los Angeles County Natural History Family of Museums in October 2015. She oversees NHMLA in Exposition Park, the La Brea Tar Pits and Museum in Hancock Park, and the William S. Hart Museum in Newhall. Her immediate goals include advancing the outreach and education around urban nature and citizen science, as well as the re-imagining of the La Brea Tar Pits and Museum, where visitors can make connections between Ice Age Los Angeles 50,000 years ago, and climate change today.

 

MELODY BROWN BURKINS, PhD, is the Associate Director for Programs and Research in the John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding and Adjunct Professor in the Environmental Studies Program at Dartmouth College. She earned a B.S. in geology at Yale University and both her M.S. and Ph.D. at Dartmouth College, focusing her doctoral studies in earth and ecosystem studies of the Antarctic Dry Valleys. With over twenty years of experience in both academia and government, Dr. Burkins is an advocate for policy-engaged scholarship across disciplines, international education and partnerships, creating new opportunities for academics and professionals in science policy and diplomacy, and the support of global initiatives investing in gender equity, earth systems sustainability, and civic leadership. She serves as Chair of the US National Committee to the International Union of Geological Sciences, and is a member of the Board on International Scientific Organizations of the National Academies.

 

BRIDGET AYLING, PhD, works at the University of Nevada, Reno, where she is the Director of the Great Basin Center for Geothermal Energy and an Associate Professor with the Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology. She is originally from New Zealand, and pursued paleoclimatic studies in her home country and in Australia during her undergraduate and PhD degrees. After completing her PhD in 2006, new government funding for geothermal projects in Australia sparked her interest. At a career crossroads between continuing with paleoclimatic studies or pursuing geothermal, she chose geothermal and hasn’t looked back! Bridget spent 10 years working for Geoscience Australia, largely on geothermal and then unconventional oil and gas projects after Australia’s geothermal sector collapsed.

 

GENE SUEMNICHT has been the Chief Geologist at EGS Consulting Inc. since January 2009 and also serves as its Chief Executive Officer. Gene has previously worked with Unocal, Ormat Technologies, IT Corporation and MacTec Engineering & Consulting. He has more than 40 years of professional experience in geothermal exploration and development throughout the western United States, Canada, Central and South America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia and has been the technical lead or project manager for multiphase projects ranging from geothermal resource assessments and investigations to environmental remediation. He has served on the Board of Directors for the Geothermal Resources Council since January 2014.  He is a registered Geologist and a Registered Environmental Assessor and holds a Certification, Site Assessment and Remediation, from the University of California, Davis. Mr. Suemnicht earned an M.S. in Geology from the University of Arizona and a B.S. in Education (Geology, Chemistry) from Southern Oregon University. Gene Suemnicht was selected as the 2015 recipient of the Aidlin Award for outstanding contributions to the development of geothermal resources.

Featured Photo: Kelsey with her father, Gene, near the San Andreas Fault, at Point Reyes National Seashore