05/19/2006 - 05/20/2006

business etiquette tips for brazil

In Brazil, a little know-how or "jeito" goes a long way.

Brazilians are warm and friendly people and building personal relationships with associates is an important part of the business culture. Loyalty and trust are highly valued and you will be unlikely to commence business negotiations until continuity has been established in your working relationship.

As a general rule, Brazilians are relaxed about timekeeping and meetings may run on longer than planned, so allow plenty of time between appointments.

us expats angry over tax changes

Americans living abroad have reacted angrily to a decision by U.S. lawmakers to approve $70 billion in election-year cuts that will benefit wealthy taxpayers in the United States but impose what some experts have called the biggest tax increase on American expatriates in 30 years.

President George W. Bush is scheduled to sign the tax cut bill this week. Under the bill, which the Senate approved last week, Americans working abroad will be exempted from paying U.S. taxes on the first $82,400 of their foreign earned income, up from $80,000. But the tax exemption on foreign housing expenses will be significantly reduced, and investment income will be taxed at a higher rate.

drive to increase poets from ethnic minorities

The Arts Council is spearheading an unprecedented campaign to get more black and Asian poets published via the same channels often taken for granted by their white counterparts.

Talks between publishers and writers will attempt to beef up the visibility of literary offerings from Asian and balck writers alike, so UK literature can become more reflective of its communities.

According to The Guardian, the move comes after a recent report found that poetry presses failed to enter black or Asian writers into the nominations for the Next Generation Poets List in 2004.

intercultural competence seminar at seattle university

Diversity and Intercultural Competence at Work Seminar

Description: Presented by Valerie White, lecturer in the Organizational Systems Renewal (OSR) master’s degree program, this seminar will explore what it takes to create and maintain a work environment in which people from various cultures can fully participate at their best. Participants will learn about cultural competence and intercultural communication as they apply to work settings in the Northwest, and will practice some skills to take with them. This seminar is part of the 2005-2006 Service in Action Seminar Series. Registration deadline: May 12.

Ethnic groups given a new voice

A professor has helped launch a new organisation which will give a strong voice to black and ethnic community groups in Coventry and Warwickshire.

Prof Ted Cantle has welcomed the creation of an umbrella group called CEMAP (Coventry Ethnic Minority Action Partner-ship). It's the brainchild of groups like Coventry-based Black Boys Can, Minorities of Europe and the black workers' group from Warwick District Council.

Prof Cantle said: "In the past there were only six different ethnic communities in the UK, now there are literally hundreds, and segregation is growing in some schools and residential areas. "The way forward is to respect differences, communicate and look at what we all have in common."

word of the day: spurious

spurious \SPYUR-ee-uhs\, adjective:
1. Not proceeding from the true or claimed source; not genuine; false.
2. Of illegitimate birth.

Some of these graves are clearly spurious and were manufactured by nineteenth-century royalists who wanted evidence of an unbroken 2,000-year-old imperial line. -- Gale Eisenstodt, "Behind the Chrysanthemum Curtain", The Atlantic, November 1998

We need at least to separate the real issue from the spurious. -- Eugene D. Genovese, "Getting States' Rights Right", The Atlantic, March 2001.