Hi all,

Earlier this week, ADHO announced a change in leadership as John Nerbonne stepped down as ADHO chair and Karina van Dalen-Oskam was elected as interim chair (the announcement is here: http://adho.org/announcements/2015/adho-announces-new-steering-committee-chair). As part of the announcement, Karina called for a discussion on inter-cultural communication:

"The first thing I have asked the Steering Committee to do, is to establish a protocol or a set of rules/guidelines for dealing with these fundamental cultural issues. We will not be the only organization that runs into this kind of problems. I have asked all members of the Steering Committee to do some research, and I would welcome input from others as well. Can you find guidelines that we could adopt/adapt for ADHO? Do colleagues from other international organizations have suggestions based on their own experience? Are there policy makers who can help? "

This is something GO::DH can contribute to: it is closely related to our core interest AND we have actually discussed parts of this in our early days (see for example, the discussion involving some of these emails: http://listserv.uleth.ca/pipermail/globaloutlookdh-l/2013-April/000319.html http://listserv.uleth.ca/pipermail/globaloutlookdh-l/2013-January/000163.html  http://listserv.uleth.ca/pipermail/globaloutlookdh-l/2013-January/000188.html

At our meeting today, the executive decided to lead development of a GO::DH response to Karina's call. Because of the time limitations, we will not be able to have a full membership development and approval process (it is due Nov. 30th), though we may want to develop the interim statement further using that process after it is submitted to ADHO. For this reason it will be submitted formally as a document of the executive (and any additional authors) and as specifically reflecting their views rather than those of the SIG as a whole.

But we would very much to develop this as openly and as broadly as possible within those constraints.

To do this, we will be developing and writing the document openly in Google Docs between now and Sunday. We have divided our response into three sections:

Each of the editors will be sharing a link to a Google doc specifically for their section with the list in the next couple of hours. In the document, they will collect notes and points and examples (and ask you to help with your ideas). On Sunday morning, we will then lock the documents down and edit them into a narrative (it is because of time pressure that we will institute this lock down; this lock-down and the lack of time for followup consultation is also why, in the end, it will be submitted as a document of the executive rather than the SIG as a whole).

In keeping with the GO::DH ethos, we encourage people to contribute in whatever language you feel most comfortable in and let the editors figure out how to combine the bits and pieces. Our final document will be submitted in three forms: an original language narrative written in the languages the editors feel most comfortable in (probably English and Spanish for the most part), an English-language, lingua franca translation for wide dissemination, and, as Karina has indicated that her first choice would be for Dutch, a Dutch-language submission copy.

Let me emphasis the extent to which we welcome your ideas on these topics and invite you to contribute to the formulation of our response. It may also make sense to use the list as a way of conversationally developing ideas under these topics as well, so please feel free to contribute ideas that way, as well, again in whatever language you feel most appropriate.

-dan