{"word_count": 228, "character_count": 1617}
March 13, 2017Open Statement from the International Federation for Public History regarding the United States Travel BanIt is with a great and growing concern that the International Federation for Public History witnesses current developments in the United States. As public history professionals - academics, curators, educators, and researchers - we believe in international and transnational cooperation. Our goal is to encourage, promote, and coordinate - at the global level- research, practice, and teaching in public history. Our world is built on the international dialogue.We are therefore alarmed by President Trump administration’s decisions and practices that impede intellectuals from predominately Muslim countries from entering the United States to freely engage in historical and socio-cultural debates. We are also aware that these actions have discouraged American intellectuals from leaving the United States.Public history is conducted with, and for, publics across the world. We engage and empower communities, including those most vulnerable, to tell their stories. We learn from the past and we learn from disenfranchised. We therefore strongly object to regulations that target minority groups, immigrants, and refugees, and that denigrate people based on their circumstances, race, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, or country of origin. Such regulations only promote a culture of fear, division, and hate.As public historians, we insist on the free circulation of scientists and humanists worldwide and we stand with minorities, immigrants, and refugees everywhere.The IFPH Steering Committee 