In my last post I spoke about the business of education (think infusion of dollars into local economies). Today, I’ll talk about how consuls may internationalize education, mainly universities, although parallels can be drawn to secondary schools offering International Baccalaureate diplomas. I begin with the most basic way of all in which a local foreign consul contributes to international…
Read MoreThis is the 3rd post about the connection between universities and the foreign consuls throughout our communities. Moreover, I’m talking about those consuls who serve as honorary consuls for a foreign nation. They are long-term residents somewhere in the United States and they are not subject to transfer like their colleagues who hold a career consular position. There has been no…
Read MoreWhy would I say the foreign consuls throughout our communities in the United States are grateful to Luke Lee? And, who’s this Luke Lee? First of all, he passed away on January 7, 2015, at the age of 91 in Bethesda, MD. so our gratitude must be for the legacy he leaves behind. Consuls everywhere…
Read MoreWhen I gathered all my notes for my consular reference book a couple of my beta-readers commented, “Why so much emphasis on titles?” This led me to repeat the commonly-stated explanation of how people in distinguished positions — think judges, politicians — generally are offended when they are not recognized with their titles. To repeat from a prior…
Read MoreYou know the old saying that “if I had a penny for every time I’ve heard [fill-in-the-blank], I’d be rich.” Well, some day it’s a dead body – a corpse – that’s going to make me very, very rich. Lest you suspect some sinister motives here let me rush to explain: we’re only talking incorrect terms for a consular corps!…
Read MoreDo consuls have an impact on the strategic internationalization goals of today’s universities? I started thinking about that when I ran across a newspaper tidbit from 1964 about how the then-mayor of Coral Gables actively sought to attract consuls to his city. At that time, Coral Gables (one of over thirty municipalities in the Miami-Dade…
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In my previous posts (and more extensively in chapter The Tiff over Titles in my book) I have written about the many confusing titles that consular officials may claim. All this makes for interesting (and fun!) social and official situations to observe. Most recently, my mind has wandered to the usage of Emeritus for a…
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Recently many of us read or heard about the suspension from duty of the honorary consul of a European nation (for the purposes of this blog it doesn’t matter what country she represented in a small part of the U.S.), for her political activity on social media. The first question should be who/what agency can…
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You can imagine how my ears perked up when the fictional character of a consul appeared Season 9, episode 2, of Curb Your Enthusiasm (HBO). How was Larry David going to deal with this person? Was he going to (incorrectly) say “c-o-u-nsel” when speaking with this official? I couldn’t wait. Well, kudos to Larry’s character.…
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For years, we here in Miami believed the consular corps was somehow “founded” in the 1950s (quotation marks are appropriate because, as readers of my book know, a corps is sui generis – by itself – unique in that it doesn’t require a special act to come into being). So when I started digging into…
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