This past spring, thanks to the diligent efforts of Dr. Elahé Omidyar Mir-Djalali, founder and President of Roshan Cultural Heritage Institute, working in conjunction with the Anwar Sadat Chair for Peace and Development at UMD, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama visited the university on May 7. Events included a large public presentation for 15,000+ attendees, a lunch at the president’s residence for VIP guests, and a special presentation hosted by the Institute on “A Meeting of Two Oceans: Dialogue on Sufism and Buddhism” with more than 600 attendees.
These events engaged the university community and brought increased attention to the major role of the Roshan Institute in contributing to the intellectual and cultural life on campus. Other events during the year included “An Evening With Rumi: Persian Mystical Poetry and Music,” a reading by poet Hushang Ebtehaj, the Ehsan Yarshater Lecture Series featuring Professor Carl W. Ernst, William R. Kenan, Jr. Distinguished Professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, RIPS’s first Iranian film festival, Festival Cinema Invisible, and International Women’s Day Celebration with writer Shahrnush Parsipur.
RIPS looks forward to another year rich in top-notch programming in 2013-2014.