When I worked at the Center for International and Comparative Studies (CICS) at the University of Iowa, I set up a partnership with the university’s well known International Writing Program (IWP).

I remember an IWP writer-in-residence at CICS. A poetess from Holland, she traveled across the state of Iowa by Greyhound Bus. Greeted at small town bus stations, after a good night’s sleep, she engaged at the public library with Iowans about her writing. These horizon-expanding experiences across boundaries were supported by Humanities Iowa.

I think the American government is temporarily confused about what is important for a nation — by abruptly cutting funding to the International Writing Program, which has been an important site of learning and reflection for so many writers around the world and a horizon-expanding experience for communities in Iowa and beyond.

I do not think being insular is a future.