On June, 20^th, 2013, the Department of International Cooperation and Exchange and the Department of Foreign Languages co-organized an international academic seminar under the topic of cultural obstacles in Sino-US exchanges which was chaired by Wang Xiao, Director of the department of Foreign Languages. The lecturer is Robert Daly, senior diplomat, scholar and Director of the Maryland China Initiative of the University of Maryland. The participants involve teachers and students from the Departments of Politics, Sociology, Public Administration, Economics, Party History and Postgraduate Students.

Mr Daly sincerely and objectively expressed his views about the cultural differences existent in Sino-US exchanges. In the interactive session, heated discussion was launched in the areas being studied or of people’s interest, such as history, politics, economics, military, science and technology, and hot issues such as the meeting between President Xi Jinping and President Obama in the manor, and PRISM, an electronic monitoring plan of NSA. The participants exchanged their opinions candidly. The seminar lasted for two and a half hours and all hoped that BAI would give another such opportunity so as to deepen and broaden international academic exchange.