The Library of Congress has a wonderful and timely exhibit featured on their website that allows the world to hear from the people of war-torn Afghanistan. Their voices are heard in the letters that they wrote to Radio Azadi, the Afghan outlet for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. There are many themes expressed in the letters, but what can be found throughout is that there is some joy in their lives, despite everything, and that there are many similarities between the desires, hopes and fears of Afghanis, and those of people of any other country. That may sound cliché, but helping to resolve conflict there depends in part on how Afghans are viewed by the rest of the world. This enlightening exhibit has two "Featured Items" of particular cultural interest, which are "The Tradition of Accordion Books" and "The Tradition of Scrolls." The links to these two items are on the homepage, near the bottom part of the page. The "Themes" area, found in the middle of the page, combines the letters into groups. The thematic groups include "Requests for Action & Assistance", "The Question of Employment" and "Crossing the Technology Frontier".
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