Taylor: Berggruen Foundation and York City

taylor: Taylor, 84, will receive the honour on Dec. 1 in New York City, according to Hamilton Spectator. The institute described it as annual prize to be awarded to a thinker "whose ideas are of broad significance for shaping human self-understanding and the advancement of humanity." "I'm very pleased and honoured because the goal of the Berggruen foundation is to find some way of overcoming the mutual misunderstandings between the great cultures, great civilizations which I think are very deep and very troubling and creating all sorts of difficulties for us," Taylor said in an interview. "That they could think my work could be somehow relevant to that is tremendously satisfying because it something that very important to me too, so that makes me extra pleased." The McGill University professor is known as a leading voice for Canadian unity and the preservation of Quebec distinct identity. The Montreal philosopher and writer learned earlier this week of the accolade, which carries a $1-million US award from the Berggruen Institute, a California-based non-partisan think-tank founded in 2010. Taylor is a household name in Quebec for having co-chaired with Gerard Bouchard the Bouchard-Taylor commission, which looked at the "reasonable accommodation" of religious minorities. Its founder paid tribute to Taylor, who was chosen by an independent jury and selected because of his contributions to various social sciences, public affairs and humanities. "Charles Taylor is a brilliantly appropriate recipient, because he has changed the way people all over the world think about some of the most basic questions in human life," said philanthropist and investor Nicolas Berggruen, the institute chairman. The Berggruen Institute says its mission is "to develop foundational ideas" and use them to help shape political and social institutions in the 21 t century. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.