Changing Perspective (Part 1 of X)

 Part of the reason I applied to come to Qatar is because I wanted to shift my perspective. I wanted to push myself outside of my comfort zone, to challenge myself to think differently. 

I am still figuring out what has changed so bear with me as I share unfinished thoughts. 

Two months in, I can start to see a shift. For one, I am disturbed when this area is referred to as the Middle East. Did you ever take a moment to think about why we call it the 'middle' east. Middle of what? According to the Indiana University Center for Middle Eastern Studies- the term comes from a Eurocentric definition of geography. This is the same world view that describes the US as the 'New World' or 'rebellious colonies'. The USA has been around for over 200 years, so I would hardly describe us as 'new'. The Europeans defined Japan and Korea as the 'far east' because at the time you had to travel a far distance eastwards in order to reach the countries. The countries of the Mediterranean (Turkey, Egypt, Tunisia, etc) were called the 'near east' because they were nearer. The Arabian peninsula (now containing Saudi Arabia and Qatar among others) was a middle distance away, so they were called the 'middle east'.

For perspective see the picture below. This is a map in Portugal showing the path of a famous Portugese poet (whose name I can not remember). This map shows his journey from Portugal, below the southern tip of Africa, to the Arabian Peninsula, India, and China. You can see me pointing at where Qatar should be (it is a tiny peninsula not shown on this map). Its in the 'middle' of his journey. However, the majority of the world's population lives in the 'middle or far east'. So if we try to define the world in terms of where the population is (India and China), Portugal would be called the 'far west' and the US would be called the far east.

So much of what we talk about in the US is from the Eurocentric perspective. For example, most chemistry textbooks start with the ideas of the Greek ' Democritus' who proposed the idea that matter consists of small particles.  We ignore the fact that the first chemistry lab in the world was actually found in a small cave in South Africa. Over 100,000 years ago, the coastal people mixed 'chemical's to make a new compound that we call 'ochre'. The Blombos cave is the first example of 'chemistry' but this is rarely mentioned in chemical books in the US. This is images of the reconstructed cave in the Natural History Museum in Capetown, South Africa.

What is also ignored in the west, is the root of the word 'chemistry' which is derived from the Arabic term 'alchemy'. Part of the adventure here is discovering the Islamic stories of scientific discovery that I may not hear in the US. For example, the research complex at Qatar University has a huge two story mural showing pages from the world of Al-Jibbr- one of the founders of optics. The mural shows examples of geometric measurements and an apparatus for distilling substances (which separates one part from another part.).

People in the region to themselves as part of the GCC, the Gulf Cooperative Council. I believe very strongly that we should strive to call people by the name they desire, so a first step is to shift from thinking about this place as 'middle' and more in terms of the region is resides. 

The Gulf Countries are defined by their dry, sandy climates, their proximity to the calm salty shores of the Gulf (Arabian Gulf if you are on the Arabian Peninsula and Persian Gulf if you are in Persia/Iran). Many (but not all) have large oil or natural gas reserves that are easily accessible. And the predominate religion is Islam (but there is a large minority of other religions too). History shares that the worlds first university was founded by a Muslim woman in Morocco - University of al-Qarawiyyin. The school was called a madrassa - an Arabic used to define an institution of higher learning. 

So, I'm learning a lot about a different culture. And learning how to better support my students from this region in the US. That's where I end for now, so I can wrap up and make it to the rest of the conference today on Sustaining the Oasis in the Gulf.