This past semester, I had the wonderful opportunity to TA a political science class on the Middle East. While an introductory ME class at the 300 level, intended for really anyone other than straight outta high school first years.
The following is a list of tips for those of you planning on taking any class on the ME. Some are general tips, applicable to any class, but these are primarily to help you not only pass any ME class but also not look like a bigot doing it. And yes, these are all based on actual experiences (minus one or two).
Tip 1: Be aware that your opinion on women and gender relations in the ME probably will not appreciated outside FOX and Friends.
Tip 2: Good idea not to declare Islam as the root of all the persisting problems in the ME on your final exam, knowing that at least one of your TAs is a Muslim. And with an IQ over 90.
Tip 3: When discussing Orientalist scholars, do not cite Edward Said as a leading example.
Tip 4: Avoid using the following words: “renege,” “hodge podge,” “oppression” (or any variant of it), “problematize,” and “fingering.”
Tip 5: When asked about a contemporary issue regarding a specific ME country do not go into great irrelevant detail regarding the country’s history. I’m glad that you are well aware of the Fatimid Caliph Al-Hakim’s ascension into power in 1021, but how is this relevant to Lebanon’s sectarian divisions and confessional system of governance?
Tip 6: WMDs hasn’t been the ‘right’ answer for a long, long …long time.
Tip 7: Your handwriting does determine your final grade. The equations are rather simple in this case:
Clear, double-spaced writing + tired grad student with other responsibilities = Good grade + tears of joy
Sloppy writing resembling semitic languages + tired grad student with little time = Bad grade
Tip 8: Use more than 1.5 exam booklets and die.
Tip 9: Flirting with your TA will not get you a better grade or a date. It will, however, get you a spot in her next tweet.
Tip 10: Make sure that if you’re writing a 15-20 page research paper in which Israel comprises a major chunk of your discussion, don’t spell it “Isreal” every ..single ..goddamn time.
Tip 11: I’m glad you’re passionate about your religion/ethnicity/nationality/birth/existence/brainwashing, but what does the Israeli-Palestinian conflict have to do with family status laws in Algeria?
Tip 12: Daniel Pipes is not really a legitimate source (unless we’re talking about the slave soldier military system in Islamic history, then he’s really one of the only people to have written extensively on that topic. How unfortunate.)
Tip 13: I’m glad you spent a summer in Lebanon/Israel/OPT/Iran/Jordan/Egypt. This, however, is a research paper not a travel log.
Tip 14: Emailing your TA with a topic proposal for a 20 page term paper two days before its due is really not a good idea. At all. We will give you bad advice. On purpose.
Tip 15: Be aware (and prepared) that your papers/exams will possibly have coffee/hummus/bodily stains when returned.
Tip 16: Okay, seriously, Hosni Mubarak is not leading Egypt towards a democratic future. Seriously where is this coming from?
Tip 17: It’s too soon to do an analysis of the so-called Iranian Green Revolution. And don’t cite Twitter.
Tip 18: Pakistan and Afghanistan do not make up the Middle East. They comprise the AFPAK region, with the former a part of South Asia/Sub-continent and the latter a part of Central Asia. There. Now you are pretty much as well informed as the US Republicans and Democrats are about the region.
Tip 19: When discussing the political war between Hamas and Fatah (and general elite politics) and how it is detrimental to Palestinian statehood aspirations, its probably a good idea to mention Israel. Even just once. In some capacity. Anywhere.
Tip 20: Sadat did not initiate the intifida. It was the infitah.
Tip 21: Kurds are not a religious group. Sunnis and Shi’a are not ethnic groups.
Related posts:
- Japan and Middle East Politics in History
- More news from the only democracy in the Middle East
- Helena Cobban Reports Back from Middle East Trip
- Time traveling to the Middle East
- No Humour, All Hate: Racist Cartoons in the Middle East
I bet you have a whole new appreciation for how knowledgeable FOX news anchors are, now
Posted by programmer craig | December 29, 2009, 8:13 amHaha, awesome! Great post.
Posted by Programmer Buydatti | December 29, 2009, 6:43 pm"It’s too soon to do an analysis of the so-called Iranian Green Revolution. And don’t cite Twitter."
Nothing is too early…as Bob Dylan would say, "the times, they are a changing".
Posted by C.H. | December 29, 2009, 8:08 pmThat's hilarious that you say that because one of the student quoted that Dylan lyric in their discussion of the Green revolution.
Posted by SanaKF | December 30, 2009, 9:21 pmAnd we are better? Why do we have to condescend to those under our responsibility, whether it is starting a facebook page, a tweet (e.g. 'I hate students that…' or 'I hate patients that…') or gossiping and making it something we laugh at – 'we are so better than them'…
I am no better, so it is an advice for all – Try to better the students or anyone who comes across our path, if a few are not taking the course seriously and are beyond intervention than give them their grade and afterwards send them a private email of advice and leave it at that (or contact their personal tutor, that they require monitoring).
Weakness and ignorance is human nature and the folly we percieve in others is no excuse for conceit.
Posted by Blog reader | December 29, 2009, 8:16 pmI guess humour doesn't transfer to everyone equally.
Or at all.
Posted by SanaKF | December 29, 2009, 9:23 pmThis is both funny and true…a great fun and funny post! Thanks for writing it
Posted by Hanitizer | December 29, 2009, 10:42 pm"I guess humour doesn't transfer to everyone equally. "
you're right, I can be drab.
Apologies for the message, it isn't for me to judge and the message above is clearly written in that tone.
But the point about bettering the students by viewing any folly as a sign for intervention is good practice, a standard. I realise it can be fustrating but in that relationship the student comes first in every way (I know, easier said than done, that is why it is a standard. To serve with grace is the most difficult thing).
Posted by Blog reader | December 30, 2009, 12:07 amDude, i am super graceful. I did dance for years, despite a horrid leg injury.
On a more serious note..
I agree with you and the standard you raise. I think that too often undergrad students are taken advantage of and not taken as seriously as they should be.
Posted by SanaKF | December 30, 2009, 3:34 amBodily stains? Sana, gross.
Posted by JillianKF | December 30, 2009, 4:41 pmDon't judge me. I can't control the amount and speed at which I drool after 15 mins of inactivity.
Posted by SanaKF | December 30, 2009, 9:08 pmHaha, beautiful. From personal chagrined experience (but a history class) I would add:
-Thirteenth-century "capitalism": not a useful or relevant construct.
-Fatimids and Safavids: not as similar as you think.
Posted by Suddha | December 30, 2009, 5:05 pm-Thirteenth-century "capitalism": not a useful or relevant construct.
Do they even claim there is such a thing in history classes? As I recall it, that's when "merchants" emerged as a sort of middle-class. Not exactly capitalism!
-Fatimids and Safavids: not as similar as you think.
And neither is relevant in the modern world for anything except playing computer games. The only two cases I can think of where the pre-modern history plays a role are Israel and Lebanon.
Posted by programmer craig | December 30, 2009, 5:35 pmOn capitalism: since this is on "taking" ME classes, I figured I'd touch on student foibles only. Of course the good Professor W—— would never claim such a thing to have existed in thirteenth century Anatolia. However, undergraduate students with no real exposure to pre-modern history often graft capitalist analysis onto pre-capitalist ages. Saw this sort of thing not only in "Islamic Empires" but also in "Ancient Greece," where of course notions of capital and capitalism are even more problematic. Of course it's relatively easy to correct, so all's well that ends well and with a good prof.
As to contemporary relevance of pre-modern history, I'm not sure why you bring it up in this context – after all, I'd say (as a historian) that the most interesting errors in historical perception occur when one grafts a modern worldview onto pre-modern subjects. And we were talking merely about foibles – or I was.
If we were to discuss this, I'd have to cede ground on the Fatimids. I know little about them and have only looked at them cursorily. But the Safavids built much of Iran, including the port of Bandar-Abbas and Isfahan. Their cultural accomplishments remain a touchstone for people who care about Persian culture. They effectively broke Uzbek power in Central Asia and moved a good many Armenians around, both of which certainly shaped the landscape of Central and Near Asia. And they checked Ottoman expansion to the East. All important, modern-world-shaping phenomena. But, obviously, things that happened since the early 1700s are arguably more important than those earlier occurrences. Or at least they're easier to trace, track, and quantify. How's that for ambivalent historiography?
Posted by Suddha | December 31, 2009, 6:03 am-But the Safavids built much of Iran
Pre-Islamic Iran
I'll grant you that most Iranians are intensely proud of their pre-islamic history, but its no more relevant in today's world than pagan Europe's history. The Fatamids might be more relevant as they did contribute to creating the status quo as it exists today in the Arab world, but Pan-Arabism seems to have trumped all that.
Posted by programmer craig | December 31, 2009, 8:18 pmI think you might be confusing the Safavids (1501-1736) with the Sassanids (224-651). The former were very much Islamic, despite the madcap heresy (well, ghuluww, which is a little different) of their founding ruler (Ismail I). The Sassanids were the last pre-Islamic rulers of Iran (really fascinating stuff in their fall, since they basically wore themselves out fighting the Byzantines and then got pwnt by newly-Islamized Arabs. A good short account is in the first couple chapters of David Lewis' "God's Crucible" if you like military history.)
Actually the real significance of the Safavids lies in their establishment of an assertively Shia Iranian ideology, which was asinine of me to leave out. Missing the forest for the trees, if you will. A matter of deep geopolitical importance resonating down the ages, methinks.
Posted by Suddha | December 31, 2009, 8:46 pmOh – and if you know of a computer game where the Safavids play anything like a leading role, I'd be much obliged if you'd point me to it.
I don't know if it'd be more fun to play as Ismail I or to pwn him…
Posted by Suddha | December 31, 2009, 6:06 amThis one is a good bet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_of_Honor_%28…
They play as big a role as you can manage, if you choose them as your faction
That's actually a pretty good war game but it might seem a bit dated now.
Posted by programmer craig | December 31, 2009, 8:29 pmLove this post
Posted by BuJ | December 30, 2009, 6:49 pmThat's pretty hilarious…
Posted by yaman | December 31, 2009, 5:14 amOops, belay that about Safavids… I was thinking Sassanids
Posted by programmer craig | December 31, 2009, 8:21 pmHaha, *delete post*
Still relevant: Actually the real significance of the Safavids lies in their establishment of an assertively Shia Iranian ideology, which was asinine of me to leave out. Missing the forest for the trees, if you will. A matter of deep geopolitical importance resonating down the ages, methinks.
Posted by Suddha | December 31, 2009, 8:47 pm