Factors of my Political Identity

Others in Our Community

 I'm part of a small minority at Dickinson: a transfer student. I don't know the exact statistics but when I went to orientation as a transfer there were about 14 other transfers spread across two class years, and roughly 600 freshmen, or first years as they are called at Dickinson.

Orientation was a particularly rough time. The freshmen were very excitable-- after all it was their first time away from home, they were going to make new friends, and participate in all of the extra curricular activities a liberal arts school has to offer. The orientation was designed for the freshmen and aside from the few special programs for transfers, we were completely ignored. During one activity, the school handed out class of 2017 shirts and when I asked them if they had any class of 2015 shirts they stared at me blankly and asked why on earth would I want a 2015 shirt.

Nobody really thought less of me for being a transfer, and I didn't think less of anyone for being a Dickinson student for the entirety of their undergraduate studies. It's just different and sometimes manifests itself in different ways.

As Dickinson is a small school, come junior year, a lot of the students had already formed their friend groups. While I do have some traditional Dickinson students for friends, I ended up spending most of my time with other transfer students. As a transfer student, they room you with other transfer students, most likely due to housing constraints, but it makes it harder to escape that group.

My second year at Dickinson, I opted to live in special interest housing as a way to meet more people. I live in the Global House, and my roommate is a junior and always brings her friends to visit and introduces us. Doing extra curricular activities on campus has also provided me with a chance to interact with traditional students.

Sometimes my friends and I will talk about the differences in our first two years of education. It's a fairly politically neutral topic and doesn't really cause fights. Sometimes, I feel left out, because many of my friends has experiences here that I never had but then I think back about my time at Montgomery County Community College and can't imagine what my life would have been like without my time there.

Edit:

While this wasn't part of my original post, something happened tonight that I think belongs here.

I received a call from an older friend who works for a school district nearby. She had asked me previously to help as a translator for the school district as they had just enrolled an Iraqi girl whose parents spoke very little English.

"Remember that girl I told you about from Iraq? Her father mixed up the time of the parent teacher conference and came in at 7:30 in the morning. I asked him why he moved here all the way from Iraq. It seems strange to go all the way from Iraq to Roslyn, Pennsylvania. He said he wanted to buy a house."

We chatted a bit about moving. My friend was originally from New York and talked about her move from Brooklyn to the suburbs of Pennsylvania. A little while later, she asked me another question.

"Jessica, aren't all Iraqis terrorists?"

Though I was not attacked in this statement, I was offended, and even embarrassed.. As a Middle East Studies major, I spend a great deal of time discussing the peoples, languages, histories and cultures of the MENA region. In my little academic bubble, I don't hear statements like this too often, but I feel they are reflective of a lot of the general American mentality towards people from the Middle East.These statements aren't always made out of hate: most people get their information from news reports, or second hand through other biased informants and can only form their opinions on what information they have available.

I bring this up because fear of the unknown can lead to prejudice. After I told my friend of my good experiences with some Iraqi people, she began to calm down. Anyone can be a terrorist, terrorism isn't a genetic trait or an ethnic trait.

In order to better understand the others in our community, we need to learn about them. In a world where we are ever connected by technology this becomes increasingly important. In the old days where trans-ocean travel was only possible via boat, it was a lot easier to ignore other groups and live with the mentality of "us" and "our land here" and "them" and "their land far over there." With technology and ease of travel, this is no longer the case. "We" and "they" share the same space know.

Stepping Through the Wardrobe: Where I Live, Where They Live

Found on Pinterest

Discussing the transition of going from Morocco back to our home country, the U.S with the group I studied abroad with was difficult. The closest we came to describing our feelings came from the popular C.S. Lewis novel, "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe." It was like preparing to return from Narnia for the first time. While Morocco is lacking in ice queens, it was a perfect way to describe the alternate realities we faced.

These alternate realities make understanding one another difficult sometimes. It's hard to walk a mile in another's shoes if you can't first comprehend how to put them on and properly tie the laces.

Cultural Differences

One of the biggest cultural differences I noticed was the dependence on material goods in the U.S..  For someone living in Gaza, in constant fear that their home will be bombed, their children taken, and their loved ones killed, the need for material goods here in the U.S. is absolutely absurd.  Yet, if you want a job that will be able to support your family, it's usually necessary to own a nice suit, and a car to transport yourself to and from work. Without these items, and the rates of unemployment, it is possible to loose your home through foreclosure, have your children taken if you are unable to care for them, and have your loved ones killed by illness since you have no health insurance to bring them to the doctors.

Another cultural difference has to do with the family dynamic and sense of community. In the MENA region, it is quite common, and quite desirable for children to live with their parents even after marriage. Here in the U.S. it used to be completely unacceptable for this to happen-- living with your parents at the age of 40 used to carry huge negative stigma. With the aftermath of the Great Recession of 2005, this is becoming more of a necessity but it is not usually a prideful move.

Environmental 

Photo from my trip to the Sahara in Morocco

In terms of environment, one of the biggest differences between the North East USA and the MENA region is the climate. The North East has a clear four season cycle with plenty of rainfall whereas the majority of the MENA region is desert.

Due to the lack of precipitation in the desert, there is a lack of access to fresh water for many people which affects everything from bathing, to international politics over who has access to which source of water.

Philadelphia: found on ilovebricks.blogspot.com

In my part of the United States, access to water is something that is taken for granted. We bathe daily, take long showers without shutting the water off while we lather up, forget to fix leaky faucets, etc. We never have to worry about water whereas some people in the MENA region only have water in their homes on some days of the week. Israel is one of the world leaders in water conservation not out of luxury but out of necessity.

The state of Pennsylvania will never go to war with the state of New Jersey over access to water. However there could be wars between states over access to water sources in the MENA region.

Resources to Overcoming Boundaries

One of the best resources in overcoming environmental and cultural boundaries to understand another group of peoples is to step through the wardrobe and travel. Travel allows you to experience things first hand. While it is not possible to travel to every nook and cranny of the MENA region there are some other resources that can be used to understand "them":

books, films, anthropological studies, academic courses, and of course speaking with the people from the region.

If relying on second hand experience, it is important to remember that some media sources are more truthful than others: everyone has an agenda and nothing is completely unbiased.

All too often we have a tendency to discuss the Middle East as one giant party where everyone is the same but this couldn't be further from the truth. Again, looking at the U.S. as an example, the culture in Philadelphia is different from the culture of New York City and they are only a two hour drive apart. Even the geography is a little different: New York is mostly an island. Environment is a huge factor on the development of civilizations and cultures that someone who lives next to a freshwater lake may have some trouble understanding the life of a nomad in the Sahara desert.