Question ?

[thuraiya]

How can Arabs understand western culture?
* In your opinion*:) :)

[andave_ya]

hm. well. my family is Arabic but I was born in the States. So, in essence, I don't know much. One thing I have noticed is that there is less regard for tradition in the States than there is in the Middle East. Does that help at all?

[EAP]

By experiencing it?

[dramasnot6]

What do you mean by "understand" western culture? There are all kinds of levels of understanding and many interpretations to what is meant by "western culture" as well.

[SheykAbdullah]

I think the ways to understand any foreign culture are the same. The trick is to put aside prejudice (not just prejudice in a negative sense, but rather all preconceived ideas of another culture) and try to look at things from the other's perspective. For example, take something you find strange about western culture, assuming you are an Arab, which I do given your name, and try to think about it from a Western standpoint using everything you know about western culture and then read a westerner's explanation about it and see how you did and if you were wrong why.

Of course this can be difficult, I know. I have am doing the same thing you are doing, Thuraiyah, except in reverse. I am an American anthropologist interested in the Middle Eastern (specifically Persian and North African) peoples, but asking myself why, trying to fgure it out and then reading about it is what I do.

Understanding is hard at first, but after investigating a few things you will find that it comes to you easier than you first thought. After you ask and answer a couple of the 'why' questions I mentioned above you will begin to see a pattern of thought emerge, one of the biggest patterns of thought that will emerge as a difference between east and west is the differing views of fate and the role of external forces in a person's life, which is a cause of much of the confusion when we look at one another's lives. For example, the idea that a woman would wear the burqa/hijab to protect her and prevent a man being overcome by lust seems like a totally ridiculous concept to a westerner until he looks at the matter within the context of Arabist thought, ie we are constantly subject to outside forces (or an outside force) that causes our actions, and then it makes sense.

The same thing may be said of the idea that tradition is less important to Westerners than to Arabs. Tradition is still important to us, even in the sates, but we have a different view of tradition. To us nothing is fixed and everything is up to personal interpretation, ie there is no leagalistic outside standard of conduct (even when there is, namely religion, it is a religion often of our choice because there are so many different brands of Christianity it can almost be customized), so while tradition is maintained very strongly with our society, as in all societies, we view it as something to be reinterpreted with each passing generation, not, as is more common with Arabic thinking (demonstrated by the importance of sunnah in both everyday life and faqih, and indeed by the very words of the Usul al-Kafi, the Shi'a hadith which directly declaims faqih based on analogy*), as something that is pased down from generation to generation in an orthodox manner.

Those two above are just a couple examples of the things I have come across in my quest to understand the peoples of the Middle East, and I think if you take the opposite approach to understand the peoples of the West it will be both fruitful and beneficial, but someone who is studying another culture should always remember that in order to obtain a true picture of the other he must first, and most importantly of all, approach the subject in an open, plain manner with as few preconceptions as possible and certainly no judgements.

Many times, as I have seen many Westerners do when confronted by an Arabian way of doing things, you may shake your head and say, 'these people are crazy,' but if you try to rationalize why whatever makes you think that is, you will always find some reason, even if it happens to be a little novel or even just a little funny.

*I do realize that this is hadith is viewed by many, if not most Sunnis to be da'if at best, mawdo at worst, but I think it represents a view of the rigidity of tradition from the context of most Middle Eastern cultures well.

[Poetess]

Some understand it as "spoiling" and others as for freedom.. freedom of movement and any other thing.
I see alot of people who appreciate the western culture, and others see it as ruining of morality

[SheykAbdullah]

Some understand it as "spoiling" and others as for freedom.. freedom of movement and any other thing.
I see alot of people who appreciate the western culture, and others see it as ruining of morality

Well, I think when it comes to understanding any other culture value statements such as "ruining morality" needn't be used, and it may also be pointed out that appreciating a culture has very little to do with understanding it. You can love a culture and have no idea about why it does what it does, and hate one while knowing it intimately. Understanding is a non-value laden term. Understanding a culture just means that you have some ability to see things from their standpoint.