Period 4: Turmoil in the Middle East, Day 2 - Class Recap

Suzanne Mubarek, the first lady of Egypt, who we read about in class today. Doesn't she look like Emily Gilmore,
from The Gilmore Girls?
Good afternoon (by the time I finish writing this), class!

Thank you for another interesting class! I think we are gradually getting in to really getting to know each other well. The turn-in rate on the letters to me could have been a little better, but I am very excited to read what I did get! A shortened period knocked off some good time you would have had to write about women in the Middle East, but I trust that you will be be good at getting it done. Again, if you have anything to ask me or comment about, please do! :-)

Essential Questions: How does conflict arise and in what ways have various people responded? What impact can women in the Middle East have on policy? - We especially looked at answering the second question in class today!

Soundtrack: "Rock the Casbah" by The Clash. Lyrics here. Wikipedia has a really interesting background on the song: Wikipedia.com - "Rock the Casbah". I didn't mention this in class, but one possibility of the song's meaning is about the banning of rock music in Iran. Also, a song featured in many commercials, and Will Smith used it as the beat for his song "Will 2k" on his album Willenium. You can watch the video for that song here.

AGENDA 4/2/09:
Blog Talk
News Brief
Article Reading
What Can Women Do?
Debrief Discussion

Homework: Finish three paragraphs on women in Middle East. Interview an adult woman about any struggles she sees that women around the world have. Check blog!

The three paragraph assignment will be explained in more depth in the "Debrief Discussion" below, but essentially, I want you to think of three ways that women can have some sort of say in policy decisions in the Middle East. Write a paragraph about each way, explaining what it is, why you think it will work, and how it can be done (this is especially important). This should not be a very difficult assignment, but I am going to be looking to make sure you put some effort and thought into it, as always.

Secondly, another easy assignment: interview an adult woman about any struggles that she thinks women face throughout the world. What are they? Why? All I am looking for here are some notes on a conversation. Talk to your mom, Mrs. DeFrance, another teacher, anyone who is grown up and has some perspective about these issues.

Finally, if you are reading this sentence, you have the "check blog" homework in the bag. Way to go! :-)

Blog Talk: Thank you for the feedback on this! I really liked all the participation in the comments! Remember to use comments to ask questions or talk about anything else that is on your mind (within reason, of course). The blog is really an extension of class, and hopefully you can see how important it is to be following along with what is going on.

News Brief: Cameron brought in an interesting article that happened to totally relate to what we were talking about in class: CNN.com - Afghanistan to change controversial 'rape' law. We will talk a little more about the uproar over this law and its effect on women's rights in the Middle East in the coming days. Again, everything that we talk about in class should be relevant to the outside world! Thanks for bringing this in Cameron! Chris, you are next up for Monday. Any article that has to do with something outside of the United States that is currently going on. Let me know if you want to run it by me before class!

Article Reading: I read this article to the class: The Observer - The Arab world's first ladies are forging rights for women. Some good thoughts and comments came up during the reading. One was about genital mutilation, and whether or not that was okay to enforce our culture on other cultures. I am not going to link to any articles or pages on the subject, but I think you can pretty much guess what the debate is about from what we talked about in class. Do we have a right to go into another place and say "hey, stop doing that (even though it is a part of their culture) because it is barbaric" - or should we just ignore these things, which are somewhat similar to the human sacrifices of not that long ago? It is a difficult question to answer!

What Can Women Do? After reading the article, we circled up and everyone said one thing that they thought was interesting about the article. Then, we started in on a discussion based on the essential question of "what impact can women in the Middle East have on policy?" How? Amanda helpfully recorded our responses, which can be viewed here:


Overall, I was pleased with how this went. There were some issues with lack of participation from everyone, but we did come up with some really good ways for women to have an impact. I also liked how we considered how both women AND men could help advance women's rights.

Debrief Discussion: Using Amanda's helpfully created list, I asked everyone to think about three things that they thought would help women have a say, while we passed around a bag of greasy chips. This was a direct lead in to your homework.

What is important to remember is that we cannot just say "women need to speak out" - because the reality is, if they did that, they would be killed in some countries. Also, we need to realize that it is not merely up to women to fight for their rights - men need to be on the forefront of helping. For instance, what good would it be if white people just sat back, did nothing, and collectively said "it's up to black people to claim their rights." We would still have segregation, at the very least.

So, use the list above (or anything that you think of on your own) to write neatly (or type) three paragraphs on how women can have an impact on policy decisions in the Middle East. Also, interview an adult woman about struggles they see that women have throughout the world.

Again, if you have any questions about what I am asking you to do, please either comment or e-mail me and I would be more than happy to help you out. Keep the conversation going!
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I will see you next Tuesday. Remember to watch the Blazers game on Saturday at 7:30, on either KGW or ESPN. So exciting! :-)

I am so excited to read your letters and get to know every one of you better! Have an absolutely wonderful weekend!