Promoting Cross-cultural Understanding

AUC faculty members and students recently traveled to Menoufiya University in the Nile Delta, to participate in a workshop promoting better cross-cultural understanding between Egyptians and Americans.

Organized by AUC’s Center for American Studies and Research (CASAR) and the Department of English at Menoufiya University, the workshop focused on breaking the stereotypes and misconceptions that the two cultures hold about each other, following a highly successful earlier workshop led by CASAR Director Jerry Leach and Lisa Portmess, visiting Fulbright professor from Gettysburg College.

“We have been astonished by the overwhelming interest and enthusiasm of the students on both occasions. They are hungry for contact with the wider world. It seems that nobody comes to the university to speak to them and there aren’t many extracurricular activities for them. Every student wanted to speak, to ask us about something and to tell us about their world,” said Leach.

Although just one hour from Cairo, the students live a much more insular life academically and socially, marked by limited first-hand contact with foreigners. They are nevertheless inundated with American cultural influences through the media.

Osama Madany, a Menoufiya professor and key organizer of the workshop, said in his introduction “I believe the bridges already exist between East and West. What we need to do now is begin to walk over them towards each other.”

Students began by addressing common misconceptions that Americans hold of Egyptians and Arabs, including the association between Islam and terrorism, the veil as a tool of oppression, and the belief that Egyptian society is overly serious. “How can people think we’re so serious? We are a nation of jokers,” explained a young woman studying at Menoufiya, amidst the sound of chuckles. Attendees also asked personal questions of the panelists that ranged from individual religious beliefs to wedding engagement traditions to the foreign woman’s experience of walking down the street in Cairo.

Everyone participating was moved by the honesty, humor and enthusiasm of the dialogue. Most said they had experienced nothing like in their lives. At the end, one Menoufiya student wondered “Why don’t we look for similarities instead of differences? If we do, we can create an atmosphere of peace.”