The EIESL Project

I would like to focus on Edward Said idea of “Orientalism” a term he uses to “describe a pervasive Western tradition, both academic and artistic, of prejudiced outsider interpretations of the East, shaped by the attitudes of European imperialism in the 18th and 19th centuries” (Wikipedia) I would like to discuss how this mentality, “Orientalism”, is still prevalent in today’s society. It is unfortunate that in today’s society we continue to a have a negative and inaccurate depiction of the ‘Eastern’ world, specifically the Middle East. I believe this is due to the world’s acceptance of an inaccurate western media that depicts the Middle East and the eastern world negatively. The willingness to judge and accept mass media’s stereotyping of a nations culture and religion is constantly and continuously ingrained into our thoughts and minds. Today’s society is obsessed with mass media, and as stereotypes of individuals, nations, religions and cultures continue to compound so do these stereotypes. It is important to look at all aspects of media with an open mind and a willingness to question exactly you are seeing or hearing. It is unfortunate that the general public accepts daily stereotypes seen in mass media as real and accurate, and that we base our beliefs towards the Middle East, generally speaking, only using a western view.

Why are these stereotypes so deeply ingrained into western society?

I believe it is based on fear, the idea of “difference” or the “other” as Edward Said discusses in his work that is the driving force behind “Orientalism” and the stereotyping of the Middle East. Just because something or someone is different, does not make it wrong, negative or unacceptable. A close mind and unwillingness to accept difference is an extremely dangerous mindset. And in my opinion creates a lot of the issues that we struggle with around the world. I think it is important for everyone to make a conscious effort to not accept mass media’s depiction of the Middle East and to not follow the general public, but instead create your own educated and well rounded opinion. Approach topics regarding the Middle East with intrigue and interest rather than with preconceptions and fear. Openness to difference is the beginning of change.

I encourage everyone who reads this blog post to go outside their comfort zone and meet someone who you believe is different from you and learn about there culture, religion and nation.

Who are you, a face on the other side of the wire?

A single sided story woven out of strands of history, projected into a future none would wish to inhabit.

Who are you, a child with a bloated belly, are you not more that your past, than the legacy of poverty attached to your picture?

A history of division, a color by number map of the world that fails to see our common humanity.

Who are you, a young man with a gun, no more than a child. You love your family, you love your country, you love.

Fear has encroached upon our ability to love; we see with veiled eyes, blind to the ways in which we become that which we fear.

Who are you, my neighbour, you live just next door.

We take the same bus, walk the same streets, yet never speak. I sit alone in my basement suite, you in yours. What keeps us apart?

Who are you, woman on the other side of the world? Your veil speaks of difference that threatens to separate, but your smile invites.

Our lenses create a reality that is upside down and outside in. Trapped in fear, we have become our own worst enemies. Who is our enemy if it is not fear itself?

I want to lay down these glasses, remove these eyes that see from the outside in. I admit my partiality, confess my blindness. Will you help me to see?

See what lies beneath our histories, beneath our stuggle for survival. See what lies beyond the veil, the book, the politics. See inside a people, see the heart that beats just like mine. What causes your heart to beat, is it love, is it justice? Is it fear?

May the ground upon which we tread be uprooted until the faulty foundations that we have learned to walk upon are changed. And we are given new eyes.

Eyes that see.

Written by Lana McGuire in response to a workshop exploring ideas of “the other”, and the danger of a single story.

This poem is an honest reflection on some of my experiences in looking upon and interacting with a fragmented world. Edward Said terms it as “orientalism”, examining the way in which we look at others; particularly those from “the Orient” or the region of the Middle East. It is essentially a question of perception, and what I was attempting to convey in my poem is the reality that we see others through our own set of lenses, be that on a political, national, or personal level. Said speaks of ways in which the media, film, imagery, and language contribute to a negative portrayal of the Middle East, a broad sweeping umbrella under which many distinct nations are clumped.

A single story, as was expounded upon by Chimamanda Adichie, is something that allows these terribly inaccurate misconceptions to be fostered in our hearts and minds, and eventually be woven into a national and international consciousness. This workshop evoked within me an urgent desire to truly meet my neighbour, globally and locally, and to learn to see them without the veils of a single story. It is time for a restoration of a world fragmented in its every fibre, a restoration of connection between people, our environments, and our history. Only when we truly see the big picture and understand that we are not each other’s enemies can we move forward into a new future, one in which we can admit our blindness and turn the other way, we will learn to see.

The Western world looks at people of the East through a lens which distorts the actual reality of individuals living in those regions. Edward Said calls this lens orientalism. The lens portrays how these individuals act, what they believe and often gives a negative stereotypical portrayal of the lives they lead. Edward Said describes Orientalism as a creation of an ideal “other” which is often a doubtful depiction. This illustration of this “other” is defined as something alien and barbaric. Often, the average American gets the impression through mass media that the “other” is to be feared and perhaps even fought against.
The media tends to give a negative, evil representation of Middle East which is often threatening. This representation is so deeply rooted that it is found in Hollywood movies such as True Lies (1994). Within this movie Palestinians are portrayed as villains and there is usage of the phrases such as “shoot dead Palestinians like clay pigeons (Wikipedia Orientalism, 2011).” Why this negative depiction of Palestinians? Edward Said has the answer. In the You Tube course video, he dictates that the American orientalism is “very politicized by the presence of Israel.” America was the first nation to recognize the state of Israel and what you really have is a creation of a western state “in the middle of the Islamic oriental world.” He further claims that “Israel regards the Arab world as his enemy” and the Israeli enmity towards Palestine is “imported into American orientalism.” The Western media often shows a one sided story in regards to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, in which the Palestinians are obviously the bad guys.
I further visualized the widespread negativity of the Eastern “other” after searching “Pakistan” on You Tube. To no surprise, the first four out of the five videos were negative. Headings of these videos include as such: “Mosque blast kills nine”, “War in Pakistan” and “Illegal Gun Market.” How come almost nothing positive about the region or culture dominates the search? Further veils worn by Middle Eastern women are often symbolized negatively. Is it not strange how a veiled Muslim woman is often recognized as “oppressed” whereas a nun who covers herself up equally is depicted as “pious” by the media? Moreover, 9/11 popularized the notion of Islamophobia and there is huge opposition by the Western world in regards to the mosque being built close to Ground Zero. Just because some Arabs may have been responsible for 9/11, does it mean the rest of the 1.6 billion Muslims are the same? Why should I have to go through special security checks at the airport because of my Muslim name? Does my religion and ethnicity put me in this category of the preconceived “other”?

From my personal experience the term ‘’other’’ cannot be confined to someone who belongs from a different race or religion, since majority of my best friends are Non-Muslims and definitely not Pakistani. What really binds us together is the notion of humanity, the ability to laugh together, to tolerate our differences, to value truth and forgiveness above all, and to relate to each others emotions. We possess the ability to express anger, be greedy and to fear something mightier than ourselves. We are all the same. We are fundamentally human, and most importantly we need to be good human beings. Why can’t we all live in peaceful coexistence despite our differences? To me an “other” is one who is judgmental and hates me for the beliefs I carry; an individual who lacks tolerance, does not promote justice and is not able to look past the distorted lens of orientalism.

Volunteer for two weeks in Africa on a medical team giving out malaria medication and mosquito nets! This is a common phrase heard and promoted to many eager students waiting to get their feet wet in volunteering in the international community. My personal opinion on short-term medical volunteers? Frankly I don’t quite agree with the idea. Not that I have anything against volunteering in a medical setting, that is only permitted in countries with loosely enforced rules and standards, assisting the surgeon in neurosurgery, delivering babies as a high school student, or paying $2000 in program fees for 2 weeks to volunteer. It’s not even about doing it to improve your resume so that you can get into medical school.

The overlying reason that unites all medical volunteers is that those that choose to go have a genuine interest in bettering the health of those that are less well off. Right? (Unless you are doing it to improve your resume) Which is totally fine, and we should tip our hats off to you for donating your time and money to do all that. The one problem that I have with this is the lack of research that short-term medical volunteers (or any foreign organization for that matter…yes the United Nations included) sometimes put in before setting off to save the world. Mainly this is research about why this problem is happening (say for example, high incidence of malaria in Africa), what are the underlying social factors behind it and evaluate what has been done before. THEN, we should think about what we can do to help. In particular, I feel the underlying social factors are extremely important, as these are the real complex problems that are causing these “presenting” problems, such as malaria. As a result many of these projects are unsuccessful and patients keep coming back for more treatment.

Yes I agree, the pressing problem is a medical one. The first thing we want to do is to relieve the patient of malaria. But the real underlying causes are rooted in deep social issues, such as poverty, inequity, gender inequality, lack of education and corruption. To cement my point, we just need to take a look back in history. Infant mortality remained constant at 150 to 1,000 live births through 19th Century Britain, which is no different than any poor country today. When midwives became more regulated with the introduction of a legislation and the enactment of the early national insurance act, rates fell rapidly in the 20th Century. By 1930, the infant mortality rate was down to 60 deaths. This was before antibiotics, vaccines, and any advances in modern medicine.

Part of the reason why public health gets so little attention in the media and even in project funding is that it has an image problem. I mean… what is more exciting, neurosurgery or building a well for clean water? Same can be said about latest cancer treatments and smoking prevention programs.

As a result I think we should all be responsible to educate ourselves and become more aware of the underlying causes to these pressing problems before we go overseas. My intent for this blog was purely for fun (well I guess it is part of our course…), but I really want to bring to light the importance of having a public health focus when taking your projects abroad. The problem might be medical but there are many other issues that need to be solved in order to resolve the problem. Intervention programs that are purely medical in nature fail to make any differences, and are a huge waste of time and energy, as the disease will keep coming back. This is the basis for short-term medical work, and while it would be interesting to give sight to someone by removing their cataracts, or cure them of malaria, the best help that you can give them is from educating yourself first.

Voluntourism has taken hold in western culture with students and professionals taking time to travel to foreign countries to provide “aid” in some form or another. People do this for various reasons but almost always the desired end product is the self satisfaction of having helped someone else in need. However, often times these volunteers aren’t helping as much as they would like to believe, in fact, sometimes they even undermine the ability for their host country to become self-sufficient from this type of “aid” in the future.
I had the opportunity to see Bill Clinton speak last May about his recent philanthropic work in Haiti. He spoke fondly of his time in Haiti and described the Haitian people as strong and with a proud culture full of ideas. He went on to say how the response received to the disaster by Americans and Canadians was incredible, with so many people donating money and time to this country in a time of great need.
However, President Clinton went on to say that despite all of the time and money given, it wasn’t enough. No, if we are truly to “re-build” Haiti it would require something that many voluntourists tend to leave in their home countries; open ears. Haiti needs to be built from the ground up with the Haitian people making the decisions as to how their country should be run.
Often volunteers go abroad with service programs only to be part of a system that unknowingly becomes a permanent crutch for the problems rather than a long term sustainable solution. I don’t believe that anyone is at fault for how foreign aid came to be this way as it is a by-product of a lot of factors in our home countries from budget constraints, media coverage to the impatient but understandable desire to want results “now”. But, if we are to truly help countries rebuild then we need to set our sights on the horizon rather than at our feet. Sure, sometimes when a countries infrastructure isn’t well established to handle some disasters it is good to give what I call “band-aid aid” to help alleviate the stress on the current civic resources but in places with no resources and no infrastructure then all the band-aid aid in the world won’t make a difference until a solid foundation is in place. In order for countries, like Haiti, to do this they don’t need a helping hand, they need partners who can commit resources and time to long term solutions.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, I look forward to questions or comments. Right now I’d like to ask what you think is the best way to go about achieving these long term solutions with these countries.

How can we help establish a framework for self-sufficiency from foreign aid?

The reading that we did for this week: “Perceptions of short-term medical volunteer work: A qualitative study in Guatemala,” made me think and feel deeply into what type of “help” truly comes from short term care/aid. I felt like my thoughts and feelings would be reflected best through poetry. I wrote it through my eyes as if I were an adolescent living in El Salvador, in a very impoverished state. Being that this is my country of origin and many organizations do short term aid work there, I reflected by putting myself in the receiving end of that aid, and how I would feel.

You come with a smile and with a “helping hand”
You say you are here to help, but do you really understand
I wake up everyday with pain that cannot be cured with a band aid or a drug
My pain needs more than just a doctor, my pain needs long term care and love
They may think that this is going solve my problems, it may solve one for today
What about tomorrow, what about next month, what about in 10 years
I will still see poverty around me and I will still feel deep fear
I thank you for the clean water and care provided for today
But I am saddened too because you always stay a little while and always go away
Your families are safe,healthy and all have food without any conflict or struggle
My family is sick, dies slowly, starves with tears and blood, while we live in rubble
I cannot share with you how one days relief can sometimes bring me more grief
It reminds me constantly that you will always have more and that I always have less
I pray that one day this “help” stops, the day when all of us are equal
The day when I can also drink clean water, have food to eat and have a home
When I am also healthy from within and all around, the day when I can feel peace and no longer alone

This weeks readings: “Perceptions of short-term medical volunteer work: A qualitative study in Guatemala,” “The ethics of nursing student international clinical experiences,” and “Volunteering: Beyond an act of charity” all seem to run along a similar theme: in all international engagements, it is crucial to take into account the sustainability of one’s work. It is important to bear in mind the needs of the communities so that local members are able to thrive on their own with the existing resources they possess. Most international student volunteering organizations provide programs of two weeks to a month at underserved communities. These short-term volunteer work certainly make a difference during the times they are there, however once the volunteers leave, the underserved communities may not have the capability to maintain the same service to patients as before. Something these organizations may consider is to work with what the communities abroad have and share with the people ideas and practices to help them feel empowered and educated.

What these organizations can also think about is whether the people they want to help actually want their help and think of ways to best approach their presence in a long-term sense. Practices that seem “good” and “right” in the context of healthcare in our communities may not coincide in other communities. For instance, by simply donating unused medical equipment and instruments to a community without research may defeat the purpose of aid, as the supplies may not function properly with the technology in the community and cause more problems. This charitable approach may benefit the donor, but one must ask oneself whether it benefits the receiver. Is the help people are being given truly helpful? Do the people have to reply on temporary service or can they rely on systems that already exist?

“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.”

In the article Community Service Learning in the Face of Globalization: Rethinking Theory and Practice, Novella Zett Keith discusses the contribution of neoliberalism, time-space compression, and globalism to globalization, which is bringing to light the truly interdependent nature of human existence. An example from recent history is the people’s revolution that changed the political landscape of Egypt, and emphasized that small actions can bring about much change through a ripple effect. The poem below reflects some of my thoughts based on our recent class discussions regarding colonization, globalization and motives for international development.

Brother From Another Mother

The air I breathe fills thy lungs too
The water I drink quenches thy thirst too
The earth that nourishes me feeds thy belly too
Then, Brother, why art thou poor?

The air that fills your lungs is made pure
By the lush greens that you saved
But Brother, they wiped away my forests
To build the factories that leach poisons
Into the rivers that my kinsmen bathe in and drink from,
That were the source of my sustenance until the fish died.
The earth, too, was plundered for copper, silver and gold
The metals that adorn you, and the carbons that fuel your way of life
The luxuries you enjoy from methane, oil and coal
Why then, Brother, do you wonder about my poverty?

No! No! It was not I, Brother, that took away thy riches
‘Twere those big corporations, whose greed hath left thee
Without trees to shelter from the heat of the sun
And without land to grow thy nourishment
What was I to do?

But was it not you that wanted independence, Brother?
Did you not vote to for freedom from the state,
For the capitalism that has fueled life into the greedy corporations?
How did the demands for individual freedom from a few
Turn into squashing the rights of entire communities?
Do you not wear the clothes my children sew,
Eat the food that we pick from the fields for you,
Smoke the tobacco and opium my neighbors grow for your pleasure
When they could grow grains, fruits and vegetables
But do I complain of sleeping under a mud thatched roof
While you enjoy fast cars and freedom?

O Brother! I did want to improve the quality of my life,
For what parent would not want their children to enjoy,
A better life without the suffering that they themselves had to live through.
But in my haste and greed I forgot
That this planet is as much yours as is mine
That my actions have consequences
That my privilege means your oppression
That freedom of choice brings with it a moral responsibility.
Brother, I cannot undo the decades of damage
Nor will I play the blame game that leads to nowhere
But hope that my actions now will make your future brighter