Video conferencing allows students to react to stereotypes
As the first rays of autumn sunlight stream through the windows of Lauinger Library at 7:00 a.m., it is early afternoon in Cairo, and while Jenny Weingarten (SFS ‘08) is wiping the sleep from her eyes, she is discussing American-Arab relations face-to-face with a student from the American University in Cairo.
Weingarten is part of the early shift of students in Professor Cynthia Schneider’s Diplomacy and Culture class, where Schneider uses the Soliya student video conferencing network to help students get past the view of the Middle East presented by mass media and expose them to direct intercultural contact.
Under the direction of two moderators, several U.S. and Arab students log into the service weekly to discuss issues like stereotypes and identity between the two cultures.
“That direct contact sort of bridges those boundaries,” Rob Cooper (SFS ‘08) said.
“It makes [students] look at the whole business of representing a country abroad,” Schneider said.
In one exercise, students picked 10 factors that defined themselves, and in a dialogue they narrowed it down to only three.
Schneider said that the Arab students usually kept their nationality and their religion, while American students tended not to choose those characteristics.
In another instance, Arab students explained stereotypes about Americans and heard stereotypes about themselves. Weingarten said that the Arabs were well aware of the stereotype that all Arabs are terrorists, while the Americans were not surprised at being described as “ignorant, greedy warmongers.” She was quick to add that none of the students took the stereotypes seriously.
Though the meetings generally go smoothly, students interviewed think that the moderators can detract from the experience.
Cooper said that the students were primarily responsible for directing the conversation, but Weingarten said that the moderators often restrict the flow of conversation in favor of addressing the specific agenda for each meeting.
“Some of the moderators don’t allow the conversation to take its own road,” she said. “If we naturally get to a point in a conversation people are more likely to talk about that.”
Weingarten said this problem is compounded by the relative quiet of the Arab students compared to their American counterparts.
“Even though they do ice-breakers, everybody is still pretty quiet,” Weingarten explained. “I don’t know if this is a cultural thing or what.”
Though both Cooper and Weingarten thought the program was beneficial, Weingarten thought that the exposure that the program provides would better benefit students who were less educated about the Arab world.
Many of the students in the class have traveled abroad before, and a few even speak Arabic.
Students have several more sessions throughout the semester, though the scheduled times shift now that Ramadan is over, which might avoid some embarrassment for the American students who just woke up.
Weingarten said that at one session during Ramadan an American student was eating cereal off-camera.
