Middle East experts

New England Journal of Higher Education, The, Spring 2002 by Lootens, Abigail E

When Prince Feisal Hussein of Jordan graduated from Brown in 1985, his father, the late King Hussein, delivered a commencement speech. (New England's prestigious secondary schools also attract Middle Easterners; for example, King Abdullah II of Jordan, another son of the late King Hussein, attended Eaglebrook School and Deerfield Academy in Massachusetts.)

Former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik B. Hariri, whose son attended Boston University, donated $10 million toward the construction of BUs new school of management. The state-of-- the art building, named for Hariri, opened in 1996.

Even Osama bin Laden's family had enduring connections with New England. In 1994, Sheik Bakr Mohammed bin Laden, Osama bin Laden's brother, made large scholarship donations to Harvard Law School to fund research in Islamic legal studies.

Courses

New England's Middle East connections are rooted in academic programs. Yale University offered courses in Arabic and Sanskrit as far back as 1841. Today, New England colleges account for more than one quarter of U.S. institutions offering bachelor's degrees in Arabic, according to a NEBHE analysis of College Board data.

The analysis also found New England campuses account for more than a quarter of U.S. institutions offering bachelor's degrees in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies and other Middle Eastern languages. Dartmouth and Harvard are the only U.S. colleges offering bachelor's degrees in Middle Eastern languages other than Arabic.

Harvard established its Center for Middle Eastern Studies in 1954 and continues to offer lectures and seminars, research projects and over 200 Middle East and Islamic related courses. The Center's Teaching Resource Center, established in 1979, educates educators, media and individuals across the country. Yale's Council on Middle East Studies coordinates research and encourages academic debate on relevant issues.

Middlebury College's Arabic School, founded in 1982, is a unique nine-week summer immersion program in Arabic that attracts students from all over North America. Michael Katz, the dean of Language Schools at Middlebury, says, "There is a dearth of Arabic programs in the country. Some schools have courses in Arabic, but Middlebury offers the only intensive immersion program." The School developed the Al-Kitaab textbooks, which have become the most widely used Arabic language textbooks in universities in the United States and abroad.

Last year, Bunker Hill Community College was accepted as the first community college member of the Middle Eastern Studies Association (MESA), a U.S.-based organization that promotes study of the Middle East, North Africa and Islamic world. As Bunker Hill's number of Middle Eastern students grew, college officials realized a need for programming in Middle East and Arabic studies. "We wanted to help everyone understand the culture and religion of that group of people," says Lourdene Huhra, who oversaw the development of the program.

Other programs are dedicated to developing relations with the Middle East and Islamic world. The International Center for Ethics, Justice, and Public Life at Brandeis University, for example, hosts a Middle East Youth Leaders Exchange Project, in which young people from Israel, Jordan and Palestine work on cross-border research projects.