next »

[danny_boy]

If I get the job I'll make it my mission to seek out the wild baboons--thats something I got to see.

No baboons in the UAE.  And no baboons in most of Saudi Arabia.  But I was placed down in the Asir region which was a surprise in so many ways.  I arrived in Decemeber and it was freezing.  The guy who picked me up at the local airport was wearing a fur-lined parka.  We were at almost 7,000ft above sea level.  This was not at all what I had expected.  The UAE is mostly flat desert with a bit of rock coast up by Ras Al-Kheimah.  You'll see lots of camels grazing out in the deserts but not much else.  Much more like the deserts of western imaginings.

The classes in Kuwait sound like they were a lot of fun! Is there anything I should know specifically about teaching the woman, as opposed to working with the male students? I've heard that you should always knock before entering a closed class room. And also that excursions are impossible unless there is a female staff member present.

I've been assuming so far that you're female.  I don't know why.  Anyway, if you are, you won't have many problems and you may have access to experiences that would be off-limits a male expat.  For example, a male expat might be invited to the male side of a wedding but never to the female side.  A female expat, however, might be invited to either the male celebration and/or the female side.  As a female teacher in a women's college you'd have no particular problems -- and I don't see any reason for knocking on the door. The reason to knock on doors would be to allow female students enough time to slip back under their abayas in case it's a male.  I was surprised that in my all-female class, the girls all immediately removed their abayas in the class -- something many wouldn't do in the presence of male students. 

The situation for a male teacher with female students is very different.  For example, you'd have to be careful not to make even the most innocent sort of complimentary comment, e.g. "Did you change your hairstyle?  That looks great."  "That's a pretty dress."  One of my male colleages in Oman made such a comment and that afternoon the girl's father was at the university looking for blood.  The teacher was fired a short time later.  And of course never never be alone with the door closed with a female student, for example, in your office.   Actually, much of this has become standard practice at American universities as well. 

I think I well and truly over priced myself--haha. But they called me for an interview anyway--so lets see what they offer. Is it normal to come back with a counter offer, or are you pretty much required to take the offer they make you? I know I could always walk away, but i'm interested in how this process works with UAE universities.

As I said I'm not at all up on current faculty salaries in the UAE.  But that $4000 a month is actually much more than it sounds like since that's in addition to free housing, free medical, and generally low cost of living expenses -- or maybe just fewer things to spend money on.  Many expats are able to save at least half of their income each month.

Also I don't know anything about your field.  I assume that, as in the US, there is an asymmetry between humanity jobs and science/business/technology jobs.

I'm interested in what did you do your PhD in? Did it relate to all the time you spent as an expat?

My BA and MA were in Linguistics but I ended up doing my Ph.D. is Communication Studies (though still with a focus on language education).  In specific, I do what is called Conversation Analysis (a type of sociologically oriented analysis of micro-behaviors in interaction) and I was looking at the micro-construction (and "co-construction") of talk between low-level novice users of English as a second language.  This included analysis of their body behaviors.

Was this related to my expat experiences?  I suppose somehow.  All the travel in other places and other cultures had made me a fairly keen observer of human interaction.  And  I certainly noticed distinct differences in interaction between my Arab students and my Japanese students.  So I guess that got me curious.

Might I ask what your area is?  You mentioned being an artist.  Is that your field or just a hobby?  BTW, I found the situation for local artists in Oman interesting.  They had trouble being "just artists" instead of always needing to be "Omani artists."  As Omani Artists they felt compelled to based their art around traditional motifs, e.g. village and desert landscapes, national symbols like the khanjar knife, or god-forbid the horrible round-about art.  You'd see cubist and impressionist work but always of the same motifs. Either that or the work seems totally derivative of some particular foreign artist.  The art was also heavily symbolic, a rose was never just a rose.  It had to represent something like "the amazing cultural renaissance made possible by his Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said." 

[tezrh]

Nope, all male--what ever that means-lol

I'm an Australian, and have been working in a university here while doing my Masters and Doctorate (which I'm still doing) I'm also a practicing artist, in fact, that is what I've been mostly doing for the past 15 years. I've built up a fairly good exhibition record, and have a reputable gallery and show at international fairs and all. I think this makes me look quite good to the University in the UAE, because from what I can gather, there is a real push to attain some form of cultural legitimacy in relation to the broader global arts community. Abu Dhabi and Dubai are both spending massive amounts of money on theaters and galleries, and foreign universities like Yale are setting up art institutes in the region as of later this year. So the push is on. (my specific area expertise is the relationship between movements in continental philosophy and there relationship to American abstraction)

It suits me, because I am at the point where I have to consolidate my thesis, after doing copious amounts of practical work, and making trips to the us to do field research. So I'm not really going over to party or for the expat experience, but to sit down and pull this research together. My thesis explores the relationships between the 19th century proto-existentialist writings of Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, and the later work of the American artist, Mark Rothko (Specifically, his chapel in Houston). In particular I'm looking at the relationship between the notion of subjectivity and the sacred that each attempts to evoke with his work.
I have a real interest in the way in which a personal sense of the subjective occurs within Islamic cultures. Mainly because the subjective doesn't issue from the self, as we understand it, but through the self--which is quite different. This is going to be a real challenge when it comes to teaching art--because there is no praising the maker, because it is always Allah who is responsible.
Yes, there looks to be a lot of terrible art being made in the gulf--but then, you see a hell of a lot here at the local markets here every Sunday as well--haha
I have seen some really interesting installation artists from the region, and some good painters too. And the Louvre is opening a wing in Abu Dhabi, so I should be able to see some good stuff when I feel a bit desperate.

[danny_boy]

Thanks for the gender clarifications.  Some people here on CHE are a little hesitant to reveal this information.  As a male teacher in a women's college you need to watch your step.  I mean, this is a country where the women's dorm at the American University of Sharjah has an armed guard with a machine gun (of course you'l discover that haivng a machine gun doesn't mean the same thing that it does in the US or OZ). 

But there's no need to live in fear.  Just remember that you need to check your own cultural attitudes on male-female interaction at the airport, to be picked up when you leave.  In many ways this was easier for me as an American married to a traditional Mexican.  I was just always clear to me that I wasn't going to have female friends of any nationality.  Male teachers need to avoid anything that might come off as "flirty" to women not accostomed to a dual sex society.  BTW, during the 8 months I was in Saudi, I think I saw a total of perhaps a dozen women.  I don't mean I SAW them.  I mean during all that time I only saw 10 women in public with their "Guiness bottle" abayas on.

You also have to wary of the one girl in the crowd who gets a charge out of making western male teachers uncomfortable by being publicly flirty with them.  These girls know you can't respond and so you're easy prey.  This is more likely in an all-female environment where they know that the other girls aren't going to tell on them.  It's just a game.

In terms of Islam it was also the "folkways" of the religion that were more interesting to me.  Things like some students carefully tearing off and saving all of the little "bism Allah ar-rahman  ar-rahim" written on the tops of documents.   They told me it was an offence to throw away a piece of paper with the name of Allah on it.  They said that they later burned all the little pieces of paper with a small ritual.   It's these sorts of marginal things that make the world culturally rich. 

So I assume (again) that you'll be teaching Intro to Art style courses in a humanities based program?  That could be interesting.  You'd certainly have to have the "religion filter" up when thinking about how to present art history -- and which art to show.  Don't imagine they you students will see the art with your western eyes.  I remember showing a photo I took of a fully veiled woman in Yemen to my Omani student's.  The photo had been published as part of a photo essay in a Mexican magazine.  It really was a fantastic shot, if I say so myself.  But all my students saw was her uncovered thumb clutching at her head-to-toe veil.  They saw this immediately from several yards away.  I'd taken the photo and looked at it hundreds of time and had never noticed the thumb -- the only bit of flesh showing.

[danny_boy]

Another fact of life in the Gulf is that there is a definite pecking order in terms of treatment of expats.  At the top are (usually white) expatriates from English-speaking or European countries.  At the bottom are bangladeshis, philippinos, and Sri Lankans doing manual labor.  What this means in practice is that the "Western" expat is often taken by a company representative down to get a drivers licence.  There are a million Indians and Pakistanis who have been waiting for hours (and will continue to wait for hours) to get their licence.  But someone will spot your (hopefully white) face and usher you right up to the window and you'll be done in 30 minutes.

Now you could become all outraged at this and refuse to accept such blatant racism and get in line with the other few hundred "low-caste" expats.  Or you could accept this as a pragmatic reality and get back to work.  And that's the incidious part.  Everyone does just accept it.  And over time it starts to feel like a natural right.

Perhaps because my brown wife was percieved as one of the "low caste" foreigners we often saw both sides of the coin. 

In a word, the Gulf can seem a little bit "colonial." 

[mingus]

Where did you like teaching the most?

  I'd attend the lecture with the students, madly try to learn the material during the lecture so that I could reteach it in simplified form in my class which immediately followed. 

Please, please, tell me thsi is a joke.  A bad one.

[danny_boy]

Where did you like teaching the most?

  I'd attend the lecture with the students, madly try to learn the material during the lecture so that I could reteach it in simplified form in my class which immediately followed. 

Please, please, tell me thsi is a joke.  A bad one.

I wish it was, but that was the case.  Many of the lecturers had had no experience teaching nonnative speakers and their lectures were almost completely incomprehensible to the the students. 

[bartowel]

Hi, I am currently in the UAE working as faculty at an American university - I was interviewed via video conference in Atlanta for a position with HCT (which I did not take in the end). The interview lasted about 45 minutes and there was a panel of 3 expat faculty, one of whom was the department chair.

I do not know where you are inteviewing for but if the offer is for Dubai or Abu Dhabi then it must be HCT or ZU. I know bot place fairly well. ZU is a good university but only has female students (not a problem but just making sure you know this).

i would choose Abu Dhabi as the beter place to live (quieter, less traffic, better housing) but if you are single and young then Dubai has the bars / clubs etc that you may want.

[lizasilva]

The management at ZU intends to accomodate majority of male students as well. The've recently financed on their new campus which will obviously encourage boys to take admissions in different courses offered by the University. Plus, the Zayed International College already offers several courses for both gals ad guys; so i think there're lots n lots of options for you!
Hope you all the Best

[nomadescientist]

Hi,

Just wondering how did your interview go. Of course, wishing you all the best.

Thanks,
NS