The object of this is assignment is to push myself to examine a multicultural issue that might be a personal challenge for me as a Marriage and Family Therapist. Using my Self-Awareness analysis as a starting point I identified that one of the area of cultural challenge might be working with Arabs population is a therapy setting.
This blog will detail my learning about Arabs in the United States and will serve as a weekly reflective journal.
In the next few weeks, I will try to stretch myself. I believe that learning occurs in many venues, reading, both academic and fictional literature, and poetry can educate us to other cultural or ethnic groups. Films can expose us to issues with we have not been personally involved. Attending religious or cultural events can expose us to community that we do not encounter in our daily lives.
This blog will be integrated with the academic learning that is occurring in class CNSL557 - Social and Multicultural Foundations.
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Cultural Challenge – Weekly Journal Week 3
This week the emphasize was on trying to increase the traffic to the blog in order to solicit opinions and reflection about the challenges that Muslim Arabs are experiencing in the United States. In an effort to create awareness of the blog, I attended an Online Chat with two Muslims, once from Brazil (Gea) and one from Morocco (MRsacramento). They both were interested in the discussion and the topic and what I learned from their perspective was that they feel that the Arabs in the USA are being discriminated and suffer from biases and prejudice from the white people in the USA. However, as MRsacamento pointed, they (the Arabs) should go back to the Arab countries and leave the USA. This brought me to the realization, that while the Arabs in the USA are being discriminated locally, the Arabs world also sees them as foreigners, and in a way, they will not feel welcome anymore in their countries of origin.
In addition, to the discussion that I had with Gea and MRsacramento, I also had the opportunity this week to watch two movies this week; the first movie was Munich, by Steven Speilberg. I do remember when it all happens in 1972, and I personally know families that lost their love ones in Munich, so watching the movie was not easy. The same time, I did pay attention to the way the terrorists were presented in the movie and while Speilberg was doing a good job developing the characters, I did feel that it did not support my quest to find positive presentations of the Arabs.
Another movie that I saw this week was Pride, which tells the story about Jim Ellis who started a swim team for troubled teens at the Philadelphia Department of Recreation. The movies presented the challenges and the discriminations that African American swim team had to overcome in it journey to become the national championship. The movie presented prejudices, racism, oppression and biases, which can easily transfer to any minority group in the USA.
Goals for next week
• Arrange for a visit at the Masque in Reno.
• Meet with a Muslim fried and hear about her struggle to immigrant to the USA and her daily struggle as a minority in this country.
• Increase the awareness for the blog and participate in another online chat to solicit additional opinions and perspectives.
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