Guest to speak on differences in Western, Middle Eastern thought
Issue date: 2/16/09 Section: News
"Differences in Ways of Thinking in the Middle East from the West" is the topic of a free public lecture by guest professor Dr. Graham Leonard at East Tennessee State University next Thursday (Feb. 19) at 7 p.m. in the D.P. Culp University Center's Martha Street Culp Auditorium.
This lecture is part of a series presented by Leonard, who holds the 2008-09 Wayne G. Basler Chair of Excellence for the Integration of the Arts, Rhetoric and Science at ETSU.
"Middle Easterners, like most of the world, have more primary 'group identity' than the individual identity the West has aspired to for three and a half centuries," Leonard says. "Like others for five centuries under the Ottomans, they had their own religious/ethnic community's Personal Status Laws and courts, yet they shared the same geographic space with other communities.
"Middle Easterners know and wear their views of history as if it were part of their current lives."
Leonard, a Kingsport native whose family has resided in Northeast Tennessee since 1760, has specialized in the Middle East since 1950. He earned his bachelor's degree in international relations from the University of Tennessee and studied at various other institutions before earning a Ph.D. in education at Harvard University, with emphasis in linguistics, psychology and Arabic.
He spent a year at Oxford University as a Harvard postdoctoral Traveling Fellow.
He spent more than 35 years in the Middle East as an educator, and has also worked in administrating and consulting. He was a UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) adviser on teacher education for UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East).
He also worked in Jerusalem as management officer of the Program for Assistance to the Palestinian People through the United Nations Development Program. In addition, he traveled to Iraq for three weeks in 2005 with Christian Peacemaker Teams, then spent five weeks as an "embedded journalist" with the National Guard 2/278th "Tennessee Peacemakers."
As the Basler Chairholder, Leonard is teaching two spring semester courses - "Origins of the Problems in the Middle East" and "Modernizing Education vs. Westernizing Schooling in the Middle East" - and is available to speak to area civic groups, churches and other organizations in addition to teaching.
Created in 1994, the Basler Chair honors a longtime member of the ETSU Foundation who is a strong advocate of numerous university programs and brings various scholars to ETSU to broaden opportunities for students and the general public in the arts, humanities and science. The Basler Chair illustrates the unity of knowledge while bridging gaps among disciplines.
For more information or special assistance for those with disabilities, call the ETSU Department of History at (423) 439-4222. To arrange speaking engagements, call Leonard at 439-4284.
This lecture is part of a series presented by Leonard, who holds the 2008-09 Wayne G. Basler Chair of Excellence for the Integration of the Arts, Rhetoric and Science at ETSU.
"Middle Easterners, like most of the world, have more primary 'group identity' than the individual identity the West has aspired to for three and a half centuries," Leonard says. "Like others for five centuries under the Ottomans, they had their own religious/ethnic community's Personal Status Laws and courts, yet they shared the same geographic space with other communities.
"Middle Easterners know and wear their views of history as if it were part of their current lives."
Leonard, a Kingsport native whose family has resided in Northeast Tennessee since 1760, has specialized in the Middle East since 1950. He earned his bachelor's degree in international relations from the University of Tennessee and studied at various other institutions before earning a Ph.D. in education at Harvard University, with emphasis in linguistics, psychology and Arabic.
He spent a year at Oxford University as a Harvard postdoctoral Traveling Fellow.
He spent more than 35 years in the Middle East as an educator, and has also worked in administrating and consulting. He was a UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) adviser on teacher education for UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East).
He also worked in Jerusalem as management officer of the Program for Assistance to the Palestinian People through the United Nations Development Program. In addition, he traveled to Iraq for three weeks in 2005 with Christian Peacemaker Teams, then spent five weeks as an "embedded journalist" with the National Guard 2/278th "Tennessee Peacemakers."
As the Basler Chairholder, Leonard is teaching two spring semester courses - "Origins of the Problems in the Middle East" and "Modernizing Education vs. Westernizing Schooling in the Middle East" - and is available to speak to area civic groups, churches and other organizations in addition to teaching.
Created in 1994, the Basler Chair honors a longtime member of the ETSU Foundation who is a strong advocate of numerous university programs and brings various scholars to ETSU to broaden opportunities for students and the general public in the arts, humanities and science. The Basler Chair illustrates the unity of knowledge while bridging gaps among disciplines.
For more information or special assistance for those with disabilities, call the ETSU Department of History at (423) 439-4222. To arrange speaking engagements, call Leonard at 439-4284.
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