This seminar introduces the contemporary Middle East and North Africa by drawing upon lively, cutting-edge studies written from a variety of disciplinary perspectives: history, political science, sociology, and anthropology, as well as studies of gender, religion, urban life, music, art, and the environment. We will discuss readings and other media together as we develop our sense of community. Students will emerge from the semester with a foundation in Middle Eastern studies, a sense of current directions in the field, and experience with conducting original research and writing in ways that are both scholarly and engaging.

Together we will also learn how to write for Wikipedia while working on teams to draft and post new articles relating to our subjects. We will be partnering with the Wiki Education Foundation, which will provide us with weekly online, self-paced tutorials to develop critical skills that we need for this purpose. We will discuss Wikipedia’s content gaps; its strengths and weaknesses (including the nature of, and reasons for, the uneven quality of articles); the meaning of public-facing scholarship and digital citizenship; and how scholars like us can use – or should avoid using – Wikipedia according to context.