It’s been a while since I wrote a post for Weekly Geeks. The last few topics didn’t really “work” for me — but this week’s theme definitely does: talk about the magazines we read. In fact, I’ve been wanting to post about a particular magazine for a long time, but frankly I wasn’t quite sure how to approach it, because it’s… complicated.
We have a free subscription to a magazine called Saudi Aramco World. My husband, who teaches high school social studies, signed up for it a few years ago when he was given short notice that he would have to teach “Middle Eastern Civilizations.” He’d never taught this class before, and he had to bone up quickly. Along the way, he discovered this magazine. The curriculum has since changed, and the class isn’t even offered any more. Nevertheless I continue to send back the renewal card each year.
According to the inside cover, “Saudi Aramco, the oil company born as an international enterprise seventy-five years ago, distributes Saudi Aramco World to increase cross-cultural understanding. The magazine’s goal is to broaden knowledge of the cultures, history and geography of the Arab and Muslim worlds and their connections with the West.”
It is a beautiful glossy magazine, absolutely gorgeous, with very high production values and great typography. As a desktop publisher myself, I find it inspiring. The articles are fascinating, too. I end up poring over the whole thing, cover to cover, every issue. It’s like a prettier National Geographic that focuses only on the Middle East.
One of my favorite articles was a biography of a historical figure I’d never heard of: Ziryab (“The Blackbird”), a musician who lived in Spain around the year 800 A.D. He was basically the medieval version of a rock star. He brought all kinds of ideas, fads, and fashions to Spain (from Baghdad) such as, for example, dessert. Yes, dessert. Some other good ones were about Saluki dogs; ceramic tilemakers in Tunisia; the history of the Obelisk, told in the first person from the obelisk’s point of view (!); and the biology of Saharan cypress trees. All written in an engaging style and perfectly calculated to appeal to history & culture dilettantes like yours truly.
I feel guilty for liking this magazine so much. Because it’s also a stunning piece of propaganda. There are times when I feel like it’s soiling our house. First of all, this thing comes from the world’s largest oil company. NOT something I am interested in supporting! And second, in the five or six years that I’ve been reading it cover to cover I have never ever detected any reference to a current event. I mean, if they are really serious about broadening knowledge of their culture and their connection with the West, perhaps they could start by explaining why they think it is okay to EXECUTE someone for talking to an unmarried member of the opposite sex. Just a thought.
I have some rationalizations to explain why I continue subscribing. First, since the magazine is free we are actually costing the oil company, ha ha! And second, remember in Little Women when Amy wears the carnelian ring as a reminder to herself not to be so vain? I always thought her argument was a bit specious, but whatever. Anyway, I keep Saudi Aramco World lying around because it reminds me that propaganda comes in many forms, and it can be seductive.
Other times I think that the reason I keep it is to remind myself not to generalize too much. Living here in the post-9/11 USA it is easy to forget about the beautiful things that came from the Arab and Muslim worlds. And make no mistake, there is great beauty. It’s hard to reconcile, though.
What do you think? Would you subscribe to this magazine?
11 Comments
My family also receives Aramco World – we have been receiving it since I can remember (to give you some idea of this, I am now 24). Like you, I love the glossy, colorful pages, and the articles on notable figures from history and cultural traditions. But, also like you, I find it difficult to reconcile the worlds I see in the magazine with my views on current events. The added twist here is that I’m a Muslim American woman and I’m not a fan at all of the Saudi government or most of the institutions that cater to that government. The oil company aspect doesn’t bother me as much as the fact that Saudi Arabia is a country that erroneously oppresses women in the name of my religion and this magazine that I love to read comes from them. Like you, I feel conflicted. My parents keep on renewing it because its articles are so engrossing and educational, and though I’m Muslim, I probably wouldn’t know half as much about Middle Eastern history and culture as I do from reading the magazine. It’s difficult to know what to do, though.
According to the campus grapevine, the daughter of the head of Aramco was in my entering freshman class at Bryn Mawr. Reem was a friend of my roommate, who (rather unkindly) coached her that the best way to pursue a crush on a handsome Haverford student was to give him a handkerchief soaked with perfume. Needless to say, the boy was bewildered and our classmate’s love was unrequited. Good example of a cultural communication gap made wider by a little mischief.
Reem didn’t return for sophomore year, and the grapevine further explained that she had decided she was interested in studying architecture so her father built and endowed a women’s school for architecture closer to home. Maybe he heard about the handkerchief incident, and wanted to prevent potential “connections to the west” of that sort.
I would happily subscribe to this magazine, for the pictures alone. It looks gorgeous. When I thought I would be teaching history this year, I bought a few books focused on Middle Eastern culture. Recommended: “What Life was Like In the Lands of the Prophet” (from an old Time/Life series) – a brief illustrated history of the origins of Islam; “Traveling Man: The Journey of Ibn Battuta, 1325-1354″ by James Rumford (a children’s picture book about a Muslim version of Marco Polo), and “The Bleeding of the Stone,” by Ibrahim Al-Koni. I strongly recommend this last title – a short novel contrasting a bedouin’s relationship with land and animals with the modern, western attitude toward nature. It reads like Hemingway, but with a dash of magical realism.
This is just the kind of post that I’m surprised and very GLAD that this theme has inspired. (which you can tell from my post – very UNinspired.) This is fascinating and I like how you share your possible discomfort with the magazine.
I think I would subscribe, actually. I’ve been to the Middle East (Dubai) before and can relate to your comment about their culture. I also teach about Iran in my comparative politics course, so I’m interested in that part of the world from an academic point of view.
I love reading magazines. Since many classes I have evolve into “current event” discussions, I need to be on top of my game. I read Business Week, Air Transport Word (I love anything to do with airplanes.), The Economist, and several teacher-oriented mags. Plus, let’s not forget the three newspapers I read each day. (St. Petersburg Times, Tampa Tribune, Wall Street Journal)
And, on top of all that, I’m a CNN junkie. Now that it’s in HD on my cable system, I’m in heaven!
About this,
“… propaganda comes in many forms…”
For me, that has come to be one of the more prominent concerns (distractions? challenges?) of teaching. For example, imagine talking about current events, and a student posts/refers to this? On a good day, you have a great discussion that deconstructs it — with all sides of the political spectrum represented and other examples raised, and so on. But that’s not how such things always turn out. It can be divisive and with people feeling attacked and getting defensive. Lines of conflict get drawn and I have to walk a careful line to maintain a position that students with differing points of view can respect.
That’s made harder too, by my view that this was a staged, propaganda ‘op’ by all the guys I love to hate. Hard to present it in a neutral manner.
But then I see everything that way, nowadays: for example, from a while back, the Tom Cruise movie Top Gun. Probably pretty easy to agree on that, right? But what about the Tom Hanks’ Saving Private Ryan, or the slew of movies about secret agents who find some rogue element within the CIA — and expose it, with the help of the other, good CIA folks.
But of course its not just in corporate publications, or photo-op presidential public appearances, or pop-culture movies, but also high school textbooks.
So, how to teach a “true” version of events makes for an interesting discussion.
I start every year with one of my favorite episodes of This American Life — show #38, “Simulated Worlds.” Part of the show looks at how we’ve viewed dinosaurs depending on shifting cultural and historical contexts (highlights: initially, as side-show-like museum attractions, they were knowingly posed in distorted but dramatic poses, in the 1980s we shifted from the big but cumbersome T-Rex to the sleek, fast Velociraptors, representing 80’s-era corporate raiders, and more recently, we’ve adopted an eco-view of dinosaurs as subjects of climate change).
…but if something as fixed as a set of fossils is subject to shifting interpretations, how can we get to a true objective “fact” about anything? Is it all propaganda, to one degree or another? What is “history”?
Which isn’t to say that extreme cases such as this lie used to sell the First Gulf War is somehow “just another point of view” — or that all atrocity stories are false. I guess what I’m saying is, “Yeah, this propaganda thing — it ain’t easy.”
Hubby, you and I have so much in common! In middle school Language Arts classes, I am supposed to teach students about “point of view,” so they can tell the difference between (for instance) a first person memoir or a third person narrator. It is so important to go beyond this to teach kids about putting things in context, questioning sources and documentation, and making judgment calls about how much of a document or speech to believe.
I asked my students to explore the use of animals as symbols throughout literature last year. One of the points I made was that dragons are symbols of good fortune in China, but usually symbols of evil in the European tradition. Is either group right or wrong? Maybe I will use the link to the dinosaur story you provided (thanks!) to show that dinosaurs and dragons are still open to interpretation. I hope that presenting students with these culturally diverse resources will help them to develop their own ability to ask questions first, and to assume that there are two or three sides to every issue.
So Bookworm’s questions about this magazine should be part of the lesson for all of us – cultural perspectives differ; think about the source; keep digging to find out more!
Wow, such an interesting discussion here.
I would definitely subscribe. I actually enjoy reading “propaganda.” I think it is ridiculously educational to read how other businesses, religions, countries, etc. frame themselves…. how they want to be perceived by the world
Plus I am a sucker for free things. As you say, you’re not actually contributing money to the mag, so I’d hesitate to say you are supporting questionable business practices.
Excellent post and follow up discussion – THIS is what blogging (IMO) is all about! This magazine does sound fascinating. The fact that current events are missing … wow. Thanks for starting such a great discussion.
And I do think I’d like to read this sometime, since I know very little about the history of that part of the world.
Me again. :) Just wanted to know that I added a link to this post in my own Weekly Geeks this time. IMO, this is the best post on this week’s topic.
Wow, what great comments! Thanks, everyone. I was not kidding when I said I felt guilty about this magazine and it really is a comfort to know that others would consider subscribing. I was particularly glad to get @M’s comment — if this magazine is hard for me to read, how much harder it must be for her!
I don’t think you should feel guilty subscribing to the magazine, especially since it seems like it encourages such discussion and thought in your household — I really liked your point that we often forget some of the beautiful things that have come from the Muslim world, and knowing that can make us better global citizens. If anything, I think thats a good reason to keep the magazine around.