Immersion Seminar Afghanistan

UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA AT OMAHA CENTER FOR AFGHANISTAN STUDIES AFGHANISTAN IMMERSION SEMINAR ESSENTIAL UNDERSTANDING FOR SERVICE IN COUNTRY HISTORY | CULTURE | LANGUAGE AFGHANISTAN IMMERSION SEMINAR MEET THE SEMINAR TEAM Seminar participants rapidly develop basic language skills, cultural ESMAEL BURHAN awareness, and a historical understanding of modern Afghanistan. CAS Dari Language Consultant Morning sessions focus on politics, ethnic relations, gender issues, Prior to leaving Afghanistan in 1977, terrorism, and a variety of other topics. Afternoons are devoted to Dr. Burhan taught English as a second developing practical communication skills in Pashto and Dari, or Afghan Persian. Some evenings feature cultural exchanges with language and chaired the English Teacher Omaha’s Afghan community. The three-week experience prepares Training Department at Kabul University. both civilian and military personnel for making their time in country He also served as the Language-Culture more productive. Coordinator for the U.S. Peace Corps, preparing volunteers in Kabul and ESSENTIAL UNDERSTANDING throughout the United States for service Afghanistan is a vastly diverse country with a rich cultural heritage in Afghanistan. He first came to Omaha and complex tribal and ethnic relationships. The region is – and as a Fulbright scholar in 1977. When the always has been – geostrategically important to the world’s major Soviet war ensued, he decided to stay at UNO. He co-authored a powers. American and other international service personnel can series of textbooks for U.S. students of Dari and Afghan students of better help Afghans if they more fully understand the country in a English, including Dari for Foreigners (1983) and the Dari-English broader context. Dictionary (1993). He has taught English as a second language to students of many nationalities. Since 2002, he has been teaching Knowing that this context is essential, professionals from the U.S. intelligence community, the Foreign Service, non-governmental Dari and coordinating Afghanistan Immersion Seminars for both organizations, and all branches of the U.S. military have attended civilian and military personnel. immersion seminars at UNO. They have departed for Afghanistan AbDUL RAHEEM YASEER with a better understanding of the country and its people, and CAS Assistant Director with more confidence in their ability to communicate with Afghan partners. A professor of English language and literature at Kabul University during the DEPTH OF EXPERIENCE Soviet occupation, Mr. Yaseer escaped Founded in 1972, the Center for Afghanistan Studies has continued Communist rule in 1987, seeking refuge to be America’s primary cultural and scholarly link with Afghanistan. initially in Pakistan. He came to Omaha a Through war and peace, destitution and reconstruction, the Center year later, where he has managed several and its partners have been on the ground in Afghanistan – printing multi-million-dollar grant projects over textbooks, training teachers and journalists, and advising U.S. the past 30 years. He has led teacher government officials. training, translation, and publishing The Center’s team members have deep roots in Afghanistan. Many efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan. He were born and raised there, later working and raising families has also served as the Director of the U.S. Peace Corps Training amid history-making events. Others have spent nearly their entire Program in Afghanistan, and has taught language and cross-cultural professional lives studying the country’s culture and geography, communications to departing Peace Corps volunteers in Colorado. visiting its cities and villages, and working with Afghans. All In Omaha, he has served as the Ameer, Imam, and as a member of are deeply committed to preserving Afghanistan’s heritage and the Executive Committee of the local Islamic Center. Mr. Yaseer developing its economy and civil society. speaks English, Dari, Pashto, Arabic, and Urdu. SEMINAR TOPICS & ACTIVITIES • Globalization on the Silk Road – Conquests, • Language & Cross-Cultural Experiences Commerce, Ideas, Language, & Culture • Research in the Arthur Paul Afghanistan • Dari & Pashto Language Instruction Collection at UNO’s Criss Library • Language Lab Practice • Afghanistan History & Culture, 20th Century • Religious Factors in Afghanistan • Medicine in Afghanistan • Women of Afghanistan & Afghan Culture • Geology of Afghanistan • Afghanistan: How Has it Been Ruled? • Introduction to Geospatial Solutions • The Politics & Perils of the Globalization • Afghanistan’s Past & Present of Extremist Religion • The Afghan Army & its Evolving Structure • Afghanistan, Pakistan, & the Pashtoons • Food & Culture Night with Afghan Families THE CENTER FOR AFGHANISTAN STUDIES MEET THE SEMINAR TEAM SHER JAN AHMADZAI SHAISTA WAHAB CAS Education & Outreach Specialist Curator of the Arthur Paul Afghanistan Collection at UNO Prior to leaving his home country in Ms. Wahab maintains the largest collection of research materials 2007, Mr. Ahmadzai served in various on Afghanistan in the United States. Before coming to Omaha positions in the Office of the President of in 1981, she worked for the Kabul Public Library and USAID in the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. He Afghanistan. In 2003 she helped archive Constitutional Loya Jirga was responsible for managing President documents and built a library for CLJ delegates. Ms. Wahab also Hamid Karzai’s daily schedule, and he also led the Afghan Oral History Project, teaching oral history to Afghan compiled profiles of all 249 members of the women journalists and collecting video interviews for the 2003 PBS newly elected Wolesi Jirga in 2005. That documentary Afghanistan Unveiled. She traveled to the country’s work made him intimately familiar with the most remote areas and recorded the personal experiences of Afghan political dynamics of Afghanistan’s lower women who lived through the Soviet invasion. Her most recent house, including the members’ political affiliations, educational publications include A Brief History of Afghanistan (2010) and backgrounds, and ethnic relationships. Before the Karzai presidency, Beginner’s Dari (2006). She speaks English, Dari, and some Pashto. Mr. Ahmadzai taught English as a second language in Peshawar, Pakistan, where he spent most of his life as a refugee. His native DR. WARD ChAMBERS language is Pashto; he also speaks Dari, Urdu, English, and Hindi. UNMC Cardiologist, Associate Professor of Internal Medicine Since 2002, Dr. Chambers has made 15 trips ThOMAS GOUTTIERRE to Afghanistan. He has worked extensively UNO Dean of International Studies & Programs, CAS Director with Kabul Medical University to develop Prior to assuming his present position in a partnership for students and faculty. He 1974, Mr. Gouttierre lived and worked for has provided patient care, lectured students, nearly 10 years in Afghanistan, serving trained medical staff, and presented at as a Peace Corps volunteer, a Fulbright World Health Organization seminars. He fellow, Executive Director of the Fulbright has also brought KMU faculty to UNMC Foundation, and Head Coach of the Afghan for training in student education, faculty National Basketball Team. He was also development, and clinical practice. seconded by the U.S. State Department to serve as Senior Political Affairs Officer on MOHAMMAD BASHEER the United Nations Peacekeeping Mission CAS Dari Language Consultant to Afghanistan in 1996 and 1997. Mr. Gouttierre speaks, reads, In the late 1960s, Mr. Basheer worked for and writes Dari, Farsi, and Tajikistani Persian. His publications the Foreign Service Institute in Estes Park, include numerous articles about Afghanistan society, culture, and Colorado, and Washington DC. In the early politics. He co-authored the two-volume language textbook Dari 1970s, he served as the chair of the English for Foreigners and a bibliography of Persian works in English. He Language Department at Kabul University also writes original Dari poetry and serves as an internationally and later as a training coordinator for recognized authority on Central Asia’s cultures and conflicts, Afghanistan’s Peace Corps office. He then appearing in news articles and broadcasts worldwide. went on to work for the United Nations in Afghanistan, first as an interpreter and then JOHN (JACK) SHRODER as a logistics manager for the UN Program CAS Research Coordinator and Professor Emeritus for Drug Control. In the mid-1980s, Mr. Basheer worked as an Dr. Shroder is an internationally renowned interviewer for the U.S. Refugee Program in Islamabad, assisting authority on geomorphology with unique Afghans as they fled the Soviet war. This experience informed his insights on the geology and geography of later research on social and economic adjustment issues of refugees Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the Himalayas. from Afghanistan, Ethiopa, Poland, and Romania. Since the late He has served as the Editor in Chief of the 1980s, he has coordinated many projects for the Center involving Elsevier book series Developments in Earth visiting students and scholars from Central Asia. Mr. Basheer holds Surface Processes and Editor of the journal a bachelor’s degree in teaching English as a Second Language Geomorphology. He was awarded Fulbright from Kabul University, and graduate-level credentials in teaching grants for work in Pakistan in 1983 and in ESL from Indiana University and the Philippine Normal College Afghanistan in 1978, as well as National in Manila. Basheer is fluent in Persian and Dari,

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