An Ethnographic Case Study of an English Language University Preparatory Programme in Qatar

Students’ Experiences of Othering: An Ethnographic Case Study of an English Language University Preparatory Programme in Qatar

A thesis resubmitted to The University of Manchester for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Humanities

2018

Magdalena Rostron

Manchester Institute of Education

School of Environment, Education and Development

TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Images ...... 9

List of tables ...... 10

List of abbreviations ...... 11

Abstract ...... 12

Declaration ...... 13

Dedication ...... 15

Acknowledgements ...... 16

Introduction ...... 17 i. Thesis topic and context ...... 17 ii. Research purpose ...... 18 iii. Ethnographic case study ...... 19 iv. Me, myself and I in the study ...... 19 v. Spelling and transliteration ...... 20 vi. Past or present? ...... 21 vii. Thesis structure ...... 21

Chapter 1: Context ...... 22 Introduction ...... 22 1.1. Academic Bridge Program: Institution ...... 22 1.1.1 Students: educational backgrounds, expectations, needs ...... 25 1.1.2 Administration and teachers ...... 26 1.1.3 My position as a teacher: professional and cultural background ...... 28 1.2. Key dimensions of the ABP educational culture ...... 29 1.2.1 Co-education ...... 29 1.2.2 Studying in English ...... 31 1.2.3 Academic integrity ...... 34

1.2.4 Critical thinking and independent study skills ...... 35 1.2.5 Critical feedback ...... 37 1.2.6 University and degree choice ...... 38 1.3. Institutional affiliations and educational environment ...... 39 1.3.1 Qatar Foundation and Education City ...... 39 1.3.2 Overview of recent educational developments in Qatar ...... 42 1.4. Qatar as a Muslim Gulf Arab country ...... 44 1.5. Language, ethnicity and religion ...... 47 Concluding remarks ...... 48

Chapter 2: Building a theoretical framework ...... 49 Introduction ...... 49 2.1 Othering, the Other, and Otherness as key concepts in my study ...... 49 2.2 Understanding the relevance of identity in the context of Othering ...... 55 2.2.1 Strong sense of Arab identity ...... 57 2.2.2 Identification with Islam ...... 57 2.2.3 Qatari as national and local ...... 58 2.2.4 Complexities of being Western ...... 59 2.3 Power dynamics in Othering ...... 60 2.4 The role of alienation in the context of Othering ...... 64 2.5 Internationalised educational context ...... 65 2.6 Othering in internationalised English language settings ...... 67 2.7 Transformative effects of internationalised education ...... 69 2.8 Holliday’s framework and its relevance for my study ...... 70 2.8.1 My changing perspective: from large to small ...... 71 2.8.2 Small culture ...... 73 2.8.3 Host culture complex ...... 74 2.8.4 Relevance of Holliday’s framework for my study ...... 76 Concluding remarks ...... 77

Chapter 3: Research methodology and ethics ...... 78 Introduction ...... 78 3.1 Initial thoughts: natural rhythm and thinking time ...... 78 3.2 Qualitative approach and research gap ...... 79 3.3 Research questions ...... 80 3.4 How Holliday’s approach led me to ethnography ...... 81 3.5 Ethnographic case study ...... 83 3.5 Research design: overview ...... 87 3.6 Study participants ...... 88 3.6.1 Participants: sampling and profiles ...... 88 3.6.2 Student informants ...... 89 3.6.3 Respect and trust ...... 92 3.7 Methods of data collection/generation and sources of data ...... 93 3.7.1 Relevant documents ...... 93 3.7.2 Questionnaires 1 and 2 ...... 94 3.7.3 Observations ...... 95 3.7.4 Interviews/conversations with a purpose...... 96 3.7.5 Background knowledge and Teacher Notes ...... 101 3.7.6 Researcher Journal ...... 103 3.8 Researcher reflexivity ...... 104 3.9 Ethics and ethical procedures ...... 105 3.9.1 Member checking ...... 107 Concluding remarks ...... 109

Chapter 4: Approach to data analysis and interpretation ...... 110 Introduction ...... 110 4.1 The semantics of data analysis and abductive analytical approach ...... 110 4.1.1 Embedded researcher ...... 112 4.2 Avoiding reliability and validity pitfalls ...... 113 4.2.1 Validity ...... 113

4.2.2 Reliability ...... 115 4.3 What was my data in this research? ...... 116 4.4 Data management ...... 117 4.4.1 Organising the data ...... 117 4.4.2 Familiarising myself with the data ...... 119 4.4.3 Coding the data ...... 119 4.4.4 Generating categories and themes ...... 120 4.4.5 Interpreting the data ...... 120 4.4.6 Search for alternative understandings ...... 120 4.5 Analytical procedures ...... 121 4.5.1 Observation notes ...... 121 4.5.2 Questionnaire 2 ...... 122 4.5.3 Student informants class observations...... 124 Concluding remarks ...... 126

Chapter 5: The place, the students, the experiences ...... 127 Introduction ...... 127 5.1 The place: Liberal Arts and Sciences building (LAS) ...... 127 5.2 The students: initial responses to key dimensions of ABP culture ...... 130 5.2.1 Questionnaire 1: demographic summary ...... 130 5.2.2 Co-education: positive initial response ...... 130 5.2.3 Language: recognition of the relevance of English ...... 130 5.2.4 Academic concepts and practices: varied degrees of familiarity with plagiarism, independent study, critical feedback ...... 131 5.2.5 University plans: applying to English-language universities in EC and abroad ...... 132 5.3 Independent school background ...... 132 5.3.1 Transition from gender-segregation to co-education ...... 133 5.3.2 English teaching issues: lack of materials and preparedness ...... 133 5.3.3 Academic integrity: lack of concern ...... 134

5.3.4 Learning during school time ...... 134 5.3.5 Teacher disenchantment and changing demographics ...... 134 5.3.6 Negative impact on university admission...... 135 5.4 Students’ experiences: What goes on here? ...... 137 5.4.1 Profiles of study key informants ...... 137 5.4.2 Co-education ...... 141 5.4.3 English versus Arabic ...... 154 5.4.4 Academic integrity ...... 161 5.3.5 Independent study / critical thinking ...... 164 5.3.6 Critical teacher feedback ...... 169 5.3.7 University application ...... 174 5.4 Key informants’ summary comments with their teachers’ views ...... 177 5.4.1 Abdulla ...... 177 5.4.2 Hamad ...... 178 5.4.3 Aisha ...... 179 Concluding remarks ...... 180 Chapter 6: Students’ experiences interpreted through the lens of Othering ...... 181 Introduction ...... 181 6.1 Main themes emerging in student experiences in the ABP ...... 181 6.2 Four areas of student experiences ...... 183 6.3 Co-education and Othering ...... 183 6.4 Language and Othering ...... 189 6.5 Academic integrity and Othering ...... 193 6.6 Independent study/critical thinking and Othering ...... 195 6.7 Critical teacher feedback and Othering ...... 199 6.8 University application and Othering ...... 204 6.9 Deep action and Othering ...... 208 6.9.1 Liquid alliances, hidden hostilities and Othering ...... 210

6.9.2 Empty spaces and self-alienation ...... 212 6.10 Host culture context of Othering ...... 213 Concluding remarks ...... 217 Chapter 7: Conclusions and implications for internationalised educational settings in Qatar and beyond ...... 218 Introduction ...... 218 7.1 Key points of my study ...... 218 7.2 Contextual conclusions: cultural Otherness in the ABP ...... 219 7.2.1 Academic and language issues ...... 221 7.2.2 Social interactions ...... 223 7.3 Internationalised English education-related conclusions ...... 224 7.3.1 Language and Otherness ...... 224 7.3.2 Power and Otherness ...... 226 7.3.3 Othering in English language settings ...... 227 7.4 Cultural Otherness as stimulus for dialogue and change ...... 229 7.5 Students’ experiences and educational transformation ...... 233 7.6 Potential implications for Qatar’s vision and beyond ...... 234 7.6.1 Utopian search for perfect society ...... 234 7.4.2 Subversive strands of foreign education in Education City ...... 238 7.4.2.2 Theory versus practice ...... 240 7.4.2.3 Subversiveness and liberal education ...... 241 Concluding remarks ...... 242

Chapter 8: Contributions and further research suggestions ... 243 Introduction ...... 243 8.1 Study goals ...... 243 8.2 Contribution to the literature on Othering in internationalised English education ...... 243 8.3 Contribution to educational ethnography ...... 245 8.4 Pedagogical contribution ...... 246

8.5 Personal impact ...... 248 8.6 Potential areas for further research ...... 248 Concluding remarks ...... 249

References ...... 250

Appendices ...... 282 Appendix 1: ABP entry requirements ...... 282 Appendix 2: Sample syllabus (Academic English: Composition) ...... 283 Appendix 3: ABP consent to my research ...... 286 Appendix 4: Participant Information Sheet and Participant Consent Form for Initial Questionnaire (Q1) ...... 287 Appendix 5: Questionnaire Q1 (ABP student background information) ....291 Appendix 6: Questionnaire 2 (for student informants) ...... 293 Appendix 7: Teacher/administrator interview questions ...... 294 Appendix 8: My notes from purposeful conversation with ABP administrators “Alia” and written answers from “Fatma” (her own writing) ...... 295 Appendix 9: Email responses from two English teachers, Sara and Chris .297 Appendix 10: List of selected presentations, papers and publications ...... 302 Presentations and papers: ...... 302 Publications: ...... 303

Word count: 74505

List of Images

Image 1: ABP banner in the LAS building Image 2: Screenshot of an ABP flyer Image 3: Pictures of ABP faculty, administration and staff (2016) Image 4: QF’s Education City Community Housing (ECCH) Image 5: Host culture complex (Holliday 1994: 29) Image 6: Teacher Notes sample random pages, autumn semester 2012 Image 7: Screenshot of my observation notes with coding labels and notes Image 8a: Screenshot of analytical notes on Questionnaire 2 responses, with labels Image 8b: Screenshot of analytical notes on Questionnaire 2 responses, with labels Image 9: Fragment of observation notes from a student informant’s class Image 10: LAS building façade with wind towers on the roof Image 11: Inside the LAS building: patterned aluminium screens (2015) Image 12: One of the ABP classrooms Image 13: Percentages of Qatari teachers in schools 2011-12, SEC report Image 14: Screenshot of an ABP email to students about the required dress code Image 15: Male ABP students dressed in national attire, LAS building Image 16: Female ABP students (conservatively dressed, separate seating) Image 17: Education City fence with the “Think” campaign slogans Image 18: Sample page from Fatma’s written comments

List of tables

Table 1: Summary of my study design Table 2: Components of my data corpus Table 3: Themes emerging from my data

List of abbreviations

ABP: Academic Bridge Program AE: Academic English (advanced, top level of English in the ABP) CEA: Commission on English Language Program Accreditation (US national accrediting body for English language programmes) EC: Education City F1: Foundation One (lowest level of English in the ABP) F2: Foundation Two (intermediate level of English in the ABP) HEI: Higher Education Institute LAS: Liberal Arts and Sciences (building housing ABP) LRC: Learning Resource Center QF: Qatar Foundation for Education, Research and Community Development QNDS: Qatar National Development Strategy 2011-2016 QNV: Qatar National Vision 2030 QU: Qatar University SEC: Supreme Education Council (replaced by the Ministry of Education and Higher Education in 2016)

Abstract

This thesis reports on an ethnographic case study of students’ experiences of Othering in an American-administered and accredited university preparatory institution, called the Academic Bridge Program (ABP), part of Qatar Foundation (QF) in Education City (EC), Doha, Qatar. I aimed to find out about various forms of Othering, understood as stereotyping and alienation, present in students’ experiences in the ABP as an internationalised space of learning. I also wanted to examine how those forms of Othering related to different educational processes occurring in this setting with its new academic culture characterised by several key dimensions: co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, critical thinking, and critical teacher feedback, as well as emphasis on studying in foreign universities. I aimed to consider the study findings in terms of their potential implications for Qatar’s vision of knowledge-based society, educated to Western standards, as well as for similar institutions beyond this setting. In the study, I explored one cohort’s experiences in the ABP over the course of one academic year, focusing on their encounters with the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture. I used a blend of methods and data types, including scheduled observations; informal, semi-structured interviews with volunteering participants (students and colleagues); and field notes. The thesis presents thick description of the research context with emergent understandings of educational, cultural, and social dynamics involved in various forms of Othering local students’ experienced in the ABP. The study found that students’ experiences of Othering resulted in dynamic classroom cultures and interactions, as well as some unexpectedly positive outcomes, leading to potential educational transformations, and subversive tendencies. The study is situated in the field of educational ethnography and aims to offer an original contribution to the literature of Othering in internationalised educational contexts.

Declaration

No portion of the work referred to in the thesis has been submitted in support of an application for another degree or qualification or any other university or other institute of learning.

i. The author of this thesis (including any appendices and/or schedules to this thesis) owns certain copyright or related rights in it (the “Copyright”) and she has given The University of Manchester certain rights to use such Copyright, including for administrative purposes. ii. Copies of this thesis, either in full or in extracts and whether in hard or electronic copy, may be made only in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (as amended) and regulations issued under it or, where appropriate, in accordance with licensing agreements which the University has from time to time. This page must form part of any such copies made. iii. The ownership of certain Copyright, patents, designs, trademarks and other intellectual property (the “Intellectual Property”) and any reproductions of copyright works in the thesis, for example graphs and tables (“Reproductions”), which may be described in this thesis, may not be owned by the author and may be owned by third parties. Such Intellectual Property and Reproductions cannot and must not be made available for use without the prior written permission of the owner(s) of the relevant Intellectual Property and/or Reproductions. iv. Further information on the conditions under which disclosure, publication and commercialisation of this thesis, the Copyright and any Intellectual Property and/or Reproductions described in it may take place is available in the University IP Policy (see http://www.campus.manchester.ac.uk/medialibrary/policies/intellectualproperty.pdf), in any relevant Thesis restriction declarations deposited in the University Library, The University Library’s regulations (see http://www.manchester.ac.uk/library/aboutus/regulations) and in The University’s policy on presentation of Theses.

Dedication

To my parents-in-law, Joyce and James Rostron

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to my supervisors, Dr Richard Fay and Dr Diane Slaouti, as well as Dr Charlotte Woods, my previous secondary supervisor, for assisting me on this doctoral journey with their knowledge and support.

I would like to thank my ABP colleagues and students who willingly and even enthusiastically participated in my study. I am grateful for their cooperation. The administrators of the ABP, past and present, Dr Miles Lovelace, Dr Bryan Lewallen and Dr Mark Newmark have been helpful and supportive and I want to thank them for that.

I am also grateful to my Qatari friends – former students – Ali Al Mulla, Hissa Al Sowaidi, Aisha Al Thani, Suhaim Al Thani, Jassim Al Thani, Fahad al Thani, Mohammed Al Thani, Bashayer Al Ali, Ahmad Al Kuwari, Reem al Kobaisi, Fatma Fakhroo, and so many others, who have given me invaluable, personal insights into Qatari culture and society. I want to express my deep gratitude to my many international friends in Qatar, especially Dr Anne Nebel from Georgetown University in Qatar for encouragement and assistance.

I am indebted to my doctoral colleagues at The University of Manchester Institute of Education, Eljee Javier, Susan Dawson, Mariam Attia, Lou Harvey, Magdalena de Stefani, Achilleas Kostoulas, Paul Breen, Khwan Sutraphorn, and all the others who made me welcome in Manchester and gave me useful tips on research ideas and methods, and provided me with academic inspiration and support.

Most importantly, I would like to thank my family: my husband Ian, son Robert and daughter Katherine, for their infinite patience, good humour and faith in me, especially at those times when I did not have any myself. My daughter-in-law, Harriet, has been wonderfully positive and reassuring, and I am very grateful to her for that. My brothers- in-law, John and Philip, deserve a separate word of thanks for the constant encouragement they gave me. Finally, I would like to express my infinite gratitude to my mother-in-law, Joyce and my late father-in-law, Jim, for their hospitality, generosity and love.

Without you all I wouldn’t have made it. Thank you.

Introduction

i. Thesis topic and context This thesis presents an ethnographic case study of students’ experiences on an English language university preparatory programme. Those experiences involve local students’ encounters with key dimensions of a new educational culture in the Academic Bridge Program1 (ABP), which is an American-administered English-language pre-university institution, located in Qatar Foundation’s Education City in Doha, Qatar.

In the last two decades major educational reforms have taken place in Qatar, aiming to transform the existing system of education. The reforms and institutional developments have brought in a new educational culture to Qatar, embodied in the Western academic institutions of Education City. Based on my teaching practice and the relevant literature, I see this new culture as characterised by a number of key dimensions, which include:

 co-education;  English as the medium of instruction;  academic integrity;  critical thinking and independent learning;  critical teacher feedback;  emphasis on preparing students for English-language universities in Qatar and abroad.

These key dimensions have been considered by various writers and scholars working in the country, as well as being reflected in the official ABP documents, Qatar Foundation’s policies, in the government’s statement of Qatar Vision 2030, and RAND’s report Education for a New Era2 (Brewer et al. 2007). In Chapter 1, describing my research and professional context, I provide a more detailed discussion of each of these dimensions with relevant references, placing them against the socio-cultural and

1 My usage of British and American spelling variations is explained in section V of the Introduction. 2 The title of the RAND report is also the name of Qatar’s K-12 education reform initiative.

17 educational background of the ABP, Qatar Foundation, and Qatar as a Gulf Arab, Muslim country.

On a practical, empirical level, these new educational dimensions are encountered and negotiated by local post-secondary students entering the ABP. For many of them it is often their first direct contact with this new foreign educational culture, especially if they previously studied in national schools, which practise a different set of educational values, approaches, and methodologies. This meeting of diverse educational cultures produces a range of students’ experiences, including their behaviours, feelings, thoughts, and reactions related to studying English and in English, with an international team of teachers, at a foreign co-educational university preparatory programme functioning within a local domain. As a long-term English teacher in the ABP, I have observed and/or been told about such experiences by students and colleagues alike, and sought to conceptualise and support those observations and insights through the related literature. My decision to embark on doctoral research was informed by both, my professional engagement with the context and my extensive reading about it.

ii. Research purpose Fascinated and inspired by the literature as well as my ongoing teaching practice, observations, and reflections, I set out to conduct a systematic doctoral study into local students’ experiences of the new educational culture in the ABP setting, aiming to find out more about those experiences.

Based on my “hunches” derived from my long-term professional practice in Qatar and the related literature, I increasingly saw that those experiences could be conceptualised as forms of Othering. I understood Othering as defining a group of people or an individual by applying a set of negative cultural characteristics stereotypically associated with that group (Holliday 2011: 198), thus making the group or individual seem inferior (Staszak 2008:1). The concept is discussed in detail in Chapter 2, which outlines my theoretical framework and foregrounds my methodology.

The purpose of my study was to find out about various forms of Othering present in students’ experiences in the ABP: what contributed to these forms of Othering and how they related to different educational processes occurring in this setting with its new academic culture espousing co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, independent learning and critical thinking, critical teacher feedback, as well as emphasis on studying in foreign universities. Furthermore, I wanted to consider my research findings against the backdrop of Qatar’s vision of knowledge-based society educated to Western standards as declared in Qatar Vision 2030, with references to a broader context of internationalised English language education in the Muslim Arab Gulf. iii. Ethnographic case study In light of the cultural complexity of my research context, I chose to use an ethnographic case study approach as a methodological foundation for an effective data collection and generation strategy. An ethnographic case study is a description of a particular cultural context, using a detailed or thick description of this context aimed at providing meanings to be applied for interpretative purposes and to generate hypotheses about emergent cultural patterns present in that context and their significance in relation to a wider social setting. As an English language teaching internationalised tertiary institution in an Arab country, the ABP constitutes a rich context for an ethnographic case study, which takes into account its specific, concrete nature, while indicating potential parallels with other similar settings and developments in the region and beyond. This study is therefore situated in the field of educational ethnography and contributes to the literature of Othering in internationalised educational settings. iv. Me, myself and I in the study My professional and personal on-going engagement in the research context constituted a significant aspect of my ethnographic case study. In my role as a teacher researcher, I pursued research questions and approaches which emanated from my teaching practice and drew on my own background knowledge of the context, as well as deriving from the literature. Exploring the setting where I had been working for years meant that I could not write myself out of my research: I felt that would be misleading. Hence, my voice permeates my thesis. The research subjectivities inevitably resulting from this

19 approach needed to be made transparent, examined, and managed through a reflexive dimension. Therefore, my study was strongly reflexive (Holliday 2008; Herrera 2010) in a two-fold way: through self-reflection on my relationship past and present with this educational setting (Teacher Notes) and through an effort to disclose the inner workings of the research process (Researcher Journal).

v. Spelling and transliteration Since the ABP is an American-run programme, its nomenclature and documentation use American spelling conventions. Therefore, in this thesis I observe the standard spelling adopted for names of institutions as in the “Academic Bridge Program”, or “Student Center”, but follow British spelling in my own writing. Also, throughout the text, I refer to sources using either British or American spelling and leave the original spelling in quotations taken from those sources.

Furthermore, I refer to Arabic words in English transliteration. In such cases, I follow the style used by the source/participant I am citing. However, other sources or participants might transliterate the same word in a different way. This is because “there is no generally accepted system for doing this” (Smart and Altorfer 1999: 12), given the nature of the Arabic language and script (Mace 1999/2003; Wickens 1980). The same is true in reference to Arabic names, many of which can be transliterated and spelled in confusingly diverse ways in English. For example, the name of Qatar’s ruling family is usually spelled Al Thani in foreign sources and local Qatari media, but at least one of its members, former Minister of Economy and Trade turned writer, chooses to spell it Althani3. Similarly, the family name Al Misnad can be spelled Al Misned or Al Missned, and so on. Qatari nationals and other Arabic speakers recognise those different English spellings as the same name of the same tribe, but a reader unfamiliar with the intricacies of the Arabic orthography and its English renditions may find it baffling. To avoid complicating things unnecessarily, I only indicate differences related to spelling and/or transliteration when they matter to a specific point I am making in the thesis.

3 The Polish version of the name is Al Sani (Górak-Sosnowska K. and R. Czulda (Eds.) 2009). I note this for the record since I used some Polish language sources in the thesis.

20 vi. Past or present? I conducted my study in the academic year of 2012/13, starting in August 2012 and completing it in May 2013. It revealed a fragment, frozen in time, of the educational scene in Qatar, hence the use of Past Tense in my thesis. After finishing my field research, however, I returned to my usual role as a teacher working in the same environment that I had explored. In other words, I am still here now, thinking in the present tense about new student cohorts, teaching issues, reforms and changes taking place in Qatar, all of which keep modifying the parameters of my (continuing) work and (former) research context. Therefore, while trying to maintain grammatical correctness and conceptual logic of this text, I occasionally switch/ed from past to present, clarifying the purpose of the switch if not self-evident. vii. Thesis structure I have organised this thesis to reflect the development and inner logic of the research process. Chapter 1 provides details of my study context, the ABP, highlighting the key dimensions of its new educational culture. Chapter 2 establishes my study’s theoretical framework referring to the relevant literature and leading to my research methodology presented in Chapter 3, where I articulate my research questions, discuss the design of the study, instruments of data collection, and ethical issues. Chapter 4 focuses on my data handling and analysis procedures. Chapter 5 presents the data I gathered during my research, with thick description of the ABP setting where students’ experiences took place. Chapter 6 offers an interpretation of those experiences through the lens of Othering, answering my first and second research questions. In Chapter 7, I provide conclusions and answer my last research question, demonstrating how my study can be placed within a framework of more general debates on internationalised English language education in Qatar and beyond. Finally, in Chapter 8, I discuss the contributions to scholarship this study represents and suggest areas for further research.

Chapter 1: Context

Introduction My study took place in the Academic Bridge Program (ABP), part of Qatar Foundation (QF), located in Education City (EC) in Doha, Qatar, a Muslim Arab country in the Gulf, in the Middle East. This setting comes with its own distinctive and complex organisational and socio-cultural characteristics, providing the background for local students’ encounters with the new foreign educational culture of the ABP classroom. Chapter 1 presents details of this setting. The chapter starts with a synopsis of the ABP as an institution (Section 1.1) and moves on to describe the key dimensions of the ABP’s new educational culture (Section 1.2). Next, the chapter deals with the wider institutional and educational environment where the ABP operates (Section 1.3), discusses Qatar as a Muslim Gulf Arab country (Section 1.4), and provides an overview of the region’s common characteristics: language, ethnicity and religion (Section 1.5). The chapter includes photographs depicting the ABP setting, used here for illustrative purposes.

1.1. Academic Bridge Program: Institution The Academic Bridge Program (ABP), where I work and conducted my research, occupies the LAS (Liberal Arts and Sciences) building in Education City (EC). The ABP was established in 2001 as a two-semester, co-educational programme preparing local students for entry into English-language universities in Qatar and other countries. Its mission is to provide high school graduates in Qatar with the academic and personal skills for success in reputable English language universities around the world, with special emphasis on preparing students for the universities in Qatar Foundation’s Education City.4

The core goals of the ABP extend beyond linguistic instruction into broadly understood academic preparation for English-medium universities. That is why the main emphasis of the ABP’s teaching approach is on developing skills such as critical thinking, independent

4 For more details, see: http://www.abp.edu.qa/about-abp/mission-n-vision

22 study, and problem solving, working in a mixed gender environment, and acting with academic integrity5.

Since its inception, more than 2,500 students (mostly Qatari high school graduates, but also students from over 30 other countries) have graduated from the programme. Many have enrolled at one of the universities in Education City, at Qatar University, or at universities in the US or the UK6.

With over 90% of ABP graduates admitted to university each year (for example, nearly 60% of ABP applicants were accepted at EC universities in 2017), the Program is considered highly successful in terms of its academic performance7, despite the on- going reservations regarding mainly its co-educational profile seen as culturally controversial by many local voices (Althani and Romanowski 2013; Toumi 2010), but also emphasis on Western style education, with English instruction and foreign university applications.

The admission to EC universities is not conditional on completion of the ABP, and neither is it guaranteed by attending the ABP. Some students gain acceptance directly upon finishing high school, if their grades merit it. However, for those rejected due to lower grades, the ABP is seen as a preferred option, with several EC universities (e.g. Northwestern, Carnegie Mellon, Virginia Commonwealth) offering “dual enrolment”, i.e. admitting students into their undergraduate programmes on condition of completing some or all ABP courses and raising their level of English and academic preparedness. Furthermore, high performing ABP students can cross-register at EC universities and take courses there, which is yet another way of strengthening their university application8.

5 For more details, see: https://abp.edu.qa/gateway-to-university/academic-skills.html 6 For more details, see: http://www.abp.edu.qa/about-abp/about-abp 7 For more details, see: https://abp.edu.qa/app/media/ABP%20Tribune_Issue23.pdf 8 For more details, see: https://abp.edu.qa/academics/cross-registration-options.html

Tuition fees at the ABP are set by the Qatar Foundation (QF)9. All Qatari students are eligible for sponsorship by the Higher Education Institute (HEI), a sector of the Ministry of Education. Various companies (e.g. Qatar Petroleum, Diwan Amiri, etc.) also provide scholarships for Qatari students in the ABP. Additionally, in the second semester, the ABP offers a limited number of scholarships for non-Qatari students, allotted on the basis of academic excellence and documented financial need10.

Image 1: ABP banner in the LAS building

9 For example, in the academic year 2012-2013, they were QR 57,500 (just under ₤10,000 then) per year for non-Qataris, while Qatari students paid QR 47,500 or about ₤8,000 (Brandenburg 2012: 261). 10 For more details, see: http://www.abp.edu.qa/about-abp/faqs#Does_the_ABP_have_any_scholarships

1.1.1 Students: educational backgrounds, expectations, needs Most ABP students are Qatari11 and many have previously studied in recently reformed gender-segregated local independent schools. Despite the on-going and now much criticised educational reform (Independent schools to have new curriculum…2014; Qatar Education Study 2012: Curriculum Report 2014; Report: Hold the oil, pass the book… 2012; Walker 2015), a number of them state that at school they were still taught according to traditional memorisation and repetition-based methodology (Paschyn 2013a; 2013b; Are they ready? 2012). However, some also come from international schools with British or American qualifications such as AS levels, A-levels, IB or various high school diplomas. In their case, the main reasons for their enrolment in the ABP may be low final grades preventing them from gaining admission into universities in EC or abroad (mainly the UK and the US), missing university application deadlines, or, sometimes, uncertainty as to their preferred degree programme.

In general, students entering the ABP expect to improve their English and other academic skills to match university entry requirements. For example, in the Academic level, students’ needs may include improving English reading and writing, and critical thinking skills, and developing the ability to use and cite sources. Many also need to develop independent study skills and broaden their academic and general knowledge to bring it to the level expected at university. Finally, they need to improve their organisational and time management skills.

11 Usually 80-85%, but this varies from one year to another.

Image 2: Screenshot of an ABP flyer

1.1.2 Administration and teachers Currently (at the time of writing this thesis), the ABP has five full time administrators, a university counsellor, a librarian, a learning resources coordinator, thirty teachers, and nineteen support staff members. Ninety five per cent of the teaching faculty members have at least one Master’s degree, and several hold PhDs. ABP teachers and staff come from diverse backgrounds and countries including Canada, Croatia, India, Ireland, Jordan, Lebanon, New Zealand, Pakistan, the Philippines, Poland, Qatar, Romania, Sudan, Uruguay, the UK and the US12. These statistics have remained largely unchanged in the last seven years or so (Image 3).

All ABP teachers are employed on a rolling (‘indefinite’ in the official QF terminology), one-year contract renewable in the autumn semester of each year, contingent upon positive evaluation by administration. Salaries vary, depending on the teacher’s experience and qualifications as well as the ‘grade’ assigned by the QF

12 For more details, see: http://www.abp.edu.qa/about-abp/faculty-n-staff

Human Resources. Qatari employees’ salaries are paid according to a different grading system and are usually much higher than expatriates’, especially after a mass, across- the-board salary hike of 60% for nationals, offered by the government in 2011 (Hancock 2011; Toumi 2011; Wright 2013).

Foreign teachers employed by the ABP enjoy a good standard of living: they are housed in QF-provided accommodation near the Education City campus (Image 4), with all utilities free, including a basic cable TV package, fast internet and wifi, water and electricity, health insurance for eligible dependants and education for children up to the age of 18, as well as annual return air fare for themselves and dependants during summer holidays.

Image 3: Pictures of ABP faculty, administration and staff (2016)

Image 4: QF’s Education City Community Housing (ECCH) where QF employees live

1.1.3 My position as a teacher: professional and cultural background Since 2008, I have been employed by the ABP as an English teacher, teaching literature and writing to Academic level students with an IELTS of 6.0 and above. Prior to my current post, I worked as an English instructor at Qatar University (1991-2005), Student Development Specialist (ABP, 2005-08), and as adjunct faculty at Georgetown University in Qatar (2007).

Supplementary to teaching, I have been methodically researching my professional context (Rostron 2007; 2009a; 2009b; 2009c; 2010; 2011; 2014; 2016; 2018) through investigative engagement with the academic community in Qatar and continuous exploration of local educational issues (Appendix 8).

My professional, but also social and economic, condition in Qatar is determined by my status as an expatriate employee with a one-year rolling contract whose renewal is based on performance. Combined with a prevalent perception of the teaching profession as relatively unremarkable and inferior to other professions in Qatar (Al-Hazmi 2003:

341; Rostron 2014: 160), this aspect of my (and my colleagues’) position here (Edge 1996: 14; Johnston 1997: 682; 1999: 255-257) is explored further in Chapter 6, which discusses forms of Othering emerging from my data.

My position as a teacher researcher or “participant observer” (Richards 2003:14), also termed “embedded researcher” (McGinity, R. and Salokangas, J. 2014; Watson-Gegeo 1988), is discussed in Chapter 3, Section 3.7 and Chapter 4, Section 4.4, in the context of the related issue of researcher reflexivity. It informed my research questions, approach, and strategies, as well as affecting my thinking about my study topic and participants. The reflexivity strand present in the thesis aims to make these issues transparent.

1.2. Key dimensions of the ABP educational culture As a pre-university preparatory programme, the ABP practises a new educational culture, ushered in through reforms modernising Qatar’s schooling system (Brewer et al 2007; Nasser 2017) and related to the opening of the American branch campuses in EC, (Anderson 2015a; Lewin 2008; Stanfield 2014). Based on my long-term professional practice in the ABP and the related literature, I see several key dimensions that characterise this new educational culture: co-education, English language instruction, academic integrity, critical thinking and independent study skills, critical teacher feedback, and emphasis on preparing students for English-language universities in Qatar and abroad. In the sections below (1.2.1 – 1.2.6), I discuss these key dimensions and their significance in my research context.

1.2.1 Co-education Gender segregation is an essential characteristic of the local educational system at the secondary and tertiary level, with Qatar University, the only national university in the country, having two adjacent campuses, separate for male and female students (Golkowska 2017: 4). Furthermore, it is still practised by many Qatari families where men and women do not mix on social occasions13. However, the ABP is a co-

13 For example, all Qatari weddings are gender-segregated (Golkowska 2017: 2).

29 educational institution, as are EC universities and most international schools in Qatar. Their co-educational character reflects the current national discourse focused on creating a knowledge-based society (e.g. General Secretariat for Development Planning 2008; Government of Qatar Planning Council 2007; Ibnouf, Dou, Knight 2013; Nasser 2017; Qatar Foundation 201514) for the country to be able to lead research and innovation in the region, and become an important partner on the global scene (Golkowska 2017: 3). The advancement of women is essential to the success of this new agenda. A number of legislative initiatives have been launched to facilitate women’s progress in all areas of life, promoting gender equality and equal opportunities, especially in education (ibid.: 4). Yet, the government-sponsored modernisation drive is taking place in a society still strongly attached to its traditional view of women as homemakers, “guardians of moral values and the country’s cultural heritage” (ibid.), with the tradition-modernity dichotomy creating social and cultural tensions. These tensions, related to redefining the position of women in Qatari society, are explicitly articulated in Qatar National Vision 203015 (QNV), which is an official government document outlining a development plan for the country launched in October 2008 by the General Secretariat for Development Planning in the State of Qatar:

Qatar’s very rapid economic and population growth have created intense strains between the old and new in almost every aspect of life. Modern work patterns and pressures of competitiveness sometimes clash with traditional relationships based on trust and personal ties, and create strains for family life. Moreover, the greater freedoms and wider choices that accompany economic and social progress pose a challenge to deep-rooted social values highly cherished by society (General Secretariat for Development Planning 2008: 4).

Co-education and related issues of the changing role of women in society have also been discussed in the context of educational developments in the Gulf (Al-Fassi 2011; Al-Qassimi 2010; Findlow 2013; Hatem 1985; Sonbol (ed.) 2012). In Qatar, for many

14 For more details, see: https://www.qf.org.qa/content/20th/developing-a-forward-thinking-society 15 For more details, see: https://www.mdps.gov.qa/en/qnv1/pages/default.aspx

ABP students coming from segregated independent schools, getting used to co- education in the internationalised ABP environment is often a problematic experience affecting classroom cooperation modalities and interactions with other students. In my study, I wanted to find out how the background of previous schooling as well as social and family mores and values regarding gender relations may contribute to students’ experiences of Othering in the ABP.

1.2.2 Studying in English English is the language of instruction in the ABP where the subjects taught include English, science, maths, and computer skills. The most advanced students (usually with IELTS above 5.5) are placed in the top Academic level and take Academic English. Lower level students, with IELTS between 4.5 and 5.5 are put in Foundation English 1 or 2 (for entry requirements, see Appendix 1)16. Students in the highest, Academic, level are taught English in two modules, Academic Composition and Literature17 (for sample syllabus, see Appendix 2). Foundation English courses, offered to students with IELTS of 4.5-5.5, include Reading, Writing, and Grammar modules.

The significance of English as the ABP’s medium of instruction reverberates far outside the ABP classroom. Questions of a much broader nature are often asked in relation to it, with some students expressing concern over their perceived loss of Arabic in favour of English or doubting the fairness of university admissions based on English fluency. Both issues are directly connected to the internationalised nature of English language education in Qatar and stem from the school reform (Education for a New Era or EFNE) conducted in Qatar in the first decade of the 21st century. One of the most significant changes introduced by the reform was a shift to English as the medium of instruction. It took place in the newly created so-called independent schools18 and in Qatar University. The reason behind the decision was that fluency in English was vital

16 Best-performing students in Foundation 2 can be ‘promoted’ to the Academic level in the spring after successful completion of the required English courses in the autumn. Similarly Foundation 1 students can move up to the higher level of Foundation 2 after the autumn semester, if their grades fulfil ABP requirements. Such students are called “jump-ups” in the ABP. 17 In 2014/15, an advanced English Communications course was added to the curriculum. 18 Modelled on American charter schools, or academies in the UK.

31 for young Qataris who wanted to study for academic degrees in foreign universities at home or abroad, and then participate in globalised economy (Coker 2010). Furthermore, given the emphasis the government put on building a knowledge-based society and economy in Qatar, English seemed an appropriate vehicle for modernisation and rationalisation of life, to be achieved through education and engagement with Western academic and research entities.

Thus English was given priority in Qatari schooling, but its newly acquired prominence did not meet with unanimous approval, especially among Qataris. Many of them saw English as a threat to Qatari culture, complaining about loss of cultural identity and declining standards of Arabic. Some also pointed out that prioritising English as the language of instruction had led to denying educational advancement to the Qataris with weaker English skills (e.g. Arab students in Qatar struggle to learn Arabic 2012; Qatar Varsity students… 2012; Use of Arabic in schools in Qatar deemed inadequate 2012). Independent schools have come under increasing criticism, with some claiming that the school reform has failed altogether (Aid for Qatari students in private schools 2012; Paschyn 2013a; Sparking debate… 2012).

After several years of reform, in a rather unexpected move, the decision to use English for instruction at QU and in Qatari schools was reversed in February 2012 (Khatri 2013a; Lindsey 2012; Wheeler 2012; Are They Ready? 2012; Rostron 2014: 151-152), resulting in new tensions as seen in the ABP and wider QF/EC environment where the existing foreign universities continue to teach in English simply because they are foreign and, as such, exempt from any national reforms. In the debate that followed that decision local educational stakeholders’ opinions were divided (English versus Arabic… 2012; Guttenplan 2012): Some Qataris still worried about potential loss of cultural identity due to continuing prevalence of English in the schooling system (Qatar’s identity crisis… 2011; Walker 2016), while others were concerned about inadequate preparation “for jobs in an increasingly globalized world” (Latest Qatar University criticism… 2012). The controversy surrounding “linguistic dualism in education and the role of English teachers in Qatar has not abated as the position of

English vis-à-vis Arabic has come under increasing scrutiny and criticism” (Rostron 2014: 152). The topic continues to generate lively discussion among Qataris, with Sheikha Moza19, adding her voice to it in a speech at the Renaissance of Arabic Language Forum, held under the theme “Linguistic Upbringing of The Arab Child” (Fahmy 2016).

The question of the language of instruction is also discussed elsewhere in the Gulf region, reflecting similar trends. The emphasis on teaching in English is a particularly strong and controversial feature of efforts to internationalise education in the Gulf, with English being placed in opposition to the indigenous Arabic and local religious and cultural values (e.g. Belhiah and Elhami 2015; Burden-Leahy 2009; Clarke, Ramanathan and Morgan 2007; Findlow 2006; Hopkyns 2014; Karmani 2005; Lindsey 2012; 2013a; 2013b; Paschyn 2013b; Raddawi and Melsem 2015; Syed 2003; Weber 2011a; 2011b):

English has become a symbol of the westernization and modernization that has resulted from hydrocarbon revenues that fuel most of the Gulf economies. As these nations strive to diversify their economies, lower the rates of brain drain, and equip their citizens for participation in the global economy, English has taken center stage in many debates about religion, politics, and culture and the language has frequently been blamed directly for the erosion of Islamic values. (Weber 2011a).

Such tensions related to the position of English versus Arabic in contemporary Qatari education and wider society are detectable in the ABP context. Through my research, I wanted to see if they were reflected in students’ experiences of Othering.

19 Moza bint Nasser, the official consort of the previous emir of Qatar, Sh. Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, Sheikha Moza is the Chair of Qatar Foundation.

1.2.3 Academic integrity In the ABP, academic integrity is taught as a discrete skill with academic and ethical impact. Each of the EC universities practises its own Code of Honour and requires its students to abide by it (McHarg 2013: 38). However, most ABP students who come from local schools seem unfamiliar with the concept and related issues, such as plagiarism (ibid.: 39). Therefore, a lot of time is devoted during Student Orientation and in class to teach them how to avoid various forms of academic dishonesty. Many students seem to find it difficult to adjust to this requirement which some perceive as culturally foreign and unnecessarily strict (ibid.).

Plagiarism is a major academic offence in educational institutions in the West and modern Western academia views plagiarism as “a disease” (Drum 1986: 241); even a “plague” (Howard 2001: 2), or “the worm of reason” (Kolich 1983: 141). It is considered an intentional theft of someone else’s scientific, intellectual, or other creative property – a misappropriation of thoughts and ideas expressed in written or spoken words or in any form of art, without credit given to the author. In university settings, penalties for plagiarism vary, depending on both the institutional policies and an individual faculty member’s discretion. Punishment ranges from giving the offending student a zero on a particular assignment to expulsion from the university.

But not all cultures and related educational systems see plagiarism in the same way (East 2006; Fawley 2012; Hayes and Introna 2005; Pennycook 1996; Sowden 2005). In part, this perception may be because other cultures have a different concept of knowledge ownership and its private or public status, which determines their view of plagiarism: “In some traditional cultures in Asia and the Middle East, for example, college students are expected to quote or paraphrase the best known political or religious authorities without attribution because readers, especially professors, are expected to know what texts are being circulated.” (Cultural Perspectives on Plagiarism)

Similar issues are present in Qatar, where rote learning and memorisation still practised in local schools, oral culture traditions, and Bedouin values of collaboration and group

34 cohesion all add to the complexity of the academic integrity perception (Fawley 2012: 176-178). As a result, this situation generates conflict:

different cultures have different ideas as to what constitutes appropriate collaboration and this creates a conflict in a Western university setting where there are distinct rules as to what is considered acceptable in this situation. (ibid.: 178)

Exploring ABP students’ experiences in the area of academic integrity would demonstrate if this conflict was present in them and whether it might contribute to various experiences of Othering.

1.2.4 Critical thinking and independent study skills In their study of critical thinking pedagogy in Qatari schools, Romanowski and Nasser express concern that critical thinking skills are not taught effectively in Qatari schools, leaving students unable to engage with new concepts and views, particularly if they challenge their own pre-conceived beliefs and assumptions (2012a: 72). Similarly, Fawley states that if “the only book used in class is a textbook and students are expected to memorize and repeat it verbatim in an exam […], critical thinking and problem solving are not required or expected” (2012: 177). The government-requested RAND evaluation of Qatari schools (Brewer et al. 2007) highlighted a number of weakness of the Qatari school system and curriculum as “unchallenging” and relying mostly on “rote memorization” (ibid.: xviii). Based on this criticism, it was considered imperative that the educational reform, Education for a New Era (EFNE), be designed to develop students’ “questioning and critical thinking skills”, with teachers required “to promote critical thinking skills by providing opportunities for students to learn them” (ibid.: 103). Romanowski and Nasser question the effects of the reform while at the same articulating the educational and cultural paradox inherent in teaching and learning critical thinking skills:

At the heart of critical thinking is questioning, doubt and contradictions. However, any questioning of societal, economic, judicial or cultural issues can be considered as a direct criticism of religious traditions. Let us provide an illustrative example. Recently one of the authors conducted a workshop addressing various teaching strategies. During a discussion of her school’s vision, a teacher commented that the school encouraged students to be open-minded, appreciate diversity and develop critical thought in step with EFNE. When asked for an example, she responded that the school tells their students about various religious and national holidays outside of Islam. Since several staff members are Westerners, the classrooms have a small party to celebrate the Easter holiday. When asked if they tell students the meaning of Easter, she was quick to say that this was not allowed and that this clearly goes against their religion. The first question that comes to mind is; how students can develop critical thinking skills when some knowledge is excluded or when particular issues are above criticism? (ibid.: 127)

Thus, critical thinking in an academic context presents controversial responses and experiences, which may impact on students’ experiences, possibly leading to the Othering of those who question the status quo and undermine social consensus and cohesiveness.

Critical thinking is linked to independent learning (Halpern 2003: 6). Independent learning, just like critical thinking skills, is considered part of internationalised education (Çelik and Gömleksiz 2000: 139). However, the term “independent learning” comes with some semantic complexity: “there is a surprising lack of consensus as to what it means” (O’Doherty 2006: 1). “Confusion exists due to the number of terms and possible interpretations of those terms (Broad 2006: 120, cited in O’Doherty 2006: 1). The synonyms include “autonomous learning, independent study, self- directed learning, student initiated learning, project orientation, discovery and inquiry, teaching for thinking, learning to learn, self-instruction and lifelong learning” (Kesten, 1987: 9). Some scholars prefer the term “self-directed learning” (Knowles 1975; Garrison 1992), defining it as a learning process where an individual is in charge of their own learning, establishing their educational needs, goals, resources for learning, strategies and outcomes, with or without the support of others (Knowles 1975: 18) and contrasting it with “independent learning” interpreted as conducted on one’s own, in isolation. The term autonomous learning has also been used, particularly in the context of adult education, meaning a mode of learning where the student takes responsibility

36 for their own study beyond classroom instruction, developing educational self-reliance, critical thinking, decision making and independent action (Little 1990: 8). Yet others refer to continuous, learner-driven or personalised learning executed outside the classroom (Meyer 2010).

In this study, I used the term independent learning or study for practical reasons related to clarity: based on my teaching experience, I decided that “independent” could probably be more easily recognised and understood by students taking part in my research than “autonomous” or “self-directed”. The definition of the term I adopted here combines elements of autonomous and self-directed learning, stressing students’ capacity to study on their own, outside the classroom environment, in a self-motivated way, not in isolation from educational processes in the classroom, but to complement them. Thus understood, independent learning skills are a vital element of the ABP teaching practice for strengthening students’ motivation, developing their intellectual autonomy, broadening their background knowledge, and, ultimately, increasing chances of university admission. In my study, I wanted to see how the independent learning dimension of the ABP educational culture is reflected in students’ experiences and how it might manifest itself in class interactions and participation.

1.2.5 Critical feedback Receiving critical feedback on their work is another new aspect of local students’ experiences in the internationalised educational context of the ABP. However, ‘criticism’ can be perceived by them in a negative light as hurtful, upsetting or demeaning, particularly if received in a public situation, i.e. in class, in front of classmates. This can significantly impact the functioning of the classroom, the position of the students among their peers, and interactions with their teachers.

A dictionary definition of the adjective “critical” explains its meaning as “making or involving adverse or censorious comments or judgements”, with a list of appropriate synonyms to follow: “censorious, disparaging, depreciatory, […], judgmental, adverse” (The Oxford Dictionary and Thesaurus 1996: 340). Even a less negative definition – “giving opinions or judgements on books, plays, films, etc.” (Cambridge Advanced

Learner’s Dictionary 2003: 290) – does not indicate that criticism could be linked to a constructive effort to address a weakness and lead to its improvement.

In the Arab Qatari context, the word “critical” tends to be understood in its common, negative meaning, both semantically and culturally. Therefore, criticism is generally seen as socially unacceptable, especially if expressed in public, where it could be considered demeaning to an individual, leading to loss of face and honor (e.g. Patai 2002, 95-99; 108- 113; Pryce-Jones 2000, 34-57). Whether in a work environment (Nydell 1988/2006, 24), personal (Hamady 1961), social (Patai 2002, 323), or political sphere (Pryce-Jones 2000, 40) – even if intended to bring about improvement, progress, growth, enhanced quality and integrity – criticism is often met with indignation, perhaps even enmity, as an assault on traditional local values, such as honor,20 respect, and civility (Rostron 2018: 126).

Exploring how this dimension was perceived by ABP students would reveal if teachers’ critical feedback and students’ responses to it might play a part in their experiences of Othering.

1.2.6 University and degree choice Based on the official educational policies of the country, Qatari students can theoretically apply to any university of their choice, in the country or abroad, to study anything they like. Many ABP students aim or are encouraged to aim for admission to the American branch campuses in EC (Anderson 2015a; Asquith 2006; Dedinsky 2017; Stanfield 2014), in line with the ABP’s mission statement. In practice, ABP students’ choices are influenced by factors related to family and society, and may be limited by availability of government or company sponsorship as well as requirements of the job market in the country (Al-Ali et al. 2018). Their academic performance in the ABP, related to their aptitude for academic progress and English fluency, is another factor shaping available university options.

20 It is interesting to find that a definition of “honor” provided by The Oxford Dictionary of Islam includes “avoidance of degradation of others” (2003: 117).

Their chosen university acceptance or rejection can have an impact on students’ motivation and attrition rate, affecting class size and its functioning. In my study I wanted to find out if it might also contribute to their experiences of Othering, since it could potentially determine their social status within their peer group, with students unable to join a university in EC marginalised or looked down on, particularly if they opted to go to Qatar University instead (Comparisons between Education City, Qatar University… 2012), or another local institution outside the EC academic parameters. This is mainly due to the fact that EC universities are generally perceived as more prestigious and reputable than QU (Anderson 2015a; 2016b; Comparisons between Education City, Qatar University… 2012; Siegel 2013).

Studying these key dimensions of the new academic culture practised in the ABP (coeducation, English instruction, academic integrity, critical thinking and independent study skills, teacher feedback and stress on Western university education) would disclose how they shaped local students’ experiences in the Program and if those experiences included a sense of Othering.

1.3. Institutional affiliations and educational environment The Academic Bridge Program is a member organisation of Qatar Foundation (QF), part of Education City (EC), and a feeder school for EC universities. In this section (1.3), I provide an overview of the ABP’s wider institutional environment and affiliations.

1.3.1 Qatar Foundation and Education City One of the first initiatives undertaken by Sheikh Hamad after he took over power in 1995, the Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development (QF) was set up in the same year as a private, chartered, non-profit organisation, with the aim of modernising the entire schooling system in the country and providing the best possible educational opportunities for young Qataris, while at the same time engaging with renowned foreign universities, think tanks, research centres, and other academic institutions in the world21. To this end, Education City (EC) was founded – a vast (and

21 For more details, see: http://www.qf.org.qa/home

39 growing) site on the outskirts of the capital, Doha, hosting a number of educational and research entities, and, most importantly, branch campuses of American and European universities with several purposefully chosen degree programmes. Education City, where the ABP is located, is considered a hub of internationalised education (Anderson 2015a; Knight 2011; 2015a; 2015b; Lewin 2008; Stanfield 2014), understood as an effort to integrate international, intercultural and global dimensions into higher education in a country (Knight 2003: 2) and positioning itself as a centre of regional academic excellence22 (Knight 2010: 20).

Thus far, six American universities have established branch campuses in Education City in Doha: Virginia Commonwealth University’s school of design (set up in 1997), Weill Cornell Medical College (2002), Texas A&M with engineering (2003), Carnegie Mellon for business, computer, and information systems studies (2004), Georgetown University School of Foreign Service with international relations (2005), and Northwestern University’s journalism and media programme (2008). In addition, HEC Paris offers a graduate management programme and UCL has established Master’s programmes related to library and museum studies as well as archaeology. In addition to these universities, a new entity was established in May 2011, Hamad bin Khalifa University (HBKU), which offers research Masters and Doctoral programmes implemented through several interdisciplinary colleges (Science, Engineering and Technology; Humanities and Social Sciences; Law and Public Policy; Public Health; Business; Qatar Faculty of Islamic Studies; and Translation and Interpretation Institute). It also offers undergraduate degree programmes delivered in affiliation with other EC universities.

The foreign universities were selected by the QF under the leadership of Sheikha Moza for their respective programmes’ academic excellence. The rationale for this selection included a number of points, starting with the country’s need for well qualified professionals with academic credentials from recognised universities. Also, Qatar has been implementing the programme of Qatarisation (Al-Subaiey 2010) which means

22 For more details, see: https://next.qf.org.qa/pages/education-city/

40 replacing foreign workers with suitably skilled and professionally competent Qataris, in both public and private sectors. Moreover, offering local students access to career- specific university programmes provided by renowned colleges operating in the country provides educational opportunities to young Qatari females who may not be otherwise allowed to travel and study abroad (Rostron 2009: 219-220).

Since the American universities brought into Qatar demonstrate a strong commitment to liberal arts education (Anderson 2015a; Chaudhury 2008), a debate has ensued as to how relevant to local students their respective liberal core curricula might be and how appropriate they are in the local educational and cultural context. The debate stems from the fact that in the past, Qatar’s education system was closely linked to religion and based on memorisation and repetition, and devoted to transmission of unquestionable, divine message revealed in Arabic in the holy book of Islam, the Koran (Abu Saud 1984; Al-Misnad 1985). Therefore, exposure to American-style liberal education brought in by EC universities, focused on open questioning and critical thinking, has resulted in significant opposition from several sources, including some conservative religious scholars, parents, local teachers and even a number of students, who felt that it was increasingly a threat to the local values and traditions (e.g., Westernisation biggest threat 2006; Survey: Western education erodes Qatari culture 2011; Rostron 2009: 225).

Furthermore, with the emphasis on the pragmatic needs of Qatar as a developing country, concerns have been raised as to the usefulness of liberal arts education for Qatar’s job market and economy. Some argued that the vocational, professional nature of the degree programmes offered by the QF partner universities in Education City was essential for Qatar’s most pressing economic and labour market needs, and there was no need for liberal education to be included. Dr Abdullah Al Thani, former QF Vice- President for Education, articulated that position:

Personally, I like what the liberal arts do in the United States, but if you look at what our country needs right now, we need people trained in the oil and gas areas, we need doctors, we need media, so those are the programs we are bringing in. (Lewin 2008: 9)

1.3.2 Overview of recent educational developments in Qatar Qatar’s recent educational reforms need to be considered in the light of a key document produced by the previous government under the leadership of Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani and heeded by the current regime led by his son, Sheikh Tamim. The document is Qatar National Vision 2030 (QNV), formulated and published in 200823, followed by its ‘action plan’ Qatar National Development Strategy 2011-201624 (QNDS). A government website (Qatari Ministry of Development and Statistics) provides the following introduction to the QNV:

During the reign of His Highness Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, the Father Amir, may God protect him, Qatar National Vision 2030 has been launched to serve as a clear roadmap for Qatar’s future. It aims to propel Qatar forward by balancing the accomplishments that achieve economic growth with the human and natural resources. This vision constitutes a beacon that guides economic, social, human and environmental development of the country in the coming decades, so that it is inclusive and helpful for the citizens and residents of Qatar in various aspects of their lives. (Pillars of Qatar National Vision 203025)

One of the main objectives of Qatar National Vision 2030 is to create a knowledge- based society and knowledge-based economy. To that end, science and scientific research are emphasized and “world-class” educational facilities provided via Qatar Foundation’s Education City with its foreign campuses and its own, new Hamad bin Khalifa University. “Knowledge-based”, “forward-thinking”, “unlocking human potential” are phrases that have become widely used in public discourse in Qatar (e.g. Harding 2014; Kovessy 2014; Qatar focusing on knowledge-based society: Attiyah

23 Full version available at: http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/WBI/WBIPROGRAMS/KFDLP/0,,contentMDK:21259 343~menuPK:1727179~pagePK:64156158~piPK:64152884~theSitePK:461198,00.html 24 For more details, see: http://www.gsdp.gov.qa/gsdp_vision/docs/NDS_EN.pdf 25 For more details, see: http://www.gsdp.gov.qa/portal/page/portal/gsdp_en/qatar_national_vision

2014). The ambitious goal set for Qatar by its leadership is to establish the country as “a leading center for science, research and development excellence, helping to build innovation and technology capacity for the local, national and international community.”26

Education constitutes one of the critical building blocks of the National Vision 2030, with an educated indigenous population of Qatar as a desired outcome of the country’s investment in its human resources. As an umbrella organisation hosting Education City with foreign branch campuses and research institutions, Qatar Foundation has been at the forefront of modernisation and internationalisation (see Chapter 2, Section 2.6) of education in Qatar and a major agent and stakeholder in the processes defined in the National Vision. It plays a key role in educating Qatari society through providing a “world-class educational system that equips citizens to achieve their aspirations and to meet the needs of Qatar’s society” (QNV2030: 9), including appropriate academic curricula, vocational programmes, and wide opportunities for life-long learning (ibid.). The QNV2030 document also envisions Qatar’s “significant international role in cultural and intellectual activity and scientific research” (ibid.) – a role also largely fulfilled by Qatar Foundation through its engagement with academic entities at home and abroad, and active support for diverse research pursuits27.

At the same time, QNV2030 makes it clear that educational frameworks in Qatar must offer “a solid grounding in Qatari moral and ethical values, traditions and cultural heritage and a strong sense of belonging and citizenship” (ibid.). The complexities resulting from the underlying tension between a desire for internationalisation and modernisation of education and retention of local culture, traditions and values include, for instance, co-education and language controversies, as indicated earlier in this chapter (Sections 1.2.1 and 1.2.2). They have become topics of relevant official and private educational narratives in the country (Guttenplan 2012; Khatri 2013a; 2013b;

26 For more details, see: http://www.qf.org.qa/content/20th/developing-a-forward-thinking-society 27 For more details, see: http://www.qnrf.org/en-us/

Matthews 2013a). These arising dichotomies and tensions are related to practical aspects of fulfilment of the National Vision 2030 plans and reflected in ABP classroom interactions between local students and foreign faculty members, academic norms and social conduct, dress code, curriculum implementation, choice of acceptable teaching materials, and teaching objectives and methods.

To fully understand the complexities of the recent modernisation of the Qatari educational system and the functioning of institutions such as the ABP in Education City, they need to be placed in the wider socio-cultural landscape of Qatar as a Gulf Arab Muslim country.

1.4. Qatar as a Muslim Gulf Arab country Qatar is part of the Persian Gulf, or, rather, its western, non-Persian side, Al Khaleej al Arabi (Whitaker 2010), or Arabian Gulf. As a Gulf Arab country, Qatar shares the khaleeji (Gulf, Ar.) characteristics with its immediate neighbours: it is defined as a socially conservative monarchy (Hammond 2014; Kéchichian 2007; Muslim World: Modern Muslim Societies 2011), with Sunni Islam being its official religion (Lefebure 2009: 165- 166). Qatar’s society is seen as essentially tribal, steeped in ancient Bedouin values (Fromherz 2012: 3; Zaky 2012). It is also considered one of the wealthiest countries in the world (Greenfield 2012; Tasch 2015), with its wealth obtained mostly through oil- and gas- based economy (McAuley 2015; Qatar Economy 2010), similarly to the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and, to a lesser extent, Bahrain and Oman. These ‘Gulf’28 features distinguish Qatar from other Middle Eastern entities (e.g. Althani 2012a; 2012b; Kamrava 2013), are often pointed out in Qatari public narrative and in personal accounts, and can be observed in Qatar’s educational system and the institutional ethos practised by the Qatar Foundation (Coughlan 2012; Weber 2011).

28 An explicit definition of the specificity of the Gulf countries has been affirmed through the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), a security-oriented alliance of the six Arab Gulf autocracies (Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and Bahrain) with some additional emphasis on common economic, social and cultural interests (Beardmore et al. 2010; Heard-Bey 2006; Qureshi 1982). Due to most recent political developments (the 2017 blockade of Qatar), the GCC is all but defunct.

One of the most significant elements of the Gulf cultural character is its nomadic Bedouin traditions. In fact, Bedouin tribes are spread beyond the Gulf, all over the Middle East and North Africa (Kay 1978: 7) and their socio-political status in different countries in the region is a complicated matter (Cole 2003; Franz 2011). In the Gulf, the Bedouin heritage has recently been given new prominence in public discourse through efforts aimed at national identity construction in different Gulf countries (Althani 2012a: 46-47; Partrick 2009: 16). The main features of the Bedouin folklore include a strong sense of tribal genealogy, loyalty and pride, independence, freedom, hospitality and a love for poetry and tradition (Kay 1978; Taida-Drózd 2004). One of the most essential traditional Bedouin values is emphasis on collective integrity and solidarity:

[The] the traditional nomadic Bedouin society is […] group oriented; the focus in on the family or tribe, not the individual. […] Cohesion and conformity to the group’s codes were necessary for survival in the desert and goals were set based on the improvement of the fate and position of the family (Patai 2002, 83). Personality traits, such as independent thinking, that did not strengthen the group were not encouraged and were punished; independent needs were subordinate as well. […] Sincerity, loyalty and devotion to the family are character traits that still exist today. (Fawley 2012: 177-178)

Family membership is a key aspect of one’s identity and marker of social position (Al- Misnad 1985; Althani 2012a; 2012b; Kamrava 2013). In Qatar, as in the other Gulf countries, the Bedouin ethos is a significant element of the country’s national identity, with stress on ancient lineage of local tribes and their loyalty to Islam.

Another key aspect of the Gulf is its religious composition, in itself a broad and complex topic in the Middle East, with sectarian differences contributing to wider regional politics and conflict (e.g. Matthiesen 2013), especially concerning the two main factions of Islam, Sunni and Shia Muslims. They “have developed differing interpretations of history” (Esposito, Fasching, Lewis 2006: 217), and have differing religious rituals, although they adhere to the same set of core Islamic beliefs (The Oxford Dictionary of Islam 2003). In the case of the Gulf, estimated statistics show that, with the exception of Oman and Bahrain, GCC countries’ populations are predominantly Sunni Muslim (Factbox: Gulf Arab

45 countries' population, economy, military 2012; Sunnis and Shia in the Middle East 2013). Most Qatari students in the ABP describe themselves as Sunni, and relatively few come from a Shia background. This seems to reflect the country’s national population statistics with 85% Sunni and 10% Shia, both Muslim, according to the 2004 census (Illustrated Dictionary of the Muslim World 2011: 175). Another source states that “Islam is the predominant religion in Qatar” and about 8.5% of the total population are Christian and 10% other (Culture, religion and history of Qatar 2013).

According to some writers, a more recent feature of the Gulf countries is the make-up of their labour force characterised by a large number of foreigners, including highly educated professionals, semi-skilled workers and unskilled labourers (Kamrava 2013; Kovessy 2014). This has already triggered some security- and culture-related concerns for governments in these countries, as the number of expatriates far exceeds the size of indigenous populations, especially in Qatar29, the UAE and Kuwait (Bahgat 1999; Kamrava 2013; Kapiszewski 2007; Snoj 2013; UAE, Qatar have highest expat ratio in GCC 2013). In the official discourse, expatriates are referred to as “residents”, while native Qataris – as “citizens” or “nationals”. This differentiation affects the status of foreign teachers in the country, making them vulnerable to contractual changes and limiting their professional and/or social status.

The Arab Gulf is an integral element of the Middle East. The next section (1.5) provides an overview of the language, ethnicity and religion as the key markers of common Muslim/Arab/Gulf/Middle Eastern identity shared by the majority of ABP students.

29 Indigenous Qataris constitute about 12% of the country’s population (Chalabi 2013; Snoj 2013).

1.5. Language, ethnicity and religion Some writers perceive the Arabic language, Arab ethnicity and Islam as the most prominent features characterising the Middle East as a whole; a sort of cultural glue that binds the region together and defines the identity of most of its inhabitants (e.g. Barakat 33-35; Kamrava 2005; Nydell 2006: 81-84, 93-99; Patai 2002: 43-50, 152-156). For example, in The Modern Middle East (2005), Kamrava draws attention to the significance of those three characteristics:

Although there are vast differences between and within the histories, cultures, traditions, and politics of each of these regions within the Middle East, equally important and compelling shared characteristics unify the region. By far the most important of these are language, ethnicity, and religion. (1)

He then stresses the importance of Arabic as the strongest element in delineating regional identity:

Much of the Middle Eastern identity is wrapped around the Arabic language. (…) Even in places where it is not the national language and is not widely spoken, as in Iran and in Turkey, Arabic, the language of the Quran, permeates life with its many expressions and phrases. (ibid.)

A shared sense of being Arab is another distinguishing mark of the Middle East. Kamrava writes:

Another common bond in the Middle East is Arab ethnic identity. From Iraq in the north down to the Arabian Peninsula and west all the way to Morocco, ethnic Arabs predominate. (…) Much of the Arab world remains ethnically homogeneous and strongly identifies with its ethnicity. (ibid. 1-2)

Finally, while the term “Arab” precedes Islam, it is the Muslim religion that forms

an even stronger bond uniting the region, (…), with some 97 per cent of Middle Easterners identifying themselves as Muslims. (…) Regardless of their ethnicity, where they live, and what language they speak, the faithful share a compelling set of beliefs and rituals that transcend national boundaries with remarkable ease. (ibid. 2)

The Arabic language, the sense of being an Arab and a believer in the Islamic faith are significant, though by no means exclusive, categories for describing and understanding the context of my study and its participants.

This view of the Middle East as mainly Arab and Muslim may be perceived as limited, giving “rise to a number of difficulties” (Rodinson 1981: 7), especially when it comes to acknowledging the presence of non-Islamic religions, other languages, and ethnicities, which have existed in the region for centuries, such as the Copts in Egypt (e.g. Bishai 19560; Hatina 2006; Shenoda 2007; Van der Vliet 2009) or the Berbers in Algeria (e.g. El Aissati 2001; Kahlochue 2001). However, in contrast to other parts of the Middle East where such diversity is more common, Qatar and adjacent countries in the Gulf are seen as rather homogeneous in this respect (Kamrava 2013; Potter 2009; Potter (Ed.) 2014; Stephens 2015b), in terms of their native citizens, not overall populations, composed of large numbers of expatriate workers with non-citizen status.

Concluding remarks This chapter provided an overview of the wider institutional, national, and regional parameters of my study context, or the setting of my participants’ experiences of Othering, together with elements of their collective cultural identity. In an effort to conceptualise those experiences in this context, I conducted an extensive literature exploration. Chapter 2 brings a review of the relevant literature, with the key concepts underpinning my study’s theoretical framework and methodological approach.

Chapter 2: Building a theoretical framework

Introduction In this chapter, I present the theoretical framework of my thesis through a review of the relevant literature and define the key concepts underpinning it. Aligned with the purpose of this study, this chapter focuses on the concepts of Othering, the Other, and Otherness, providing some historical background and placing them in the Middle Eastern/Qatari context (Section 2.1). A brief discussion follows of related issues of identity (Section 2.2); power (Section 2.3); and alienation (Section 2.4). Linking Othering with language education, this chapter discusses the main characteristics of internationalised English teaching settings such as the ABP (Section 2.5), surveys the literature on Othering in similar internationalised contexts (Section 2.6), and introduces the concept of transformative education and its applicability to my study conducted in the ABP (Section 2.7). As an example of internationalised educational space, the ABP English classroom, where I conducted my research, comes with cultural complexities described in Chapter 1, requiring a methodological framework that could offer an effective way of exploring them. I found that such a framework could be derived from Holliday’s conceptualisation of small culture of a classroom and its host culture complex. I discuss Holliday’s theory in the final Section 2.8 of this chapter, showing its relevance for exploring students’ experiences of Othering and foregrounding an explanation of its methodological operationalisation in my study, described in Chapter 3, Section 3.4.

2.1 Othering, the Other, and Otherness30 as key concepts in my study Othering is a derivate of a more fundamental concept of the Other, which occupies an important position in the contemporary academic, cultural, social, and political discourse. The term the Other is said to have philosophical origins in the works of Hegel and his master-slave dialectic (Brons 2015: 69; Jensen 2011: 64), but some writers place its formation, implicit or explicit, in ancient times (e.g. Lewis 2003: 3; Said 1978/2003: 21; Staszak 2008: 2), stressing the perennial universal nature of the human tendency to form a symbolic frontier between what/who belongs and what/who does not, between insiders and outsiders, between ‘Us’ and ‘Them’ (Mengstie 2011:8).

30 Related terms include alternative forms of Otherising or Otherisation used instead of Othering.

The Other is generally defined as a member of an out-group, an outsider, outcast, alien; someone who does not belong, since their identity is seen as lacking some characteristic/s considered vital by the members of the in-group (Staszak 2008:1). Holliday describes the Other as “a demonised or glorified image of others which strengthens the personal identity of the Self” (2013: 172), emphasizing its significance for self-definition. Othering is a process of transforming a difference into an instrument of division which puts the superior in-group in opposition to the inferior out-group (Staszak 2008:1). Otherness is a characteristic of the Other, necessarily perceived as negative, lesser, subordinate (e.g. Ideland and Malmberg 2014; Holliday 2011; Mengstie 2011; Lausch, Teman and Perry 2017; Staszak 2008).

The Other may be perceived as inferior by the defining entity, termed by various writers alternatively as the Subject or the One (e.g. de Beauvoir 1949/2011: 27); the Self (e.g. Spivak 1985: 247; Staszak 2008: 2), the Centre (e.g. Holliday 2011; Jensen 2011), and understood as a construction of what is different from the Other; as a meaning-imposing power (Holliday 2011: 197, 199).

There are many identity-defining socio-cultural categories which decide on who becomes the Other. Some of the most significant include race or ethnicity; religion; gender; social class. Construing the Other on the basis of a difference rooted in one of these categories is

a discursive process by which a dominant in-group (“Us”, the Self) constructs one or many dominated out-groups (“Them”, Other) by stigmatizing a difference – real or imagined – presented as a negation of identity and thus a motive for potential discrimination. To state it naively, difference belongs to the real of fact and Otherness belongs to the real of discourse. Thus, biological sex is difference, whereas gender is Otherness. (Staszak 2008:2)

Arguably the most powerful exegesis of the Other, Othering and Otherness was formulated by Edward Said who considered it in the macro-terms of Western colonial subjugation of the Orient and its subsequent representation of the Orient as inferior, perpetuated through the ideology of Orientalism. Although he focused specifically on cultural and literary domains, where, in his view, Othering of the Orient has occurred in

50 most visible forms, Said’s seminal book Orientalism (1978/2003) is regarded as “the cornerstone of post-colonial canon” in much broader terms (Moosavinia, Niazi and Ghaforian 2011: 103). In it, Said critiqued the existing definition of Orientalism as a cultural, social and political creation of the Western imagination and academic scholarship (1978/2003: 2-3), and proposed a new understanding of Orientalism as a “Western style for dominating, restructuring, and having authority over the Orient” (ibid.: 3). He indicated “the connections between Orientalism as body of ideas, beliefs, clichés, or learning about the East, and other schools of thought at large in the culture” (ibid.: 205), stressing that “one of the important developments in nineteenth century Orientalism was the distillation of essential ideas about the Orient – its sensuality, its tendency to despotism, its aberrant mentality, its habits of inaccuracy, its backwardness – into a separate and unchallenged coherence” (ibid.).

According to Said, this body of Western knowledge of the Orient, led to “ideas about the biological bases of racial inequality” (ibid.: 206), resulting in the formulation of “the binary typology of advanced and backward (or subject) races, cultures, and societies” (ibid.), and linking “the Orientals” with other, marginalised, otherised groups existing in Western societies:

Along with all other peoples variously designated as backward, degenerate, uncivilised, and retarded, the Orientals were viewed in a framework constructed out of biological determinism and moral-political admonishment. The Oriental was linked thus to elements in Western society (delinquents, the insane, women, the poor) having in common an identity best described as lamentably alien… (ibid.: 207)

The process of Othering the Orient has prevailed until modern times, Said argues, “even as in the academic world, in the policy planner’s world, and in the world of business very serious attention is being paid to the Arab” (ibid.: 284-285). The Othering of the Orient persists in Western cultural relations policy positioning the West as “rational, developed, humane, superior” versus the East seen as “aberrant, undeveloped, inferior [...] and incapable of defining itself, […] something either to be feared […] or to be controlled” (ibid.: 293-301). Othering in the realm of religion is present in the Western conception of Islam as a dangerous yet inferior ideology incapable of complex thought (ibid.: 310) and

51 prone to defeatism and quietism in the realms of politics (ibid.: 314). Thus “the Oriental” remains the Other in the eyes of the West, Said states, a view rooted in the “Orientalist distinctions between “them” and “us”” (ibid. 327).

Since the publication of Said’s book in 1978, it has become all but impossible to use the term the Other without referring to Orientalism and seeking to add to its main argument, particularly if the discussion concerns matters to do with the education, culture, and politics of the post-colonial Middle East. Some writers have offered criticisms of Said (Ibn Warraq 2007; Lewis 1982; Varisco 2008; Zarnett 2008), but his fundamental position on the cultural Otherness of the East as a creation of the imperialistic colonising West has remained at the centre of general discourse on contemporary culture and the post-colonial world.

Said’s conceptualisation of the Other and Otherness is grounded in the context of the Muslim Arab world. As such, it is meaningful in the contemporary Qatari setting, albeit with some caveats. For example, unlike other parts of the Middle East, Qatar has never been colonised in the same way as other countries in the region, although it was a British protectorate for a period of time (Fromherz 2012). However, even without historical references to Western colonialism, the East/West dichotomy is manifested through the increasingly widespread Qatari view of modernisation as Westernisation, with the West seen as marginalising local culture and its values, while imposing its own, especially through co-education and English language education (e.g. Weber 2011a; 2011b; Westernisation biggest threat 2006). This view draws on Said’s thinking, with the resulting discourse being anti-Western in content (Cherribi 2017: 65-66; Fandy 2007: 51).

In an even more extreme form, this anti-Western trend can be observed in the perceived Qatar’s support for Islamists and the Muslim Brotherhood, both known for their hostility to the Western imperialist, colonialist power (e.g. Bakr 2014; Kirkpatrick 2014; Qatari backing for extremist preachers… 2018). Their ideologies criticise moral corruption and decadence of the West (Qutb 1964/2000), see Western civilisation as evil and its

52 supporters as “enemies of God” (Lewis 1990: 3), and consider non-Islamic entities as ignorant and inferior (Loboda 2004: 4). It is argued that such ideologies have roots in the original Muslim tradition according to which “the world is divided into two houses: the House of Islam (Dar al-Islam), in which Muslim governments rule and Muslim law prevails, and the House of War (Dar al-Harb), the rest of the world, still inhabited and, more important, ruled by infidels” (Lewis 2004: 27), a corresponding reflection of the Othering of Muslims by the West, as described by Said (1978/2003: 310).

Putting aside legitimate criticisms of various aspects of Western civilisation (Lau 2007), this discourse defines the West in terms comparable to Said’s interpretation of the Western vision of the Orient, similarly replete with stereotypes and generalisations (Lau 2007). This inherently paradoxical, double-edged nature of the East/West dichotomy existing in the Qatari31 context means that the West can be seen as both a force of Othering as well as the (othered) Other.

Although popularised by Said, “the Other” was first used as purposeful, theoretical concept by de Beauvoir in The Second Sex (1949/2011: 26) where she identified and examined gender-related power structures based on Othering of women by men (Jensen 2011: 64), with men regarded as the norm versus women seen as the Other:

Humanity is male, and man defines woman, not in herself, but in relation to himself; she is not considered an autonomous being. […] She is determined and differentiated in relation to man, while he is not in relation to her; she is the inessential in front of the essential. He is the Subject; he is the Absolute. She is the Other. (de Beauvoir 1949/2011: 26)

De Beauvoir’s work has generated a vast corpus of related scholarship as well as numerous strands of popular discourse on gender. This discussion is particularly relevant in the Middle East and the Arab Gulf, where rapidly changing cultural and socio-political circumstances have shaken up the traditional paradigms of women’s role

31 Qatar, like Saudi Arabia, adheres to the puritanical brand of Islam, known as Wahhabism, although it practices its less strict version (The Other Wahhabi State 2016).

53 in society (e.g. Ahmed 1993; 2011; Findlow 2013; Ladika 2009; Ramazani 1985; Sonbol (ed.) 2012). Over the last few decades, the issue of Muslim Arab gender relations has become the topic of a growing body of literature reflecting a multitude of voices and ideologies: “The core of the intellectual discourse on gender in the Middle East [includes issues such as] the critique of Orientalism past and present; the exploration of the diversity within Islam; the study of states and gender with respect to symbolic representations, institutions, and kin-based politics; the analysis of women’s agency; and the debates surrounding feminism and the veil” (Charrad 2011: 418). Many writers focus on the Othering of Muslim Arab women taking place both in home societies as well as in the West (e.g. Al-Fassi 2011; El-Saadawi 1980/2015; Eltahawy 2015; Golley 2004: 521-522; Mernissi 1987/2011; Upton 2018: 2). Viewpoints range from openly adopting Western style feminism, such as in the case of works by Eltahawy (2015) or El-Saadawi (1980/2015), to modifying it via inclusion of specifically Arab and Islamic elements (see: Charrad 2011: 427-430).

In the Arab Gulf, the term feminism is not commonly used (Findlow 2013: 112), even though it is increasingly clear that Gulf women are undertaking efforts to find their own voice in the gender discourse (e.g. Al-Fassi 2011; Al-Qasimi 2010; Sonbol (ed.) 2012) and discard what Qatar’s Sheikha Moza bint Nasser described as “the dark veil that cloaked the reality of their dynamic role in the region” (In: Sonbol (ed.) 2012: x).

Social and political change ushered in through fossil fuel revenues has significantly benefitted Gulf Arab women: “Oil money has opened up unprecedented opportunities for women to acquire modern education and skills” (Ramazani 1985: 258). However, in many spheres of life, their position in society remains subject to the age-old patriarchal system of male control and domination (Al-Ghanim 2009; Findlow 2013; Hatem 1985; Kazemi 2000), resulting in their tacitly or openly articulated Otherness within their own social environments, combined with Orientalist stereotypes prevalent in the West (Golley 2004: 521-522). This trend has also been observed in Qatar (e.g. Al-Qasimi 2010; Curtiss 1996; Golkowska 2017).

The issue of Othering is related to identity, whether rooted in race, religion, gender, or other defining constructs. The next section of this chapter discusses the relevance of the concept of identity in the context of Othering.

2.2 Understanding the relevance of identity in the context of Othering Othering is rooted in categorising individuals into two oppositional groups: as either “them” or “us”.

The out-group is only coherent as a group as a result of its opposition to the in-group and its lack of identity. This lack is based upon stereotypes that are largely stigmatizing and obviously simplistic. The in-group constructs one or more Others, setting itself apart and giving itself an identity. Otherness and identity are two inseparable sides of the same coin. The other only exists relative to the Self and vice versa. (Staszak 2008:2)

Identity as a “distinguishing characteristic of an individual” (Feldman 2003: G-6) determines who a person is and what he or she does. Giddens (2004) describes identity as related “to the understandings people hold about who they are and what is meaningful to them” (29), while some writers understand identity as “a property of the ego that organises experience” (Josselson, 1987: 12). Thus, identity can be interpreted as an organisational principle of one’s actions, behaviours, norms and values, usually derived from a “cultural environment” or “geographical or psychological entity” that an individual considers his or her own “at a particular point in time” (Holliday 2013: 171). It is connected to a feeling of belonging to a specific national, ethnic, religious, social, gender, or generational group, or any group in fact that has distinct cultural features, such as a common language, dress code, or manners (Kramsch 1998).

Traditionally, one’s identity was usually based on “just one affiliation that really matter[ed]” and was “a kind of fundamental truth about each individual” (Maalouf 2000: 4). That “fundamental allegiance” tended to be presented in relatively static, well-defined “religious, national, racial or ethnic” terms (ibid.) and was a sufficient element of one’s identity as a cultural expression. In the “liquid life” (Bauman 2005) that characterises the postmodern world of diversity, globalisation, deregulation and mass communications (Mineva 2007: 31), identity formation takes on new dimensions and can no longer be

55 perceived as unambiguous, single-layered, or unchanging. The complex processes participating in one’s search “for a recognisable identity” (Grimshaw and Sears 2008: 259) involve multiple cultural, ethical and social constructs (Jensen 2011: 66-67; Mineva 2007: 34-35). This is because this search does not happen in a vacuum: “No matter how self- identifying a man [sic] is or would like to be as an original, unique person, he cannot do so in solitude, without the participation of those with whom he shares the same moral – which is to say human – world” (Mineva 2007: 37). Thus, personal identity, or “personal uniqueness” (Levinas 1995: 4, cited in Mineva 2007: 37) is steadily extended to include the multiple cultural affiliations of an individual among Others as it becomes his or her dynamic, complex, flexible yet distinct, cultural identity.

However, this increasing need for fluidity and flexibility of individual identity is not easily or universally accepted, particularly not in those communities which still adhere to more traditional forms and boundaries of cultural uniqueness, and emphasise its cohesiveness and unchanging nature, such as in the case of religious or ethnic identities (Oyserman, Elmore and Smith 2012). This conflict between developing and changing one’s cultural identity while maintaining its socially required stability is particularly meaningful in my research context, as I have discussed in Rostron (2016):

Most Qatari and other Arab students in the ABP tend to experience a strong sense of cultural identity and have a clear recognition of their own cultural environment, usually based on a traditional understanding of culture as an accepted national, ethnic and/or religious code of values and norms. However, some individuals begin to explore and question its various parameters upon their encounter with foreign teachers, new systems of education and new cultural models. (2016: 196)

Identity is an essential element adding to one’s sense of belonging. The changing parameters of one’s cultural identity and the growing need for its flexibility and openness may result in new affiliations as well as discourses of rejection and Othering (Jensen 2011). Given the initially strong sense of racial/ethnic, religious, and linguistic identity (comp. Chapter 1, section 1.6.2) among ABP students upon their entry into the Program, as demonstrated through my data (Chapter 5), the term carries significant explanatory power for interpreting my participants’ experiences of Othering. In the sub-sections below (2.2.1-

2.2.4), I provide a brief discussion of the essential aspects of identity as understood and practised in the context of my study.

2.2.1 Strong sense of Arab identity A strong sense of Arab identity was one of the key components of ABP students’ expression of selfhood, playing a meaningful role in their various experiences in the Program. However, it is a complex characteristic. Scholars discuss the multiple strata of Arab identity in terms of specific geographical location, shared culture, historical connections with the early Arab supremacy, Islamic religion, and language (Lewis 1975; Nydell 2006; Patai 2002; Rogan 2011), describing it as a world “united by a common religious culture expressed in the Arabic language” (Hourani 2005: 83). Patai’s definition corresponded to multi-layered interpretations of Arabness present in my research context:

Who is an Arab? The answers usually include one or more of the following criteria: Arabs are those who speak Arabic, are brought up in Arab culture, live in an Arab country, believe in Muhammad’s teachings, cherish the memory of the Arab Empire, are members of any of the Arab nations. (2002: 13)

Accordingly, I use the term “Arab” or “Arabic” in reference to the geographical, social, cultural and linguistic locality of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), with a caveat that “of all these criteria, only the linguistic one holds good for all Arabs and for almost nobody else but Arabs” (ibid.). This was also the understanding of being an Arab derived from my participants’ understanding and usage of the term.

2.2.2 Identification with Islam Even with the influx of foreign nationals as workforce, Qatar is a predominantly Muslim country (e.g. Fromherz 2012; Kamrava 2013; Kapiszewski 2007). Some sources indicate that Muslims amount to almost 70% of the current population32. Others stress the conservative nature of Qatari Islamic character: “Considerably more liberal than many of its neighbors, Qatar nevertheless is the only country other than Saudi Arabia to espouse Wahhabism as its official state religion” (Qatar: The American

32 For more details, see: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/qa.html

Foreign Policy Council’s World Almanac of Islamism 2017). A statement taken from an official government-run website declares that

Islam is a part of everyday life in Qatar. It is the official religion of the State, with its teachings reaching all areas of Qatari society, including education, government and legislation. The prevailing doctrine is Sunni Islam. Hanbali is the official Sunni jurisprudence observed in Qatar. Islamic Law – or Sharia – remains the moral anchor of Qatari society.33

Islam is one of the most significant elements of ABP students’ cultural sense of belonging, acknowledged readily and with pride, if not simply taken for granted by my study participants. Issues related to negotiating that aspect of their identity could sometimes emerge in the ABP setting, with its new educational dimensions (co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, critical thinking and independent study skills, teacher feedback, emphasis on English- language university education), seen as Western academic practice, not always compatible with Islamic cultural and pedagogical values.

2.2.3 Qatari as national and local My study participants described themselves as Qatari. In the local context, and based on their understanding of the meaning of being “Qatari”, the adjective refers to national, or indigenous, native people, as well as institutions, methodologies, traditions, etc., which exist and operate in the country. The word is used to describe local or autochthonous Qatari citizens (also called “nationals” in public rhetoric) as opposed to foreign residents or expatriates remaining in the country temporarily, on the basis of work-related residence permits.

However, the attribute “local” can be confusing in the Qatari context where there are many people of various origins, such as Middle Eastern, South Asian, or other, born and bred in the country and therefore classifiable as “local”, who, however, are not Qatari citizens, i.e. do not hold Qatari citizenship. It is interesting to note that the term “Qatari” comes with its own inherent contextual intricacies based on detailed genealogy and carefully considered patrilineal relations (El Guindi 2012; Halliday 1977; Kamrava 2009). Thus,

33 For more details, see: http://www.hukoomi.qa/wps/portal/topics/Religion+and+Community/Religion/islaminqatar

Qatari citizens can be divided into three groups: the Bedouin, Hadar and Abd. The Bedouin descend from the nomads of the Arabian Peninsula, and the Hadar descend from settled town dwellers. While some Hadar are descendants of Bedouin, most descend from migrants from present-day Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan. The word “Alabd” translates to “slaves” and accordingly, this faction of the population are the descendants of slaves brought from east Africa. All three groups identify themselves as Qatari and their right to citizenship is not challenged. (Beydoun and Baum 2012: 10)

Various forms of the subtle socio-cultural interplay between members of different Qatari tribal/ethnic groups of diverse origins manifested themselves in students’ experiences in the ABP, demonstrating deeper layers of mutual interactions.

2.2.4 Complexities of being Western As discussed earlier in this chapter (Section 2.1), the quality of being “Western” comes with a baggage of ambivalent, if not outright negative, connotations, particularly in my research context. Thus, in the popular Qatari discourse it may be referred to as Westernisation and applied in a pejorative sense to denote “alien” or “hostile” ideologies of secularism, materialism, and liberalism, perceived as a threat to traditional, local systems of values steeped in Islam and ancient Bedouin culture (e.g. Westernisation biggest threat 2012). Putting it in a broader Middle Eastern Arab context, Nydell points out that one of “basic Arab self-perceptions” (2006: 16) is that of Western dominance and exploitation of the Arabs: “The Arab peoples see themselves as having been victimized and exploited by the West. (...) Arabs are misunderstood and wrongly characterised by most Westerners” (ibid.).

In line with my participants’ understandings of the ‘Western’ issue, I recognise and consider its complexity throughout the thesis, but also want to note that I occasionally use the term “Western” interchangeably with “foreign” or “expatriate”, for descriptive purposes, to separate different origins and habitats of educational establishments, with their particular cultures, systems and methodological approaches. For instance, the six American branch campuses, with a French (HEC Paris) and a British (UCL) one, operating in partnership with HBKU in Education City, are collectively referred to as “Western” to distinguish them from local, Qatari, institutions of tertiary education. Thus “Western” comprises entities of European, Anglo-American, Canadian, or Australasian

59 provenance. Even in that context, however, it is difficult to escape the semantic burden of the term, given its prevalent historical, cultural and political associations with Western domination and power over non-Western entities, and its complex interpretations in the research context.

In the next section of this chapter I discuss the issue of Othering and power as its key element and catalyst.

2.3 Power dynamics in Othering In Orientalism, Said presented “the relationship between Occident and Orient [as] a relationship of power, of domination, of varying degrees of a complex hegemony” (ibid.: 5). He argued that the colonising European empires had effectively divided the world into two opposing parts, the civilised and developed West and the barbarian, backward Orient (ibid.: 4-7). The Orient was made Oriental, he wrote, because of its submission to the West (ibid.: 6), and drew on the case of Flaubert and his depiction of the “Oriental woman” to illustrate his argument:

[…] Flaubert’s encounter with an Egyptian courtesan produced a widely influential model of the Oriental woman; she never spoke of herself, she never represented her emotions, presence, or history. He spoke for and represented her. He was foreign, comparatively wealthy, male, and these were historical facts of domination that allowed him not only to possess Kuchuk Hanem physically but to speak for her and tell his readers in what way she was “typically Oriental.” My argument is that Flaubert’s situation of strength in relation to Kuchuk Hanem was not an isolated instance. It fairly stands for the pattern of relative strength between East and West, and the discourse about the Orient that it enabled. (ibid.: 6)

Based on Said’s interpretation of Orientalism as a comprehensive mechanism of Othering based on East/West power relations defining the Orient as inferior, power has been interpreted as the essential impetus behind Othering. For example, Gayatri Spivak considers three aspects of Othering deriving from the colonial power of the West over the East (1985). The first aspect refers to a force that makes the ““native” see himself [sic] as “other”” (ibid.: 254). This has elsewhere been termed self-Othering and defined as accepting the negative characteristics imposed by the dominant Centre (Holliday 2011: 199). Another power-related aspect of Othering is dictating and perpetuating the

60 view of the Other as morally inferior (Spivak 1985: 254-255). Hence, for example, the historical European perception of Muslims as “hordes of hated barbarians” (Said 1978/2003: 59) or “lewd Saracens” (Kabbani 1986: 14). The third power-based dimension of Othering involves denying the Other access to “ideological production like education, religious conversion, or accessibility to common law” (Spivak 1985: 255).

In his article “Orientalism reconsidered” (1985), Said returns to the connection between power and knowledge (89) he discussed earlier in Orientalism, echoing other voices in contemporary academic discourse, such as Bourdieu (1991/2011) or Foucault (1983; 1993; 1998), who both understood knowledge as a function of power enabling one to define the world and others and/or impose one’s vision on them. Similarly, Said stresses the complex relation between political, economic, and cultural power and broadly understood knowledge, particularly in the case of Western scholarship of the Orient. He states that “the production of knowledge, or information, of media images, is unevenly distributed: its locus and the centers of its greatest force are located in what, on both sides of the divide, has been polemically called the metropolitan West” (1985: 100), or, in other words, “in a setting that is deeply inscribed with the politics, the considerations, the positions, and the strategies of power” (ibid.: 91).

The intersection of knowledge/meaning and power indicates that Othering is a process involving production and imposition of meaning: Jensen talks of “the power to describe” in Othering processes (2011: 65) and further states that “in these processes, it is the centre that has the power to describe, and the Other is constructed as inferior” (ibid., my italics). “Before we Other, we symbolically create and exchange meaning, so that we can make sense of the world and influence one another. By attaching vocabularies to human experiences, we simplify our social lives, and all the complex dimensions of individual differences into a more coherent explanation of who we are and who we want to be” (Winslow and Winslow 2014: 1). The simplification and reduction of these complex individual differences leads to “negative understandings, prejudice and easy answers” (Holliday 2013: 19), resulting in rhetoric of hostility which

61 then engenders processes of Othering related to negative perceptions of racial, national, ethnic, religious cultures, social background, and gender.

Therefore, Othering can be defined as “a discursive process of separating We from Other as a means of constructing hierarchies of power” (Winslow and Winslow ibid.). Overlapping frameworks of power emerge in my research context, playing a role in students’ experiences of Othering. They include the overarching political framework of a progressive government imposing modernisation on a conservative society, complete with the dominant regime of truth based on historical myths (e.g. Althani 2012b; Harding 2014; Fromherz 2012; Kamrava 2009; 2013 Romanowski and Nasser 2012a). Further, there is a power framework consisting of prevalent socio-cultural structures rooted in the Islamic traditions as well as tribal mechanisms which include social norms, such as dress code and gender-segregation, patriarchy, kin-based style of governance, significance of lineage (e.g. Al-Misnad 1985; Althani 2012a; Ehteshami and Wright 2007; Kamrava 2013). Professional frameworks of power can be defined as implicit or explicit organisational structures responsible for determining the position of the teaching profession in society, hiring mechanisms with emphasis on Qatarisation, local and foreign styles of bureaucracy and interactions in the classroom (e.g. Al-Subaiey 2010; Rostron 2009; 2014; Althani and Romanowski 2013; Rostron 2009; 2014; Telafici, Martinez and Telafici 2014; Woodworth 2014). Finally, personal frameworks of power detectable in the ABP context rest on notions such as one’s social/tribal origin, conservative versus liberal attitude and values, school background, level of English, dress style (e.g. Abu Saud 1984; Al-Khawaga 2008; Al-Qasimi 2010).

However, the perceptions and praxis of power are changing, and Said’s interpretation of Orientalism as a one-sided expression of Western power controlling and defining the Orient has to be modified by acknowledging the growing power of the East not only to define the West as inferior, but also to wield significant power in financial, institutional, and social terms – even if this aspect is limited to the oil-rich Gulf countries only, and not applicable to the wider Middle East. This increased financial, institutional, and social power is visible in an internationalised English language education context such

62 as the ABP, with affluent Qatari students taking instruction from itinerant, contractual foreign teachers. I discussed the resulting complexities in a book chapter on “Exploring identity of non-native teachers of English through narratives of their experience”:

In most contemporary cultural/educational power discourse, power sits with the foreign teacher, who is understood to come from a western/capitalist/imperialist background (e.g. Pennycook, 1994, 1998; Edge, 2003, 2006; Canagarajah, 2003) or be linked with a quasi-colonial “paymaster of EFL”, such as “the British Council and the United States Information office”, etc. (Johnston, 1999: 266). Those affiliations define his or her privileged position in the classroom. However, the world of TESOL is now full of non-native speakers who do not come from the English-language West, and have different institutional alliances. It follows that in terms of power relations, their position in the classroom may also be different from native speaker teachers’. Furthermore, it is not just the ethnicity or nationality of the teacher that play a part in the power equation, but also the way teachers are perceived by their students or the host society […], and the place of employment with its perimeters of influence.

[…] In the ABP, teacher’s institutional obligations are with an English-language programme which is run by American administrators, but constitutes an integral part of a local, Qatari organisation. Consequently, in class, […] teacher power – native- and non-native speaker alike – can only be exercised within strictly defined confines of what is allowed in the local educational, religious, cultural and social context of Qatar. And, while our Qatari students may be “linguistically underprivileged” (Johnston, 1999: 266), EFL teachers here cannot be “assumed to be naturally superior” (ibid.). We are guest workers in this country and are in fact quite powerless vis-à-vis both our students and the local organisational complex. Underscoring this is the relatively low social status of teachers in Qatari society in general which seems to accord them little esteem and recognition. It is not clear if low teacher status here is in some ways connected with teacher education and knowledge or if it is related to some other factors, but it certainly merits serious consideration. (Rostron 2014: 159- 160)

The emergent complex narratives of power and Othering reflect the changing parameters of identity, understood in terms of personal, cultural, and social attributes. Issues related to identity may lead to a sense of alienation, or not belonging, related to Othering. In the section below, I consider connections between Othering and alienation.

2.4 The role of alienation in the context of Othering Although used less frequently nowadays (Case 2008: 324), the concept of alienation carries significant meaning in my research context due to its connection to Othering and power, as well as its relation to educational contexts. Proposing to understand it as a form of disconnection, Case explains it as “the state or experience of being isolated from a group or an activity to which one should belong or in which one should be involved” (Case 2008: 323).

It is rooted in disconnection, but the manifold connotations of alienation cover areas such as separation and/or surrender (Seeman 1975: 91), as well as reification (ibid.: 92), applied to examine class relations, economic and social injustice, cultural matters, racism, gender issues, as well as personal human relations. Some writers define alienation as a sense of “powerless and meaninglessness” (Travis 1986: 61) resulting from isolation, deprivation and marginality (Lee 1973: 121). Each of these meanings can be seen as having a link with Othering which culminates in an experience of inferiority and exclusion, separation, or, in other words, alienation. The Other is necessarily disconnected from their context, or alienated from it by the process of branding them as lacking, unwanted, inadequate, un- belonging.

The more recent literature also focuses on alienation-related issues in educational settings. For example, it has been argued that alienation needs to be considered in “the learner’s social and cultural context” (Case 2008: 322), an approach in line with my own understanding of students’ experiences of Othering as belonging to and arising from their socio-cultural environment. When put in a new, linguistically and culturally foreign, academic environment, local students often display symptoms of alienation (Lindsey 2013b; Paschyn 2013a; 2013b), simultaneously undergoing an experience of Othering, since they can be seen as educationally inferior by some of their more advanced peers and/or seen as in some way inadequate by their foreign teachers.

A perspective on the student experience of alienation particularly relevant to my research context is proposed by Mann (2001). It considers “the Student as Outsider”, as “a stranger in a foreign land” of the unfamiliar territory of new academic parameters:

The student, by entering the new land of the academy, can be said to be estranged both from this new land, but also from their own language, culture and desire. The demands of learning the language of rational, abstracting, academic discourse and processes may require the student to repress their being as non-rational, creative, unconscious and desiring selves, the very selves which they may need for engaging in. (2001: 11-12)

Extending this interpretation to include native, as opposed to foreign, language and culture practised in an academic context, alienation can be seen as a significant aspect of Othering, particularly in terms of a condition occurring whenever a student encounters a new internationalised educational environment, such as in the case of Qatari students entering the ABP. This environment itself is not just a background to, but a key element in, various process of Othering. The next section (2.5) presents the main characteristics of an internationalised educational context exemplified in the ABP, subsequently linking it with the concept of Othering in Section 2.6.

2.5 Internationalised educational context Internationalisation of higher education is not a new phenomenon, dating back centuries (Berchem 1991: 297). In recent decades, internationalisation of education has been linked to a more general trend of globalisation (Teichler 2004). Although globalisation is a process understood mainly as economic expansion, involving integration and interactions between nations, governments, organizations and companies “across national boundaries” (Nayyar 2007: 30), its impact has extended into society, culture and, increasingly, education. Even in that context, internationalised tertiary education, is a development in its own right. A recent definition of internationalisation of post- secondary education highlights its unique character:

Internationalization at the national, sector, and institutional levels is defined as the process of integrating an international, intercultural, or global dimension into the purpose, functions or delivery of postsecondary education. (Knight 2003: 2).

Knight explains that internationalisation of higher education is a continuing effort based on the triad of the “international, intercultural, and global dimensions” (ibid.), because it is related to the diversity of national and institutional cultures and has a worldwide scope (ibid.). The linked concepts of borderless and cross-border education, although accurate in their emphasis on transcending national borders in the delivery of education, are insufficient when it comes to determining “regulatory responsibility, especially related to quality assurance, funding, and accreditation” (ibid.). The three key elements of Knight’s definition – international, intercultural and global dimensions of internationalised higher education – cover “all aspects of education and the role that is plays in society” (ibid.).

Another closely related term used in the literature is that of transnational education (ibid.). It describes specific features of internationalised education connected with its location and forms. According to Wilkins and Huisman,

in transnational education, learners are located in a country different to the one where the awarding institution is based. Transnational education can take several forms, including distance education, franchised programmes, collaborative ventures and international branch campuses. (2012: 627)

A new and significant aspect of internationalised higher education is the development of education hubs (Knight 2010; 2011; 2015). “Education hub is a label being used to describe a number of new and very different initiatives by countries in the Middle East and Southeast Asia that are trying to position themselves as regional centers of excellence in education” (Knight 2010: 20). Knight gives Qatar as an example of an education hub, as a country inviting and sponsoring six American institutions and one UK university to offer their full degree programs and qualifications to Qatari students and regional students. The project is totally financed by the Qatar Foundation and thus is a model difficult to replicate, but it aims to position Qatar as a regional source of high-quality education and to help prepare the country and region for a knowledge-oriented society and economy. (ibid.)

As an education hub, Qatar Foundation’s Education City (EC), which hosts several American and other branch campuses, is an example of internationalised and transnational education. Being part of EC, the ABP’s mission is to prepare local students for “universities at Qatar Foundation” and abroad34, but, in contrast to the foreign branch campuses present here, its transnational character is less obvious. This is mainly because, instead of being imported here lock, stock and barrel from another country, it was set up in Qatar as a quasi ‘local’ institution, specifically designed to cater to the academic needs of Qatari students preparing for entry into ‘foreign’ or Western universities and functioning under a local organisational entity, namely Qatar Foundation. At the same time, the ABP offers non-local, American education in English and operates in collaboration with other, internationalised academic institutions, the EC partner universities. Thus, the ABP can be seen as an internationalised educational establishment where Qatari students are offered a crossing into foreign ways of learning. It is characterised by the new educational dimensions I described in Chapter 1 (Sections 1.2.1-1.2.6): co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, critical thinking and independent study, critical teacher feedback, as well as emphasis on studying in foreign universities. Students’ experiences of Othering in the ABP can be linked to the new dimensions of the internationalised educational culture of the ABP classroom, as well as to aspects of local culture existing within the wider ABP surroundings, both organisational as well as societal. Section 2.6 discusses Othering in internationalised English education settings, thus illustrating further the relevance of the concept of Othering in the ABP context.

2.6 Othering in internationalised English language settings The concept of Othering has been applied to explore and understand the complexities involved in internationalised English language teaching settings, generating discussions among practitioners and scholars (e.g. Ahmadi 2015; Holliday 2009a; 2011; 2013; Kubota 2001; Lausch, Teman and Perry 2017; Lee and Rice 2007; Mengstie 2011; Palfreyman 2005; Rich and Troudi 2006). “Othering is important for TESOL professionals to consider because it shapes perceptions about many of the issues that administrators and teachers face”

34 For more details, see: http://www.abp.edu.qa/about-abp/mission-n-vision

(Palfreyman 2005: 213), such as “classroom interaction [and] conceptions of what it is to be taught and how it would be assessed” (ibid.). Thus, some writers use the concept of Othering to characterise classroom communication and conduct, educational goals, or teaching approaches. For example, Kubota examines Othering of foreign students in an English language teaching context enacted “by essentializing their culture and language” in an American classroom (2001: 10), while Rich and Troudi (2006) discuss patterns of racialization and Othering of Arab students of English in the UK. Other aspects stem from what Palfreyman describes as processes of cultural Othering visible in “everyday generalizations about cultural groups” (2005: 211) that show up in ordinary utterances such “the students here are so reluctant to speak up in class” (ibid.).

For Holliday, the act of Othering in an educational setting means “reducing a group of people to a negative stereotype” (ibid.) which can take the form of “reductionist overgeneralisation (…) of ‘foreign’ educators, students and societies” (Holliday 1999: 237-8). It is related to the notion of culture in its essentialist, macro-dimension of perceived collective cultural characteristics understood as “patterns of attitude and behaviour shared by people from a particular national or ethnic group” (Palfreyman 2005: 212) and affecting classroom exchanges and interactions.

Palfreyman links processes of Othering to power relationships in specific teaching situations (2005: 213), but shows that in such situations power can be distributed among various actors: administrators, teachers, and students, both local and foreign (ibid.: 218). Similarly, Jensen (2011) shows that Othering may happen be executed by diverse agents, for diverse reasons. In view of my previous discussion in this chapter (Sections 2.1 and 2.3), the issue of “the centre” with “the power to describe” (ibid.: 65) calls for reconsideration as it may have unhooked itself from its traditional association with the Western teacher as its only source, stretching now to local students Othering each other or becoming Others within their own society and potentially undergoing diverse modes of transformation through experiencing internationalised educational processes. Such encounters, taking place in an internationalised higher education context, lend themselves to interpretation from the perspective of transformative education, which I discuss in the section below (2.7).

2.7 Transformative effects of internationalised education The literature on internationalised higher education increasingly links it with the concept of transformative education and seeks to find out their mutual relevance and interactions (e.g. Kumi-Yebaoh 2014; Ritz 2010; Smith 2009). The theory of transformative learning was originated by Mezirow (1978), based on his research into “dramatic changes experienced in adults returning to college” (King 2011: 5). Mezirow defined transformative education as “a process of perspective transformation involving a structural change in the way we see ourselves and our relationships” (1978: 100). He coined the term a “meaning perspective” describing is as “the structure of cultural assumptions within which new experience is assimilated to – and transformed by – one’s past experience. It is a personal paradigm for understanding ourselves and our relationships” (ibid.: 101). The shift in one’s “meaning perspectives” is a crucial element of transformative learning. As an example of such a shift, Mezirow proposed “consciousness raising in the women’s movement”, as well as “the civil rights movement [in the United States], the Black awareness movement, and the anti-war movement” (ibid.102), thus linking meaning perspective transformation with social action.

However, other examples include transformations experienced on a more personal or psychological level (ibid.: 103-104): “The intentional use of educational experiences to bring about deep transformations in human consciousness and behaviour has existed in many forms throughout history” (Fisher-Yoshida, Geller, and Schapiro 2009: 3), since education is essentially a process of change and progress. Islamic view of education is rooted in spiritual development understood on a personal level but also in terms of gaining theological knowledge of God’s revelation and laws (Halepota 1975; Halstead 2004: 522). Western education, on the other hand, proceeded along increasingly secular lines (Gutek 1995). Mezirow’s understanding of a meaning perspective transformation builds on the cultural and social dimensions:

This perspective is important because it dictates criteria for identifying problems seen as relevant to him, for attitude formation, for making value judgments, for setting priorities for action and for feeling that he can change his situation through his own initiative. A meaning perspective is an integrated psychological structure with dimensions of

thought, feeling and will. What one wants to learn, his readiness to learn, the problems he chooses to act upon, his receptivity to attempts to inform or communicate with him, the source of legitimization he requires before he will try out new ideas, his conception of what is bad and good and his determination to persevere in taking individual and collective action - all depend upon his meaning perspective. We all require the meaning perspectives prescribed by our culture, but we have the potentiality of becoming critically aware of our perspectives and of changing them. By doing so, we move from an uncritical organic relationship to a self-consciously contractual relationship with individuals, institutions and ideologies. (Mezirow 1978: 108)

In the setting of my study – an internationalised educational institution offering pre- university English instruction to local students aiming to enter Western university – the concept of transformative education offered a possible additional interpretative insight into students’ experiences as defined by Othering in their potentially transformative encounters with the new educational dimensions and filtered through various multi-dimensional micro- and macro-cultural forces operating in and outside the ABP classroom.

In Section 2.8 below, I discuss how the cultural complexities of Othering present in my research setting can be studied through the lens of Holliday’s conceptualisation of small classroom culture and host culture complex.

2.8 Holliday’s framework and its relevance for my study Holliday’s conceptualisation of the small culture and host culture complex constitutes a significant part of my theoretical thinking on Othering in internationalised educational contexts, as well as providing a methodological groundwork for my study. As one of the most important writers in my immediate professional domain of English language education, his work constitutes a bridge between TESOL and a broader field of internationalisation of education and Othering in intercultural educational contexts (1994; 2009a; 2011; 2013). The seeds of his thinking grew out of his questioning internationalised educational initiatives concerning English language provision (1994). He specifically focused on its socio-cultural and political aspects, searching for appropriate teaching methodology which would be culture-sensitive and rooted in the specific context of a given language classroom (1994: 163-164), thus potentially minimising the effects of Othering. Holliday’s work provided me with an apparatus to approach the complex issue of Othering as the perspective of small culture and host culture complex

70 offered an effective way to explore the dynamics of Othering in the classroom, presenting pertinent methodological directions to do so. Holliday’s understanding of small culture also reflected the transformation of my own thinking concerning my teaching and research environment. I describe that transformation in Section 2.8.1.

2.8.1 My changing perspective: from large to small Generalised perceptions of different cultural settings arise from learning about a culture based on sweeping national, ethnic or religious characteristics (e.g. Hall 1959/1990; Hofstede 1991/2003; Jandt 2006; Triandis 2002). For several years after arriving in Qatar, most of the sources I relied on to explore local cultures and educational ethos, were rooted in that school of thinking (e.g. Hamady 1960; Huntington 1996/2002; Lewis 2002, 2003; Patai 1976/2002; Pryce-Jones 1990; Pipes 2003; Shayegan 1992).

In this way, by looking at my students through the large spectacles of their national/ethnic culture and religious background, I managed to avoid any sense of obligation to understand what really went on in my classroom as a specific small setting, with specific individuals as students. Instead, I considered aspects of Arab/Muslim culture to be the root cause of my local students’ behaviour and performance in class, interpreting both through a framework of nationally-, or ethnically-delineated concepts. For instance, if students consistently came to class late, I could use the polychronic time category (Jandt 2006: 226) to explain their behaviour: in Arab culture, there is no “adherence to schedules” (ibid.). Also, I could adopt Hofstede’s “Power Distance” (1991/2003: 27-28) and “Uncertainty Avoidance” (ibid.119-120) as blanket explanations of student-teacher relations and educational methodology in the Arab context, resigning myself to the fact that “high Power Distance societies [were] characterised by teacher-centred education” and high Uncertainty Avoidance meant “learning the subject as precisely as possible” (Goodman 1994: 138) through memorisation rather than analysis.

However, my prolonged, professional presence in Qatar and developing connections with local people gradually forced me to reconsider my initial viewpoint. The shift in my thinking was sealed by a seemingly unremarkable event still vivid in my memory. It

71 happened in an English classroom at Qatar University. With a few minutes to spare until the end of a writing class, I decided to show off my newly acquired, basic Arabic نار noor], meaning “light” and] - نور ,skills: I had just learnt to write two new words [naar], fire. Slowly, I scribbled them on the board. The students, all Arabic-speaker male undergraduates, sat there looking at my inexpert script with a mixture of surprise and amusement. At a loss for something to say, I blurted: “Noor wa naar, light and fire, like you. You are the light and fire of the world.” In the silence that followed my words, one of the students stood up, came to the board and wrote something in Arabic. He then turned to me and said: “That’s your name, ‘Majdalena’, in Arabic”. I sensed a subtle change in the classroom interactions between me and my students. It felt as if in their eyes I was no longer an indifferent, foreign teacher, a stranger in their land. Instead, I suddenly became someone like them – a fellow human being, a person with a name in their language who was trying to learn that language just as they were trying to learn English. Perhaps they saw my clumsy Arabic writing and felt empowered because now they could teach me something I did not know, even though I was their teacher. Or maybe they simply appreciated my effort to learn Arabic, which, they claimed, was the most beautiful and difficult language in the world. Whatever the reason, from then on, our interactions in and outside the classroom were different. In class, they were more ‘real’, more meaningful and personal: I taught and they studied more intensely and purposefully, in a more engaged way. We also often stayed after class, talking about ‘life’ and people, about Arabic and the Arabs, about cooking, cars, relationships, religion, politics and future plans.

It followed that I could no longer see my students as cultural clichés. Instead, they became individuals grouped together in a class, communicating with me, another individual, and jointly creating our own, new micro-culture. I saw that in my classroom, I was faced by real people whose behaviour and views often contradicted generalised, stereotyped descriptions of what was supposed to be their macro-culture. Considered in the context of an actual classroom with a particular group of students studying a specific English course, those descriptions tended to lose their seemingly sharp contours and definitive content, though they still provided some background. I realised that the

72 general cultural paradigms needed to be fine-tuned to fit my specific educational setting for me to better understand my Arab English-language classroom.

This approach found its theoretical foundations in Holliday’s conceptualisation of small cultures and host culture complex (1994, 1999). It was based on a concrete, observable small culture of a classroom, perceived and interpreted in its own right, though always in connection with its wider social context. I discuss it in detail in Sections 2.8.2-2.8.4, outlining the main points of Holliday’s framework and its relevance to my exploration of students’ experiences of Othering in the ABP classroom.

2.8.2 Small culture According to Holliday, small culture is not subordinate or subservient to a larger cultural structure, but constitutes an autonomous, integral system (1999: 239). It functions “between as well as within related large cultures” (ibid.), reflecting structural patterns that may be common across national boundaries, such as the spatial organisation of a classroom which appears to be similar in most countries and cultures due to various historical or political factors that may have shaped it. Moreover, “the idea of small cultures” does not directly coordinate with the essential features of national or regional cultures, but is closely linked to “any cohesive social grouping” (1999: 240), such as a classroom (1994: 23). Finally, “within the small culture paradigm, ‘culture’ refers to the composite of cohesive behaviour within any social grouping, and not to the differentiating features of prescribed ethnic, national or international entities” (1999: 247).

Thus, small culture is a concrete, observable, dynamic process with “a discernible set of behaviours and understandings connected with group cohesion” (1999: 248). Its dynamic character is pivotal as it can “exist, form and change as required” (ibid.). Holliday also refers to it as a social “tool-kit” to solve problems in class: it is an operational understanding of what goes on in the classroom, involving “underlying competence” of its participants who are active users of their shared small culture (Crane 1994: 11, cited in Holliday 1999: 248).

The formation of small culture is a complex process, starting from “the basic social and psychological function of culture as a process” (1999: 248), or the recognised human need for group cohesion. In other words, any social grouping will tend to create its own patterns of group life guiding its ways of conduct, “mores, laws, habits, customs, etiquette, fashions” (Schutz 1964: 92, cited in Holliday 1994: 23). Small culture formation also involves “social continuity” (Holliday 1999: 248) expressing of a sense of belonging and identity; for example, when class members form mutual ties based on “commonalities of educational, classroom, collegial and peer experience… [as] the building blocks for the new small culture” even if they come from different backgrounds and different sets of loyalties (ibid. 249). Another element of small culture formation has to do with “activities taking place within a group” (ibid. 250): classroom routines and conventions, such as “holding birthday parties for members” (ibid.). Finally, small culture formation is linked to discourse practised within the group, or the language used “in connection with a particular type of social activity” (ibid. 251).

Holliday’s small culture, though changeable and autonomous, operates within and is affected by its societal and institutional context, or the host cultural complex. I consider this in the next subsection, before highlighting the relevance of this approach in the context of exploring Othering in the ABP classroom.

2.8.3 Host culture complex Holliday describes the classroom as

part of a complex of interrelated and overlapping cultures of different dimensions within the host educational environment… [consisting of] the classroom, host institution, students, professional-academic, wider international education-related and national cultures. (1994: 28)

Thus, each classroom, however transient, functions inside this wider, more stable environment (1994: 15-18; 28-31) or the host culture complex, which comprises such aspects of the classroom’s environment as student cultures, host organisational culture, professional and international education-related, and wider national cultures. Let me briefly describe each element.

Student cultures are not understood exclusively in terms of “common characteristics of students from one particular country or region” (ibid. 54-55), but rather in terms of educational and academic cultures which transcend national cultures (ibid. 55). In the specific culture of a given classroom, students can prefer certain seating arrangements, exhibit varying degrees of motivation and responsibility for own learning, practise more or less “conservative attitudes to education” (ibid. 56-59), and reflect “the forces of role, power and status in the wider society” (ibid. 64).

The host organisational culture is related to the organisation where the classroom is situated, be it “a state school (…), private language institute (…), a university or college” (ibid. 15). Holliday defines “the host institutional environment as any type of environment which influences the host institutions and in turn, the classroom” (ibid.).

Image 5: Host culture complex (Holliday 1994: 29)

Professional-academic cultures are “the cultures connected with professional peer and reference groups, schools of academic thought and practice, professional approach etc.,

75 generated by professional associations, unions, university departments, publishers, etc. [all of which may] “extend beyond the boundaries of the national culture” (ibid. 29). This is especially true of English teachers working in non-English speaking countries since their framework of professional and academic references is of non-local nature (ibid. 29-30).

International education-related cultures concern “the wider ethos of what constitutes education, an educational institution, a department, a discipline, a teacher, and so on” (ibid. 30), but with many “approaches and practices” derived from and shared with foreign countries, “through training, visits, exchanges, conferences, etc.” (ibid.), or, broadly understood internationalisation of education, particularly English language education.

Finally, Holliday describes the larger national culture as an aggregate of “regional, urban and rural cultures, and of other activity cultures related to family, organisations, institutions, and so on.” (ibid.). Classroom culture participants will be members of several of those cultures simultaneously “and may conform to different cultural patterns in each” (ibid.), as they interrelate and interact with each other, forming the host culture complex, whose elements correspond to the various frameworks of power described in Section 2.3 of this chapter.

2.8.4 Relevance of Holliday’s framework for my study In the context of internationalised higher education exemplified by the ABP, Holliday’s conceptualisation of small culture and host culture complex facilitated an effective, in-depth exploration of local students’ experiences of Othering. It did so through an examination of new educational dimensions (co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, critical thinking and independent study skills, teacher feedback, emphasis on English-language university education) operating in the small setting of the ABP classroom and resulting in various experiences of Othering, while reinterpreting those experiences via host cultural forces present outside the classroom. In other words, the notion of small culture enabled me to form a micro-view of concrete patterns of student behaviour and mutual interactions

76 producing different forms of Othering, while the host culture complex allowed me to identify various macro-factors which had an impact on the classroom dynamics. Thus, the experiences of Othering taking place in a specific educational environment with specific educational dimensions could be seen and understood in their full richness and complexity. Holliday’s theory also provided foundations for my methodological approach, presented in Chapter 3, Section 3.4.

Concluding remarks While Chapter 2 presented the main concepts of my study’s theoretical framework, Chapter 3 will explain how I operationalised Holliday’s methodological directions, with details of my data collecting and generating tools, as well as discussing ethics procedures and researcher reflexivity.

Chapter 3: Research methodology and ethics

Introduction This chapter explains how I operationalised the methodological directions derived from Holliday’s work, turning them into the ethnographic case study I conducted to find out about students’ experiences of Othering in the ABP. I present the practical parameters of my research from the planning stages to execution, including researcher reflexivity and ethics procedures. I start from a brief explanation of its initial phase (Section 3.1), explain why I chose a qualitative approach (Section 3.2), and articulate my research questions (Section 3.3). I then discuss the rationale behind adopting an ethnographic case study as my research approach (Section 3.4) and present an overview of the research design (Section 3.5). In Section 3.6, I explain my methodological decisions and choice of instruments to gather data. Section 3.7 discusses researcher reflexivity as an important aspect of my study reflected in my Teacher Notes and Researcher Journal. Section 3.8 presents my study participant profiles and the final Section 3.9 provides details of strategies I used to minimise potential ethical issues.

3.1 Initial thoughts: natural rhythm and thinking time As a teacher researcher conducting research in my work setting, I structured my field research to reflect my institution’s ‘natural’ rhythm of teaching based on a yearly, two- semester cycle of instructional activities. That enabled me to design research activities to fit in with my professional duties during the academic year, facilitating access to research participants.

Additionally, I felt that my dual position helped to strengthen trust between me-as- researcher and volunteers taking part in my study, since they also knew me in my ‘normal’ role as a long-term teacher or colleague in a familiar organisation, and not a stranger probing into their views and experiences.

3.2 Qualitative approach and research gap My first encounter with scholarly work concerning education in Qatar was the published version of Sheikha Al-Misnad’s doctoral thesis at Durham University, The Development of Modern Education in the Gulf (1985). In it, Al-Misnad, who later became President of Qatar University, presented results of her mostly quantitative research into historical, political and socio-cultural aspects of the educational scene in Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain. Although informative and valuable, it also seemed incomplete, lacking more personal, experiential input from students, teachers, and administrators, with a laconic analysis of the local cultural and educational setting whose complexity I was beginning to recognise and acknowledge. This lack of personal/experiential and cultural data seemed to be a gap in research, especially that it has become increasingly impossible to detach English language education from wider socio-cultural concerns of its stakeholders (e.g. Holliday 1994; Palfreyman 2005; Syed 2003). In line with this new thinking of the significance of the socio-cultural context in language education, I felt that a qualitative approach would give justice to my complex educational setting and its participants (Pilch and Bauman 2001: 284).

Additionally, until recently, education in Qatar was a niche topic, studied by few scholars (Al-Kobaisi 1979; Al-Misnad 1985), with more scholarship starting to emerge only in the first decades of this century (e.g. Ahmadi 2015; Guarino and Tanner 2012; Hodges 2012; Mills 2014; Mir and Paschyn 2018; Nasser 2017; Romanowski and Nasser 2012a; 2012b; Stanfield 2014; Telafici, Martinez and Telafici 2014; Woodworth 2014), possibly due to recent educational and cultural developments in Qatar (Brewer et al. 2007; Stasz et al. 2007). To date, however, no major qualitative study of local students’ experiences of Othering in the context of internationalised English education in Qatar has been conducted, although the issue has been picked up and discussed by several writers in reference to Middle Eastern or Gulf students studying in parallel academic systems at home or abroad (e.g. Ideland and Malmberg 2014; Karmani 2005; Lausch, Temand and Terry 2017; Lee and Rice 2007; Linares 2016; Mensgtie 2011; Palfreyman 2005; Rich and Troudi 2006).

3.3 Research questions The primary purpose of my study was to find out about local students’ experiences of various forms of Othering while studying in the ABP: what contributed to these experiences of Othering and how they related to different educational processes taking place in this setting with its new academic culture of co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, critical thinking and independent learning, critical teacher feedback, and emphasis on studying in foreign universities (discussed in detail in Chapter 1, Section 1.2). Furthermore, I wanted to see how my research findings could be linked to a broader context of internationalised English language education elsewhere, where similar classrooms exist in comparable institutional and/or socio- cultural surroundings, and may invite parallel research questions.

I decided to organise the study around the following research questions, stated below:

1. What forms of Othering can be identified in local students’ experiences of the new educational culture they encounter in the ABP?

2. How do they relate to educational processes taking place in this setting?

3. What possible implications can be inferred from my study findings in the context of Qatar’s vision of knowledge-based society, educated to Western standards?

Focused on the above research questions, my study was to explore local students’ experiences in the ABP, including their behaviours, feelings, thoughts, and reactions related to studying in a new educational culture, whose key dimensions I saw as contributing to various forms of Othering manifesting themselves in those experiences. I wanted the study participants to reflect on those experiences and discuss them with me during the course of my research.

To answer my research questions, I used an ethnographic case study, operationalising Holliday’s methodological directions discussed in Chapter 2, Section 2.8. In the next section of this chapter, I explain reasons behind this decision.

3.4 How Holliday’s approach led me to ethnography The most significant part of Holliday’s thinking is that he considers the classroom in its social environment and distinguishes between the macro and micro social dimensions which determine its small, emergent culture: “the macro context includes the wider societal and institutional influences on what happens in the classroom. (...) In contrast, the micro social context consists of the socio-psychological aspect of group dynamics within the classroom” (1994: 13-14).

Accordingly, he uses the concept of ‘small’ culture “as an alternative to what has become the default notion of ‘large’ culture” (1999: 237), with its national, international, ethnic, and institutional references. He sees small classroom culture as “a dynamic, ongoing group process which operates in changing circumstances to enable group members to make sense of and operate meaningfully within those circumstances” (1999: 248). In this way, small classroom culture is freed from the constraints of essentialism, or loading it with ‘large’ cultural characteristics as if they were its essential features. It becomes an entity in its own right.

At the same time, Holliday recognises the significance of the macro dimension for the evolving small culture of the classroom. He names this “macro picture” (1994: 14) the host culture complex, showing it to be significant in understanding how outside influences might shape the inner workings of the classroom. The host culture complex comprises the host institution, professional values, education system, teachers, students, their parents, wider society, national culture, etc. (1994: 15-18; 28-31), all of which influence the functioning of small classroom culture, where students’ experiences of Othering can be detected and studied as a result of the dynamic interplay of the “micro” and “macro” forces operating within the classroom.

Holliday’s purpose was to “to present an argument for making English language education more appropriate to the social requirements of students and educators in different environments throughout the world” (ibid. 1), against “a relatively united approach to classroom instruction […] proclaimed across the globe” (ibid. 2). Searching for instruments that would enable TESOL practitioners to produce such more suitable, ‘contextualised’ methodologies, Holliday proposed the use of ethnographic thick description (discussed in Chapter 3, Section 3.4) to determine “what really happens in the classroom between people” (ibid. 10) – the main concern of my research. He specified his understanding of ethnography as “interpretative ethnography” (1999: 254), employed not to “develop knowledge of the details of a prescribed culture”, but to provide a description of culture as “an instrument of interest in a particular social issue” (ibid.), such as what happens in a language classroom. This view of ethnography corresponded with my study purpose which was to find out about local students’ experiences of Othering in a unique, complex internationalised educational context. Thus, Holliday’s framework offered to capture and conceptualise the main elements present in my research setting: “the social background of others” (1994: 3) and “the cultures of the classroom and the institution” (ibid.: 5), allowing me to develop a deeper understanding students’ experiences of Othering. His framework had significant methodological appeal for me for a number of reasons explained below.

In the ABP classroom, local students and foreign teachers create discrete areas of cultural interactions, fusing their diverse academic, cultural, and social contributions into unique ‘small cultures’, with new educational dimensions practised by the ABP, and local cultural connections brought in by the students and the wider institutional and social surroundings. In classroom interactions, both groups of actors, local students and foreign teachers, undergo a process of mutual discovery and cultural re-adjustment. Additionally, they share in the ethos of Qatar Foundation, the umbrella national organisation hosting Western branch campuses with diverse cultures of their own, practising internationalised education (Bhandari and El-Amine 2011; Chaudhuri 2008; Gill 2010; Knight 2011; 2015; Lewin 2008; Marmolejo 2011; Romani 2009; Rostron

2009a, 2009c). Students’ experiences of Othering result from the interplay of these many forces taking place in the specific, culturally complex context of the ABP.

Thus, Holliday’s conceptualisation of small classroom culture and host culture complex led me to adopting an ethnographic case study approach as an effective methodological framework for studying this intricate and dynamic setting with its participants’ experiences of Othering.

3.5 Ethnographic case study As a way “of describing a particular culture” (Spradley and McCurdy, 1972: 3), ethnography seemed appropriate for my research exploring students’ experiences within small classroom cultures in the ABP. Holliday stresses “the value of ethnography as a qualitative, interpretative research tool which looks at small groups as cultures” (1996: 234), especially in education research. Ethnographic research in education has a long and recognised history (e.g. Figueroa 2016; Heath 1983; Holliday 1996; 2004b; Hornberger 1994; Lazaraton 1995; Watson-Gegeo 1988; 1997). Since the 1970s, when ethnography first started to play a significant role in educational research (Figueroa 2016), ethnographic studies of language education have increasingly shifted away from “authoritative” towards “more “porous” descriptions [to] allow multiple interpretations and dialogicality about others’ realities” (Toohey 2008: 185), recognising power relations involved in ethnographic representations (ibid.: 182), and stressing the multi- dimensional, fluid nature of identities, cultures, and societies (ibid.: 184).

Ethnography’s chief value lies in its holistic outlook understood as “the ethnographer’s goal of creating a whole picture of the particular culture, cultural situation, or cultural event under study – a picture that (…) reveals the interrelatedness of all the component parts” (Hornberger 1994: 688, cited in Cumming et al. 1994). This holistic approach to research via ethnography includes the perspectives of different research participants, with the ethnographer describing “the culture as its members understand it and participate in it (…) and thereby attaining the emic view” (ibid.).

According to Lett (1990: 130), “emic constructs are accounts, descriptions, and analyses expressed in terms of the conceptual schemes and categories regarded as meaningful and appropriate by the native members of the culture whose beliefs and behaviors are being studied”. Using an emic approach in my study brought my participants’ points of view into the research, allowing participants and data to ‘speak’ for themselves. It highlighted participants’ agency with regard to their own cultural and learning environment they were requested to describe and interpret (ibid.).

While emphasising an emic perspective, I wanted to establish “an interpretative or etic” (Hornberger 1994: 689, cited in Cumming et al. 1994) voice of an observer/recorder, or myself. As Lett (1990) describes, “etic constructs are accounts, descriptions, and analyses expressed in terms of the conceptual schemes and categories regarded as meaningful and appropriate by the community of scientific observers” (130). This approach afforded references to my own ontological and interpretative position as a participant observer working in the research setting (Richards 2003: 14), enabling me to include my own understandings and background knowledge of the study context. I considered the etic side of the research to be ‘parallel’ with, rather than antithetical to, the emic one.

Given the cultural complexity of my research setting, I saw ethnography, thus understood, as a methodological foundation for an effective data collection and generation strategy. Since the ethnographic approach aims to provide an understanding of cultural or organisational phenomena “both in depth and within [their] unique context of place, time, and people”, it is particularly productive and meaningful when it is used with the case study design (Jung 2014:1). According to Denzin and Lincoln, case study is “the study of things in their natural settings, attempting to make sense of, or interpret phenomena in terms of meanings people bring to them” (1994: 2). Defined by an “interest in the individual case” (Stake 2005: 443), a case study is characterised by “boundedness and specificity” (White, Drew and Hay 2009: 20) and is used for researching specific small-scale contexts (Richards 2003: 20-21).

Methodologically, in a case study, ethnographic tools of data gathering can be used, such as unstructured observation, interviews, researcher reflection and/or journal notes, and analysis of documents (Toohey 2008: 177). Richards states that, in a case study, “any qualitative methods are appropriate provided that there are multiple sources of information generating a sufficiently rich description” (2003: 20). This rich or thick description of a particular cultural context is aimed at providing “webs of meaning” to be applied for interpretative purposes (Geertz 1973; Holliday 2008; Ponterotto 2006). Building on the original definition by Geertz (1973), Holliday refers to thick description as a “network of interconnected data” (2008: 103), or a multitude of significant details and observations, lived experiences, notes by the researcher and input from the participants (ibid.).

Thick description emerged as the most functional approach for my study which was conducted in a culturally complex setting, where it became more than a mere tool of data collection and generation: it formed the core of my developing research philosophy as an expression of my inherent “strangeness” (ibid. 13) vis-à-vis the researched, helping me to retain curiosity about the many aspects of the world I worked in and undertook to explore through an ethnographic case study. I was drawn to thick description because

[it] does more than record what a person is doing. It goes beyond mere fact and surface appearances. It presents detail, context, emotion, and the webs of social relationships that join persons to one another. Thick description evokes emotionality and self-feelings. It inserts history into experience. It establishes the significance of an experience, or the sequence of events, for the person or persons in question. In thick description, the voices, feelings, actions, and meanings of interacting individuals are heard. (Denzin, 1989: 83, cited in Ponterotto 2006: 540)

Essentially, in thick description, emphasis is put “on detail; context; thoughts; feelings; webs of relationships; and meanings that are both spoken out loud and those that are communicated by gesture, silence, and innuendo. Case study researchers, in seeking to examine the distinctive attributes of a particular case, are encouraged to pay attention to matters of history, context, and physical setting that are typically the focus of attention in

85 thick description” (Dawson 2012: 3). Another key characteristic of thick description is related to story building: “the narrative element present in thick description is paramount” (ibid.), especially in case study, which is “the art of telling the story of what is going on, what is most significantly meaningful” (Stake 1994, cited in Dawson 2012: 3). “The aim is to tell as much as can be discerned through interaction and observation, giving voice to the views and stories of research participants, but always mediated by the interpretive lens brought to the telling by the researcher and the circumstances in which the research is being carried out” (ibid.). Thus, I built thick description of my study context using details obtained from my research data (documents, observations, interviews, students’ stories), as well as from my Teacher Notes and Researcher Journal, discussed in Sections 3.6.6 and 3.6.7 respectively.

In summary, an ethnographic case study is a description of a specific, bounded context, using thick description of a particular culture to generate hypotheses about emergent cultural patterns present in that context and their meanings in relation to a wider social setting. Richards points out that “[i]n a field as broad geographically, socially and intellectually as TESOL […], the power of the particular case to resonate across cultures should not be underestimated” (2003: 21). As an English language teaching internationalised tertiary institution in an Arab country, the ABP constitutes a rich context for an ethnographic case study, which takes into account its specific, concrete nature, while indicating potential parallels with other similar settings and developments in the region and beyond.

Framing my research as an ethnographic case study, I followed in the footsteps of other educational researchers (e.g. Herrera 1992; Jackson 2004; Ladd 1995; Lightfoot 1983; Palfreyman 2005). Hence, my study is situated in the field of educational ethnography and aims to contribute to the literature on Othering in internationalised educational settings (e.g. Ahmadi 2015; Ideland and Malmberg 2014; Lausch, Temand and Terry 2017; Lee and Rice 2007; Linares 2016; Mensgtie 2011), combining descriptive, exploratory and explanatory aspects.

3.5 Research design: overview Signposted by my research questions and based on the working pattern of the ABP, my field study comprised three overlapping, interrelated aspects developed over one academic year, August 2012 till May 2013.

One aspect was to develop, through thick description, a comprehensive picture of the setting which formed the background to students’ experiences of Othering. The second aspect consisted of an exploration of student informants’ experiences, accessed through their own reflections and supplemented by comments and observations by participating teachers/administrators. I used three student informants, one female and two male students, each from a different level of English. The third aspect of my study was related to researcher reflexivity, aiming to provide a reflexive examination of the research process and my role in it. Table 1 below presents a summary of my research design.

Aspect of study Method 1) Ethnographic Factual Questionnaire 1 with closed and open-ended questions aspect: thick (demographic and educational background of ABP students), description (students, scheduled observations, semi-structured interviews, document teachers, analysis (e.g. ABP handbook, syllabi, lesson plans, materials, administrators, student essays, etc.), Teacher Notes classroom, institution, documents, significant incidents)

2) Exploration of Open-ended Questionnaire 2, semi-structured interviews with student experiences key student informants and other participants, Teacher Notes with focus on three student participants

3) Self-reflexive Teacher Notes and Researcher Journal aspect

Table 1. Summary of my study design

3.6 Study participants Before I discuss my choice of methods used in this study (Section 3.6), I want to present profiles of my participants.

3.6.1 Participants: sampling and profiles For the ethnographic aspect of the study, I used convenience or opportunistic sampling (Cohen, Manion and Morrison 2006. 2006: 143; Holliday 2008: 22). This was mainly because a fresh contingent of students enters the ABP every academic year and I have routine access to them via my professional contacts and duties. Thus, my student participants were graduates of local secondary schools, admitted to the ABP for the 2012/13 academic year, aiming to gain admission into English-medium universities in Education City or abroad. To recruit student participants, I asked permission from the ABP administration and colleagues in the English Department to visit several English classes of different levels (F1, F2, and AE) in August 2012, so I could announce and explain my research to students, and distribute Participant Information Sheets and Consent Forms (Appendix 4). I had no specific selection criteria for participants other than their being ABP students. Their participation consisted of answering questions in Questionnaire 1 (Appendix 5), used for the purpose of building a description of ABP students’ initial responses to the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture. Furthermore, I observed some of their classes throughout the academic year.

Over the course of the academic year, I also recruited seven colleagues (five English teachers and two administrators in total), with experience of the ABP setting, to provide insights into it and/or focus on students’ experiences as seen by teachers/administrators.

They were:

 Sara, female, American, English teacher  Chris, male, American, English teacher  Alice, female, Canadian, English teacher  Nina, female, American, English teacher  Cristina, female, Romanian, English teacher  Fatma, female, Qatari, ABP administrator  Alia, female, Qatari, ABP administrator

To recruit them, I sent an email to the ABP administration and all of my English Department colleagues detailing my research and asking for volunteers. After receiving email responses from the ones willing to participate, I approached them in person to hand out Participant Information Sheets and Consent Forms modified for teacher/administrator use.

3.6.2 Student informants I recruited my three student informants in January 2013, after they had spent one whole semester in the ABP. This was because I felt they would be more familiar with the ABP setting and culture by then, and therefore have more material to reflect on in terms of their experiences. To recruit them, I followed the same procedures as described in Section 3.5.1 above, visiting one class from each level: F1, F2 and AE, conducting information sessions and distributing Participant Information Sheets and Consent Forms two weeks prior to an introductory meeting with the three volunteers. This time, however, I did have specific selection criteria. My choice of participants was purposeful (Richards 2003: 21) to suit my research needs (Cohen, Manion, and Morrison 2006: 103) and the student informants were selected based on their nationality, educational background, university plans and level of English. Thus, all three were Qataris who previously studied in a national gender- segregated, independent school and aspired to study at an English-medium university. Each came from a different level of English in the ABP (F1, F2 and AE), with varied sets of language skills. The three student informants selected for this study were: Abdulla (F1,

89 male), Hamad (F2, male) and Aisha (AE, female). Their names have been changed. They told me the stories of their ABP experiences during the two semesters of 2012/13, based on their own perceptions and understandings of those experiences.

While working with my key informants, my procedures consisted of an introductory meeting and distribution of Questionnaire 2, and two to three post-questionnaire scheduled interviews/conversations, each lasting 15-30 minutes, depending on my informants’ availability. Additionally, I conducted a pre-arranged observation of each participant’s English class and a brief informal interview with their respective English teachers for additional data.

At the introductory meeting, each informant was asked to fill in a brief open-ended questionnaire (Questionnaire 2, Appendix 6) and given a week to do so. The questions included in Questionnaire 2 concerned students’ views on their adjustment to co- education, language issues, academic integrity rules, critical thinking and independent study, critical feedback from teachers, and university applications. Their responses were to serve as a spring board for a series of two to three scheduled, semi-structured, informal interviews, or purposeful conversations (Section 3.7.3).

I used informants’ answers as topics for our interview/conversation in the first post- questionnaire meeting. To reflect upon their Questionnaire 2 responses, I arranged separate post-questionnaire meetings with the three informants based on available timings. In total, I conducted between two and three such scheduled meetings with each informant, each lasting from 15 to 30 minutes and arranged according to our respective schedules in the ABP. After the fairly formal introductory meeting, my three student informants became more relaxed and ready to talk to me about their various experiences in the ABP.

The first post-questionnaire meeting took place on three separate days, after classes, with individual informants. At the meeting I talked to each student about their responses to the questionnaire and asked them further questions arising from my notes on their

90 original written responses. Having noted their comments, I asked them for member- checking of my notes on the spot. This technique, though time-consuming, allowed them to assert control over the material from the start and enabled me to clarify any uncertain points straight away. On-the-spot member-checking was not always possible due to time constraints, in which case I asked them for member-checking of my notes at their convenience. Our first interview/conversation focused on Q2 themes, but was designed to expand them, building on their individual written responses. Thus questions were fine-tuned to suit each case.

Their responses and comments were the backbone of their stories, but, to develop them further, I drew on additional sources of information: views on their experiences provided by their respective English teachers, my notes from class observations, and remarks in my Teacher Notes.

To add to the data obtained from interviews/conversations with my student informants, I also observed them in their respective English classes and took notes based on those observations (in total, I conducted three scheduled and pre-arranged 15-20 minute long observations, one per each participant). After every observation, I met with each of them for any additional remarks, and asked their English teachers to comment on each class I had seen. Finally, I referred to relevant passages from my Teacher Notes.

Overall, the student informants’ data was collected/generated through the following research tools:

 Questionnaire 2 with open-ended questions concerning participants’ experiences in the ABP, centred around the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture;  Post-questionnaire meetings: two to three scheduled, semi-structured, informal interviews/purposeful conversations with the three participating students;  Scheduled observations of my participants’ English classes (one observation per participant);  Brief interviews with their respective English teachers;  Excerpts from my Teacher Notes.

3.6.3 Respect and trust After the first information sessions and the initial Questionnaire 1, it was straightforward, even easy, to recruit participants for subsequent research activities. In fact, I had more volunteers than I needed and had to politely refuse some eager potential contributors. This perhaps unusual situation can be explained by the informal way information is disseminated in Qatar. Even though my position as a researcher was new within the ABP setting, to that fresh cohort, starting the autumn semester in August 2012, I was not an entirely unknown quantity as a teacher there. Many had heard about ABP courses and teachers, including me, from friends or relatives who had attended the ABP in the past. In the small community of approximately 250,000 indigenous Qataris35 (Kamrava 2013; Winckler 2015) it is the word of mouth that constitutes the essence of communication in the country. First having heard of me and then having met me as an ABP teacher with many years of experience of living and working in Qatar, students found it easy also to acknowledge me as a researcher and afford me a degree of respect and trust. This helped me to recruit participants.

Respect between the researcher and her participants translates into reciprocal recognition of mutual duties and obligations, including time-keeping, honest approach to research activities, and polite treatment of each other. A lot of that respect is already built into the institutional practice of the ABP. As a teacher-researcher I knew I could rely on it as an integral part of my interactions with the participants.

The question of trust was more complex. Aware of my participants’ vulnerable position as my research participants and learners in my work setting, I put in place a number of ethical guidelines and procedures that I followed closely throughout the entire research process (details in the section below). Over the course of the academic year, through numerous in-depth conversations, regular meetings, observations, and other encounters, I developed lasting connections with several volunteers taking part in the study, as I usually do with my regular students, uninvolved in any research of mine, who habitually come to visit me in my office. As I mention in Chapter 5, office visits by

35 I discussed the demographics of Qatar in Chapter 1.

92 students are a strong characteristic of the professional culture of the ABP. I use the word “professional” advisedly, because those visits can be quite personal in terms of topics discussed and the depth of disclosure involved, even though professional boundaries are always strictly maintained. Unlike in the case of office meetings with regular students, during all of my research meetings with participants I took extensive notes, always with their full knowledge and approval. I also provided my participants with opportunities for member-checking (Section 3.9.1). This helped to strengthen mutual trust and enhanced the ethical dimension of my research.

3.7 Methods of data collection/generation and sources of data As reflected in Table 1 (Section 3.5), I set out to gather data through a variety of methods and data sources. Those choices were a result of pragmatic and practical thinking on my part related to student availability and my own position within the study setting. Below I provide details of and rationale behind the instruments used.

3.7.1 Relevant documents My study also drew on information provided in relevant, publicly available Qatar Foundation’s publications and records, ABP handbook, syllabi, teaching materials, anonymised student essays, as well as relevant media reports. Purposeful documentary analysis enabled me to interrogate the research context. Holliday (2008: 69) includes “everyday documents”, such as the ones listed above, in his definition of artefacts: “things that are made, worn, said, displayed, shown, exchanged, and so on” (ibid. 68). He describes how artefacts reveal the unfamiliar (ibid. 68-69) and talks about a “critical awareness” (ibid. 69) of a researcher, enabling her to examine a document in a new way, to find out “what the document does and projects rather than the information it provides” (ibid. 69).

I attempted to view in this way some of the documents available to me, trying to replace my ‘normal’ thinking of them as part of my working environment with “ethnographic questions” (ibid. 69): What was going on there? Why were things written the way they were written? What values and/or ideology could be seen through the documents I inspected? (ibid.) For example, I used excerpts from an anonymised student’s essay to

93 highlight their changing view of co-education. Although the essay was written as an academic task and not for research purposes, its content was relevant and meaningful in deepening my understanding of related student experiences. I also made use of media reports, published in the local English-language press, such as The Peninsula or The Qatar Tribune, or an online information outlet, Doha News. They provided an insight into the on-going public debates in Qatar concerning issues relevant to my research, such as prioritising English in education, cultural perceptions of criticism, or changing role of women in Qatari society.

3.7.2 Questionnaires 1 and 2 Questionnaire 1 (Appendix 5) was administered as an opening activity in my field research. There were several reasons behind its use. First, since I wanted to present a rich description of the setting, I saw that a questionnaire related to students’ first, “raw” responses to the key dimensions of the new educational culture of the ABP could be a source of significant details adding to that description and building a demographic and educational background of ABP student population. Second, using a questionnaire seemed an easy way into the research process itself: with relatively straightforward questions and involving quite a large number of students (N=38) so early on in my investigation, it would help to make myself known to them as a researcher and to encourage participation in future activities. Finally, Questionnaire 1 informed the design of Questionnaire 2 (Appendix 6). I briefly explain that relationship below.

Questionnaire 1 contained “factual” (McDonough & McDonough 1997: 174) and general questions on the participants’ background in relation to the main topics of my research: the key dimensions of the ABP culture. Thus, the questions concerned gender, nationality, former school, views on co-education, recognition of academic concepts such as independent study or plagiarism, self-assessment of various English skills, educational goals and university plans, plus reasons for choosing the ABP. Thus, while responding to it, students had an opportunity to consider the key dimensions of the new educational culture of the ABP. It was administered at the very beginning of the research process, in August 2012. The responses described students’ initial views and attitudes, before any significant experiences or reflection could have taken place.

The questions in Questionnaire 2 were closely related to the first questionnaire and intended for my three student informants, later in the research process, in January 2013, as the students became more familiar with the ABP environment and more likely to offer deeper, richer insight into some of the key dimensions of the ABP. Questionnaire 2 aimed to expedite further interviews/conversations with the three informants, serving as a starting point.

To prepare Questionnaire 2, I studied responses to Questionnaire 1 and organised them in groups corresponding to the topics of co-education, language, academic integrity, etc. I then annotated and coded them, and used them as a basis for open-ended questions to include in Questionnaire 2. For example, since all Questionnaire 1 respondents initially stated they were happy about studying in English, I wanted to give my student informants an opportunity for more reflection after one semester in the ABP with English as their language of instruction. Therefore, in Questionnaire 2, I asked a question about positive and negative aspects of studying English in the ABP. Additionally, I posed open-ended questions about positive and negative aspects of studying in the ABP as well as a descriptive question asking to comment on the student’s overall ABP experience.

Designing both questionnaires, I considered my research focus and my target audience, and strived to formulate the questions in an unambiguous way, avoiding sensitive questions and adjusting the language to suit my participants, yet structured to elicit relevant data (Brinkman 2009: 4) that would help me find out about students’ experiences in the ABP.

3.7.3 Observations I used scheduled unstructured observations to add to the ethnographic description of the research context and to supplement data obtained from interviews/conversations with the three student informants and related to their individual experiences. Each observation was pre-arranged and lasted between 15 and 20 minutes. During each observation I collected extensive field notes. The purpose of my observations was to develop a deeper understanding of complex ABP classrooms settings and relationships existing within them (Bogdan 1973: 303).

Observation is one of the main methods in ethnographic research (Bogdan 1973; Cohen, Manion and Morrison 2006. 2006; Hemmings 2009; Hornberger 1994; Richards 2003, etc.). I wanted to use the data from observations to add to the ethnographic picture I was constructing of the ABP environment by describing the daily functioning of the English classroom. I felt that, through naturalistic observations, my own ‘organic’ knowledge of this environment would expand to better reflect the scope of detail characterising this setting. Still, the fact that I was intimately familiar with the research context was an asset in affording me a “privileged” position as its interpreter. Being “an organic part of the institutional environment” (McDonough & McDonough 1997: 116), with “insider- knowledge” (ibid. 118), made it possible for me “to tap into the constantly fluctuating interactions and relationship patterns in a group of people working together” (ibid. 114), in a way grounded in my pre-existing knowledge of the research setting.

Naturalistic unstructured observation had several other advantages (Kawulich 2005). Observing different groups of students in different lessons and different English courses would reveal how they interacted and communicated with each other and their respective teachers in these groups, what events and behaviours took place in various classrooms, as well as offering opportunities for me to see or take part in unanticipated happenings (ibid.).

While cognisant of the benefits of naturalistic observation, I was also aware of its limitations, particularly in my double role as researcher and teacher in the same setting. Thus I had to constantly check my own tendency to take things for granted as a long- term ABP teacher. Also, I needed to control an urge to generalise observed students’ behaviour on the basis of my prior knowledge. In my writing, I strived to clarify these subjectivities through researcher reflexivity.

3.7.4 Interviews/conversations with a purpose During my study, I used semi-structured interviews as well as informal conversations with teacher/administrator participants and the three student informants. I conducted one semi-structured interview each with Chris and Sara, two English teachers, concerning their perceptions of the ABP context and students’ experiences (Appendix

7). Due to time constraints, both opted for email-based communication. Some researchers note lack of social cues, such as facial expressions or body language, as a disadvantage of email interviewing which therefore “provides a limited register for communication” (Bampton and Cowton 2002: para. 25). However, since my interviewees were also my colleagues, any potential clarity issues would be resolved through member-checking.

I also interviewed Alia and Fatma, two Qatari administrators (questions in Appendix 7), to gain insight into their perceptions of students’ educational background of independent schools and ABP experiences. Due to her busy schedule, Alia only managed to participate in one informal interview whose content I noted down as we spoke, typed immediately afterwards and showed to her for member-checking in a second meeting (transcribed notes in Appendix 8). Unlike Alia, Fatma responded in writing, answering questions about the independent school system in Qatar, as well as questions concerning students’ experiences in the ABP setting (image in Appendix 8). When I read and annotated her responses, I met with her for member-checking of her statements.

To explore the experiences of my student informants, I used a series of two to three semi-structured, informal interviews. They were mostly oral, with some email input. One brief informal interview with each informants’ English teacher (Alice, Nina, Cristina) was also used for their comments on the three informants’ experiences. Although recording interviews and other spoken interactions is recommended (Richards 2003: 172-180; Cohen and Crabtree 2006: 1), I decided against recording my interviews. Quite early on in the research, I realised that setting up formal interviews with a recording device was unproductive, or even counter-productive, in my research context. I arranged just one such interview with a volunteering student, potential study informant36, before I abandoned the idea for good. The student, a Qatari female, Kaltham (not her real name), arrived in my office breathless and stressed out, worried that she might be late for “the appointment”, as she put it. Having been briefed earlier

36 In the end, I decided not to use that participant because she left the ABP.

97 about my research and interview with her, she had read the Information Sheet, signed her Consent Form, and agreed to being recorded. First, I allowed for a few minutes of informal chat to relax her and make the interview easier. She happily obliged and offered me interesting comments about her academic progress, fellow students, teachers, and her changing perceptions of the ABP. However, as soon as I switched on my recorder, her tone of voice and body posture visibly changed: she spoke haltingly, in a higher-pitched voice, and moved to the edge of her chair, sitting upright and tugging at her shayla. During the interview, she tried to answer my questions in full sentences, correcting her English if she thought she had used a wrong word or verb form37. She did not sound at all like the Kaltham I had spoken to earlier and did not repeat any of her previous points, although my questions concerned similar matters. I had an impression she was making an effort to please me by answering my questions in a ‘positive’ way, praising everything and everyone in the ABP, in contrast to what she had said just a few minutes before. Her body language signalled her discomfort. The whole procedure felt rigid and artificial. I finally switched off the recording device and she asked: “Can I talk normal now?”

Her simple, bona fide question made me realise that the initial ‘loose’ remarks she made during our five-minute informal conversation before the actual interview were probably more telling, insightful and honest than the responses she gave me in the carefully planned, scheduled, structured, and recorded interview. Kaltham also wanted to know if we could re-record her answers because she feared she “sounded stupid” in the original recording. I reassured her that this was not the case, but was left with a frustrating feeling of having conducted a pointless research activity.

Its pointlessness was all the more pronounced since Kaltham was a “returning” student who had studied in the ABP the year before (2011/12) and came back for an extra semester in August 2012. In the previous academic year, she was my student in an

37 This preoccupation with their own linguistic accuracy also characterised my other participants, for example, those involved in case studies and invited to double check my notes would insist on correcting their ‘mistakes’ if I had noted their words verbatim.

Academic Composition class. We often chatted after class and I usually found her observations relevant and worthwhile. She was no longer my student at the time of my field research and I welcomed her volunteering to take part in my study, hoping to get meaningful insights from her, just as I had always done in our previous conversations. In the interview, however, my hopes were not fulfilled, mainly because of the artificial situation I had created myself by setting it up in the first place. Clearly, I put Kaltham in a new, unnatural position, as opposed to the more spontaneous, casual setting she was used to while talking to me in my office when not involved in my research. Moreover, the formality of the situation called for a specific cultural protocol – going ‘on record’ meant having to appear polite and non-critical to avoid causing offence and/or loss of face. Let me add that this was not the case with teacher/administrator participants. Some responded in writing anyway, but others, who participated in conversations with notes, did not seem to have similar issues, probably due to their different position and different relationship with me as their interviewer.

That first-hand experience as a researcher trying to record an interview with a research participant convinced me that recording interviews was not going to be a productive method for my study. Additionally, the relevant literature (Blommaert and Jie 2010; Burgess 1982; Holliday 2008; Mason 2010) led me to reconsider my approach to structuring my interviews:

[L]ess structured interviews are more in touch with the social world, [and] being able to tap into everyday reality, they are clearly quite well suited to teacher research and to the ways in which teachers interact with learners, colleagues and others in their working environments. (McDonough & McDonough 1997: 184)

Quoting Schatzman and Strauss, Burgess says that “the field researcher is a methodological pragmatist” (1973: 7, cited in Burgess 1982: 4), treating each method as a practical tool for obtaining answers, monitoring its usefulness and modifying it if necessary. As I considered the above factors, I made a decision to modify my approach to interviewing my research participants, making it more effective in my specific research context. Thus, based on my experience described here and supported by the literature on effective interviewing in ethnographic research, I redesigned my

99 subsequent interviews as semi-structured, informal “conversations with a purpose” (Burgess 1982: 164-169). They served my goals more adequately, shifting from an artificial and formalised mode to a more natural and interactive one, very much like the conversations I would have with regular students coming to see me in my office. My study participants responded to them willingly, although the conversational approach also involved an increased amount of work for me in terms of extensive note-taking and member-checking.

Blommaert and Jie stress that interviews respond to the same “opportunities and constraints as ‘ordinary’ conversations” (2010: 44). As a result, an interview is “dialogical in the sense that both parties contribute to it” (ibid.). Thus, rapport between the interviewer and the interviewee is crucial, based on mutual trust and respect, two qualities I discussed in Section 3.8.1. In my case, it also involved considering cultural parameters of each research event, such as the cultural protocol of avoiding explicit public (recorded) criticism. Turning formal interviews into purposeful conversations helped bolster trust between me and my participants and provided useful data.

Researching a teaching context via ethnography means a continuing dialogue between the researcher and the participants of her study. This dialogue is understood in metaphorical terms as on-going interactions on various levels involving the researcher and different agents with a stake in the context, but it also has a more literal meaning embodied in an interview. Of course, using interviews does not automatically indicate the ethnographic character of one’s research: “there is nothing intrinsically ethnographic about an interview, and doing interviews does not make your research ethnographic” (Blommaert and Jie 2010: 42). But an ethnographic researcher recognises that “interviews are conversations” (ibid. 43) and verbatim data – “what the people in the research setting actually say” (Holliday 2008: 61) – “is as much mediated by the presence of the researcher, what she chooses to ask, the way she asks it, how she leads the conversation, how she frames the interview event, what she chooses to select from the broader corpus, how she interprets what she selects, and so on” (ibid.).

100

3.7.5 Background knowledge and Teacher Notes Over the many years of living and teaching in Qatar, I have accumulated some background knowledge of my work/research context. That knowledge does not readily lend itself to theorisation, because it is rooted in personal contacts, informal conversations, and fleeting moments of understanding. They form a body of insight and expertise that is intangible, but also solid. In my study, this body of insight provided me with an additional source of data. For the sake of transparency and rigour, I used it with caution, only referring to particularly relevant points, and indicating each piece of information or interpretation derived from it. Mostly, it was documented through my Teacher Notes which were a form of diary-writing, with personal reflections on my teaching in Qatar. I chose the word “notes” as part of their title to emphasize their random, spontaneous nature.

My Teacher Notes preceded my research and have continued even after my fieldwork was concluded in May 2013. They are a raw, written record of my twenty-odd year long experience in Qatar: a commentary on my professional life which has, over the years, blended into my personal world of long-lasting connections with the people I have met, taught, worked with, and often befriended. Some of the notes are retrospective, some written ad hoc, with most being impromptu narrative descriptions of critical or relevant events, interesting incidents or simply occurrences that for some reason made me wonder about my social/professional/research setting and people involved in it. All are linked to the reflexive aspect of my study.

McDonough and McDonough call such writings “a reflective genre and one of a battery of interpretative micro-ethnographic research techniques” (1997: 121). They quote Anaïs Nin who described a personal diary as “a rough, impulsive study of life itself” proving “that life is not one thing but changes constantly, that character has not one face but a thousand, changing as these pages change” (cited in McDonough and McDonough 1997: 121). As part and parcel of the context I was researching, I provided my own insights into it, writing them down “as a way of structuring, formulating and reacting”

101 to that context and my experience of it, and in this way making it “available for reflection and analysis” (ibid. 122).

It was only when I started contemplating a most effective methodological approach to my research that I realised the potential value of those remarks for the abundance and authenticity of detail they provide as well as their reflexive dimension. I consider them to be what Holliday calls “personal narrative” (2005: 305). He explains how “using personal narrative” (ibid. 304) turned out to be effective in examining his own position and ideology as a researcher, enabling him to “understand the voice [he] was able to project” (ibid. 306). Incorporating selected fragments or vignettes from my Teacher Notes into my thesis was essential for me to be able to review my subjectivity in the study and draw on my background knowledge of the context I was researching and interacting with professionally. Cognisant of the spontaneous, even casual, nature of some of the notes, I aimed to ensure that each note I cited in the thesis came with a clear explanation as to its origin and, if identifiable, date of creation.

Image 6: Teacher Notes sample random pages, autumn semester 2012

102

3.7.6 Researcher Journal I recorded reflections on being a researcher in my work setting in a Researcher Journal. Through the Journal entries, I wanted to disclose the practical details of the research procedures as well as my methodological struggles. I recorded the research process, moving emphasis away from my teaching role to my research role and recognising tension between them. The Journal charted the trajectory of my thinking about the research design and development, including organisational details of the research activities, my interactions with and reactions to participants, ethical issues and methodological points, as well as highs and lows of the research process, with moments of frustration when a procedure did not yield expected results, or excitement when it brought fresh insights.

At first, I approached my Researcher Journal in a rather ‘technical’ way, briefly noting down procedural minutia related, for example, to modifications in the research plan when a classroom observation had to be postponed for some reason, or when an interviewee changed the time or place of their interview, or when I had to print out extra copies of the Consent Form for my participants who kept losing them. A few weeks into the process, I started recording more in-depth reflections related to the study and doing so in a more analytical manner as I tried to understand my own researcher cognitions evolving with the research and uncover the way they had been shaped by my “socio- cultural locations, including the values that these locations confer[red] upon” me (Hammersley & Atkinson 1995: 16, cited in Holliday 2005: 305). Notes from my Researcher Journal trace my influence on the study and my development as a researcher, combining that with comments on the progress of the study in terms of effectiveness of its methods or appropriateness and usefulness of data.

My Teacher Notes and Researcher Journal illustrate a point made by Khawaja and Mørck that “researchers are always implicated as persons in the research process” (2009: 29). They make my presence in this study transparent both as a teacher and researcher investigating my teaching context; an active, involved observer “with a particular biography, training, and socialization” (Holliday 2005: 306). This, I feel,

103 echoes Holliday’s approach to “doing and writing qualitative research” (2007), which stresses the autobiographical nature of qualitative study. Through my Teacher Notes and Researcher Journal, I began to develop researcher reflexivity which I discuss in the next section of this chapter.

3.8 Researcher reflexivity Researcher reflexivity is increasingly seen as a vital element of qualitative research (e.g. Borg 2001; Herrera 2010; Holliday 2004b; 2005; 2008; Mauthner & Doucet 2003; Norton and Early 2011; Pennycook 1999; 2005). Holliday stresses the need for the researcher “to show the workings of her research” (2008: 100) through continuous reflexive engagement with it to ensure “rigour and systematicity” (Holliday 2004b: 735). This narrative reflexivity of the researcher commenting on the research is one of several “interconnected voices in the written text of the research” (Holliday 2005: 307): it tells the reader “about what happened to stimulate the research or to help the researcher get into the data” (ibid. 307), showing the inner workings of the research and adding to the richness and complexity of its presentation. Holliday states that the thick description resulting from that provides legitimacy for the researcher’s claims (ibid. 308).

A significant element of my researcher reflexivity was autobiographical. As “a writer with a biography” (Kilbourn, 1999: 28), I wanted my study to build on and incorporate my own teaching experiences and knowledge of Qatari culture and society resulting from over twenty years of my residence in Qatar, with my on-going roles in this context forming a significant aspect of my study. However, I was aware that my greatest asset – familiarity with the research setting – was also the greatest difficulty. This was because on this journey, I would be re-visiting known landscapes that I had taken for granted for a long while. Writing an ethnographic account of it meant diving deep into my own well-entrenched perceptions and ideas and remodelling them from scratch. Thus, as a researcher with a biography, studying my own professional context, I constantly re- evaluated my research focus and procedures, and re-examined my own intended or unintended influence on various elements of both.

104

3.9 Ethics and ethical procedures Since my research participants were ABP students and teachers/administrators, I found it imperative to act on a number of sensitive issues of ethical character, safeguarding transparency, confidentiality and anonymity of participants, as well as protecting them from coercion at all times through consistent measures. They consisted of providing separate, detailed Participant Information Sheets for each research activity and ensuring on-going consent through separate Participant Consent Forms for each research activity.

My study involved access to, and use of, students’ personal reflections on their educational experiences in the ABP, and of comments by participating colleagues made in interviews. Given that I work in the same institution where I conducted my research, I was very aware of the sensitive nature of those circumstances, e.g. as a teacher of similar students as my participants, I recognised that there was still a teacher-student power dynamic involved in my study. This had the potential to lead to some students feeling unable to decline my invitation to participate in my research and/or worrying about how my reactions to their participation might feed back to their regular teachers and perceptions about them within the institution. Another potential challenge was related to my position as an insider researcher requesting my colleagues to participate in my study. Therefore, in recognition of potential ethical ambiguities resulting from this situation and ensuring that ethical practice code was followed at all times (Bell 2003: 38-47; Cohen, Manion and Morrison 2006: 245-6; McDonough & McDonough 1997: 67-8; Richards 2003: 140), I followed several steps:

1. All potential participating students were fully informed about my study and their role in it if they agreed to participate, and about the safeguards that I had put in place (anonymity, the complete separation of research participation from any course assessment procedures, and the right of withdrawal at any point without giving a reason). This process of fully informing participants was managed through a Participant Information Sheet, which I gave to them to read before each research activity and then explained orally to reassure myself that they had fully understood all the information provided about the study and their potential

105

involvement in it. To avoid any potential concern over even a minimal degree of coercion, I asked administrators or colleagues to carry out these tasks instead of me, each time I introduced a new research activity.

2. Additionally, I approached the Special Assistant to the ABP Director, Qatari and a native Arabic speaker, with a request to speak to potential student participants in Arabic to confirm and guarantee that their participation or non-participation and comments made during research activities would have no implications whatsoever on their studies and assessments as all participation-related information would be kept anonymous and confidential.

3. All participating students were required to give their informed consent before each research activity. This was managed by means of a Participant Consent Form which they completed once they had time (two weeks minimum) to digest the Participant Information Sheet material and ask any questions they might have arising from their reading of it. No-one was made to participate in the project if they did not wish to do so. No influence was exerted upon potential participants to persuade them to take part in any part of the study.

4. To safeguard full clarity and transparency of data collection procedures, and to ensure on-going consent, each set of research activities was preceded by a separate Participant Information Sheet and Participant Consent Form specifying the parameters of the particular activity (such as questionnaires, scheduled observations, and interviews – procedures additionally overseen by ABP administrators as specified above). At the end of each stage, I asked for volunteers to continue to the next stage of the study.

5. Since I also wanted to interview a number of my ABP colleagues, parallel ethics procedures and safeguards, including Participant Information Sheets and Participant Consent Forms similar to those for student participants, were applied in case of teacher and administrator participants. My colleague participants were assured of full anonymity and confidentiality of any information they might

106

disclose during the proposed interviews. They were also reminded that they could stop the interview or decline to answer any question without giving a reason.

Prior to my field research, I obtained a formal, written consent from the ABP administration to conduct my study in the ABP (Appendix 8). In addition to complying with the then School of Education’s Ethical Practice Policy and Guidance 2011-12, I followed the necessary ethics procedures in the ABP and its host institution, Qatar Foundation, to ensure that my obligations and responsibilities towards the institution as well as student- and colleague-participants were fulfilled.

I encouraged all participants to discuss any concerns related to my research and their role in it with the ABP academic advisors, ABP counsellor, my department supervisor, and/or one of the administrators. Overall, during the course of my fieldwork, the ABP administration was fully informed of the details of the research process and supported me unconditionally from beginning to end.

3.9.1 Member checking Another measure I put into place to ensure a fully ethical and transparent approach was member-checking. This was particularly important to me since I did not record our interviews, taking copious notes instead. I explain reasons for this in the section on interviews and conversations with a purpose (3.6.2). After each interview/conversation with the participants, especially in the three case studies, I showed my notes to them for validation. This usually took place straight after our conversation was finished, or, occasionally, at other times, convenient to my participants and me. I would then sit down with each participant to go over the notes from our specific conversation and check that they were accurate. Since they had been hand written by me and possibly illegible to anyone but me, I sometimes had to read them out aloud to the concerned participant with him/her looking at the text with me. Though time-consuming and somewhat ‘clumsy’, it was the most effective way of ensuring transparency under the circumstances. As cumbersome as the whole process of member-checking was, I did not deviate from it to safeguard ethical and methodological rigour of my research.

107

However, throughout the entire research process I experienced a rather unexpected lack of interest in “member validation” (Richards 2003: 142) or member “feedback” (ibid. 264) on the part of my study participants. I was not the only researcher faced with this somewhat perplexing absence of participants’ reflection on their role in the research (Doyle 2007, cited in Harvey 2014: 103-104; Harvey 2014: 103-104). What it meant was that, at most, my participants politely agreed to look over my notes, but did not amend any of them. They either confirmed as accurate their words that I had noted verbatim, or approved as legitimate my interpretation (through summary or paraphrase) of what they had said. But, if someone noticed a language or grammar mistake they had made, they would usually correct the inaccurate English they used. In fact, linguistic correctness was their main concern: they did not want to appear “stupid” in my research, as one student put it. Yet, they never questioned the content or meaning of their verbal output as noted by me.

I reasoned that my participants’ reluctance to engage in such reflection was perhaps partly indicative of the trust they had in me as a researcher who was at the same time a teacher in the same institutional setting. It also seemed to confirm as credible my notes and interpretations of their stories. However, there was a flipside to that situation and I would not be completely honest if I failed to recognise another force at play here: that of a teacher-student dynamic. Even though the participants were not, technically, my students, they were still students in the same institution where I taught and conducted my research. Although we interacted through research activities, I had a feeling that, to some extent at least, they ‘performed’ for me as if we were in a teaching, not research, situation: for example, they would try to answer questions in full sentences or attempt to self-correct linguistic mistakes, as mentioned earlier. Additionally, I sensed that some participants thought I was looking for some kind of ‘right’ responses from them. Thus, in direct research interactions (interviews/conversations), I would sometimes find myself reassuring participants that whatever they were saying was absolutely fine: “Yes, go on, it’s OK”; “No, it’s not wrong/silly to say that”, etc. Gradually, I came to realise that the teacher-student dynamic was inevitable in my embedded research situation. The best I could do was to be transparent about the inner tensions it caused

108

because a) they may have coloured what was relayed to me by my participants; b) they may have coloured what I relay in this thesis.

Concluding remarks In Chapter 3, I provided a discussion of the methodology and data collecting/generating tools used in my research, together with ethics procedures. Chapter 4 explains my approach to data and data interpretation, and describes my analytical approach and procedures.

109

Chapter 4: Approach to data analysis and interpretation

Introduction Chapter 4 considers my data management and interpretation procedures. In Section 4.1, I discuss the meaning of data analysis in qualitative research, explain the abductive approach I adopted in the study and briefly comment on my embedded researcher position (Section 4.1). I then review the concepts of data validity and reliability in relation to my research (Section 4.2), and provide an overview of what constitutes my data in this study (Section 4.3). Next, I discuss my data management and analysis approach (Section 4.4). Finally, I describe sample analytical procedures I used in the study (Section 4.5).

4.1 The semantics of data analysis and abductive analytical approach According to Schiellerup (2008), in qualitative research, data analysis is a creative, imaginative and interpretative process of “constructing and attributing meaning to phenomena” gathered during research (164). Coffey and Atkinson (1996, cited in Schiellerup 2008: 164) point out “the tension between ‘analysis’ and ‘interpretation’:

For some authors, analysis refers primarily to the tasks of coding, indexing, sorting, retrieving, or otherwise manipulating data. (…) From such a perspective, the task of analysis can be conceived primarily in terms of data handling. (…) For others in the field, analysis refers primarily to the imaginative work of interpretation, and the more procedural, categorizing tasks are relegated to the preliminary work of ordering and sorting the data. (1996: 6-7)

I understood data analysis as managing data through organising it and looking for relationships between its different elements, with data interpretation growing out of those introductory tasks as “an act of composition” (Stake 2010: 55). I organised my research data to build a thick description of the research context and students’ experiences within it, and to help me identify connections and relationships between different elements of the data, in preparation for interpretation.

The transition from organisation and analysis to interpretation is an open-ended part of the research process, with no clear boundaries determining when and where

110 interpretation should start or finish (Schiellerup, 2008: 165). Rossman and Rallis (2003) believe that data analysis and interpretation takes place throughout the entire research process, starting “when you frame the research questions” (272), “and not only in dedicated moments” at the end of the research process (Schiellerup, 2008: 165).

Furthermore, Holliday stresses that “researchers often know the character of their data regardless of any formal analysis” since “it is after all largely a product of their own thinking during the process of collecting and recording” (2008: 94). He also says that a researcher should aim to “disturb the surface” [and] “dig deeper and reveal the hidden and the counter” ((Holliday 2004c: 278), as well as practise “the discipline of making the familiar strange” (2008: 13). In my study, this understanding of my role as a researcher led me to adopting an abductive approach to analysis and interpretation.

Flick, Kardoff and Steinke describe abduction as “a means-of-inferencing” comprising logical inference and extending “into the realm of profound insight” which generates new knowledge (2004: 159) and facilitates new ideas (Staat 1993). They stress its innovative character and reliance on insight (2004: 159). In order to apply abductive inferencing, they state, it is necessary to develop “an attitude of preparedness to abandon old convictions to seek new ones” (ibid.: 163). The abductive approach is rooted in the logical system proposed by C. S. Peirce and understood as an alternative to deduction and induction: “Deduction proves something must be. Induction shows that something actually is operative; abduction merely suggests that something may be” (Peirce 1934/1960, Vol 5: 171). Abduction is an inference-based “logic of discovery” (Paavola 2006: 1), “often used as a synonym for the Inference to the Best Explanation (IBE) model” (ibid.: 2). The IBE involves not just ideas within a conceptual framework, but also “an interaction with the social, material, and cultural environment in the long- term process” (ibid.: 74). Dubois and Gadde observe that the case study approach is increasingly seen as an opportunity to highlight “the interaction between a phenomenon and its context” (2002: 554), combining theory with experience through “the interrelatedness of the various elements in the research work” (ibid.: 555).Given the complexity of my study setting and my interactions with it, this analytical approach

111 allowed me to utilise my insights, making abductive reasoning particularly relevant for interpreting my case study findings as an embedded researcher, a characteristic explained in Section 4.1.1 below.

4.1.1 Embedded researcher A “participant observer” (Richards 2003: 14), also termed “embedded researcher” (e.g. McGinity and Salokangas 2014; Watson-Gegeo 1988), is an individual undertaking explicit research in their work setting (McGinity and Salokangas 2014: 3). Any researcher, but especially an embedded one, comes into the research setting with a set of pre-existing cognitions and understandings of the world, bringing

certain frames of reference, goals, biases, and abilities to the research. Each type of study is guided by the researcher’s own view of the world. These values and experiences will influence the questions chosen by the researcher, the language of the research, and what can be learned about the teaching and learning phenomenon. (Collins 1991: 182)

With my twin role as a researcher and teacher in the same setting, I was aware that my “frames of reference, goals, biases, and abilities” would inevitably affect my data selection and interpretation. In Chapter 1 (Section 1.1.3) and Chapter 3 (Sections 3.1 and 3.7), I stated that my dual position played a role in my thinking about my research context and methodology. It also contributed to the analysis and interpretation of my findings, prompting me to adopt the abductive approach as described in the previous section. Thus, throughout the study and thesis writing, I have strived to work out an interpretation of my data which would provide the best explanation based on informed inference (Dubois and Gadde 2002: 556). That effort was also related to continuously assessing and re-assessing the value of my research. According to Richards, “when it comes to assessing the value of QI, there is nothing more fundamental than [validity and reliability]” (2003: 284). I discuss these two qualities in Section 4.3.

112

4.2 Avoiding reliability and validity pitfalls Validity and reliability are key characteristics of qualitative research. Validity is related to how the researcher interprets her findings, while reliability is related to data procedures (Richards 2003: 285).

4.2.1 Validity Validity in qualitative research – also referred to, among others, as authenticity, credibility, or trustworthiness (Creswell and Miller 2000: 124) – is defined as “how accurately the account represents participants’ realities of the social phenomena and is credible to them” (Schwandt 1997, cited in Creswell and Miller 2000: 124-125). Accordingly, the concept of validity can be summarised as “a matter of making sure our reading is in line with the way things are [or] that our representations correspond to the phenomena we have encountered” (Kirk and Miller 1986, cited in Richards 2003: 285). These considerations “are matters of interpretation” (ibid.). In other words, “validity refers not to the data but to the inferences drawn from them” (Hammersley and Atkinson 1983, cited in Creswell and Miller 2000: 125).

Multiple procedures are proposed to establish validity in qualitative research (e.g., Cohen, Manion and Morrison 2006; Creswell and Miller 2000; Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Maxwell, 1996; Merriam, 1998; Richards 2003), including triangulation, researcher reflexivity, member checking, and thick description (Cresswell and Miller 2000: 126- 129).

4.2.1.1 Triangulation Cresswell and Miller describe triangulation in qualitative research as a procedure where convergence is sought “among multiple and different sources of information to form themes or categories in a study” (2000: 126). Similarly, Cohen, Manion and Morrison define triangulation “as the use of two or more methods of data collection in the study of some aspect of human behaviour” (2006: 112). Corroborating evidence can be gathered through “methods such as observations, interviews, and documents to locate major and minor themes” (Cresswell and Miller 2000: 127). In my study, I used these methods to

113 strengthen its validity. They are discussed in detail in Chapter 3, Sections 3.6.2, 3.6.3, and 3.6.5.

4.2.1.2 Researcher reflexivity This validity-enhancing procedure consists of the researcher’s disclosure of her “assumptions, beliefs, and biases” (ibid.: 127), with a reflection on her position and role within the research setting, as well as “the social, cultural, and historical forces that shape [her] interpretation” (ibid.). I discussed the issue of my position in the study context and researcher reflexivity in Chapter 1, Section 1.1.3 and Chapter 3, Section 3.7 where I clearly articulated my professional role in my study setting as well as my long-term engagement with it. Throughout the thesis, I reflect on various aspects of my dual role as a teacher researcher operating in my work context, as relevant to specific points.

4.2.1.3 Member checking Member-checking is a procedure which places emphasis on the research participants as validity warrants. Lincoln and Guba describe it as “the most crucial technique for establishing credibility” (1985: 314, cited in Cresswell and Miller 2000: 127). Researchers using this procedure take their findings back to the individuals participating in the research, for their review and confirmation of the findings accuracy (Cresswell and Miller 2000: 127). Participants are asked to assess if themes, categories and other units of analysis and interpretation are accurate and realistic, and they make sense in the participants’ view. To ensure validity of my research, I used member checking at every stage of the study (see: Chapter 3, Section 3.9.1).

4.2.1.4 Thick description Thick description brings rich detail to a qualitative study: “thick descriptions are deep, dense, detailed accounts” (Denzin 1989, cited in Cresswell and Miller 2000: 128). To supplement validity established via the use of multiple sources, the researcher’s transparency, and participants’ confirmation, thick description strengthens the validity of qualitative research through “the lens of readers who read a narrative account and are transported into a setting or situation” (Cresswell and Miller 2000: 129). Holliday describes building thick description as “bringing together (…) multiple perspectives,

114 methods and sources of information (Geertz 1973: 165, cited in Holliday 2004b: 732), for “a richness of perception” (Holliday 2008: 76). Thus, thick description consists of providing relevant details of the setting to build its credible and comprehensive image for the readers, which will affirm the validity of the study (ibid. 77).

In this thesis, I aimed to include sufficient details obtained from my research data to create thick description of my study setting, its characteristics and participants. To that purpose, in Chapter 5, I provided a detailed description of the physical surroundings of the ABP, its classrooms, seating arrangements, interactions and incidents, students’ appearance and conduct. In retelling my student informants’ stories of their experiences, I brought in a significant narrative aspect of thick description, particularly important in case studies (Dawson 2012: 3). Equally important “matters of history [and] context” (ibid.) were discussed in Chapter 1.

4.2.2 Reliability Another issue arises in regard to reliability of qualitative research, especially in a case study approach which focuses on a specific context with unique characteristics. Some scholars dismiss the concept of reliability in reference to qualitative research since it is mainly linked with replicability sought after in quantitative research (e.g. Stenbacka 2001: 551-552). Other writers suggest using different terms when discussing reliability of qualitative studies, such as generalisability (Richards 2003: 285), dependability (Lincoln and Guba 1985, cited in Golafshani 2003: 601), or trustworthiness (Guba 1981; Seale 1999, cited in Golafshani 2003: 601). Ultimately, “there can be no validity without reliability, [thus] a demonstration of the former [validity] is sufficient to establish the latter [reliability]” (Lincoln and Guba 1985: 316). I established the validity of my research through the use of triangulation, researcher reflexivity, member checking, and thick description, as discussed in Section 4.3.1 of this chapter.

Richards links reliability in qualitative research with “matters of procedure” (2003: 285), a point also emphasised by Holliday as the need for qualitative researchers to “show their workings” (2008: 42-59). This point concerns my data analysis procedures and the extent to which my workings are shown as through an explanation of the

115 organising, analysing and interpreting moves. These aspects of my research – my data analysis procedures, or the organising, analysing and interpreting moves – are discussed in the remaining sections of this chapter. I start from describing what I considered to be my data.

4.3 What was my data in this research? My field research set out to investigate educational experiences of one cohort of ABP students, focusing on the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture: co-education, English instruction, academic integrity, critical thinking and independent study, critical teacher feedback and emphasis on applying to English-language universities. The research took place over a course of one academic year (2012/13). As discussed in Chapter 3, Section 3.5, I started from a detailed, ethnographic examination of the setting. Then, I deliberately shifted focus towards the presentation of three individual student informants’ experiences in the ABP. This was complemented by a reflexive dimension, based on my Researcher Journal. Table 2 below summarises the components of my data corpus.

a) Participants’ answers to questions in the initial Questionnaire 1 designed to find out about ABP students’ demographic and educational background b) observation notes from scheduled unstructured class observations c) semi-structured interviews with teacher/administrator participants (via email or in person) d) documentary analysis (ABP/QF publications, anonymised student essays, media reports) e) three student informants’ answers to the Questionnaire 2 f) semi-structured interviews/purposeful conversations with three student informants g) observation notes from scheduled unstructured observations of classes with three student informants h) semi-structured interviews/purposeful conversations with the English teachers who taught the student informants

116

i) Teacher Notes narrating significant or critical incidents and describing general features of the ABP/QF/Qatari environment j) Researcher Journal documenting the reflexive dimension of my work as an embedded researcher k) visual records: photographs of places and people and screenshots of relevant items Table 2: Components of my data corpus

By the end of the research process I had amassed a wealth of material. I strived to manage my data in the way I saw as appropriate and practical. The fact that I was doing field research in a context well-known to me through my teaching practice and long- term exposure to Qatar played an important part in my decisions on data selection. In the following section, I discuss how I selected and organised my data, preparing it for analysis and interpretation.

4.4 Data management In my data management, I followed the phases of qualitative data analysis described by Miles and Huberman as data reduction, data display and conclusion drawing and verification (1994: 10-11). This process can be broken down further into smaller units: organise the data; familiarise yourself with the data; code the data and generate themes; interpret the data; and search for alternative understandings (Rossman and Rallis 2003: 280-289). For me, it involved sifting through various types of paperwork produced in the course of my research, filing the data chronologically, annotating it, discarding redundant material, typing up parts of the data, reading and re-reading, highlighting significant parts, writing further analytical comments and memos to myself, grouping related sections of the data, selecting relevant data portions with notes for final interpretation, and, looking for possible different interpretative options.

4.4.1 Organising the data I started from retracing my field research steps and created a timetable detailing what research activity was conducted, when and with whom. The chronological organisation was not necessary for my subsequent analysis, but helped me to get an initial, structural, grip on the bulk of data. Based on that, I sorted my materials into separate piles of

117 questionnaires, observation notes, interview/conversation notes, entries from my Teacher Notes and Researcher Journal, etc. Thus, each set of raw data was placed in a separate folder with basic colour coding for faster identification. I discarded irrelevant portions of data, cleaning up the information for subsequent analysis. Rossman and Rallis stress the importance of the cleaning-up step (2003: 280) for greater clarity.

At that stage, I also annotated each portion of data with initial hunches and ad hoc comments, using stick-on cards. Annotating my data helped me to arrange it into separate topics derived directly from my research focus which was students’ encounters with the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture:

The above topics informed my data handling and analysis since they served as the original basis for data organisation: I created a matrix for my data and initial notes based on these topics, grouping them into chunks of data on co-education, English as the medium of instruction, academic integrity, etc. It allowed me to arrange the data sources and my comments more systematically for easier coding and cross-referencing later on. I transferred most of the initial notes from the stick-on cards onto the matrix and typed up parts of my textual data (such as observation notes and most of the data from my key informants), although I still worked with some handwritten material.

118

4.4.2 Familiarising myself with the data After this first step, I went back to the original “raw” data, now more systematically arranged, started re-reading it in this new configuration, and re-considering my initial notes. Reading and re-reading through my cleaned-up and organised data and notes took some time. According to Rossman and Rallis, “this intense and often tedious process enables you to become familiar in intimate ways with what you have learned” (2003: 281).

Based on my repeated readings of the written material and my initial notes, I began to build what Miles and Huberman call a display: “a visual format that presents information systematically” (1994: 91). In my case, it was the notes matrix that provided the basic structure for dealing with the unwieldy “extended, unreduced text” (ibid.). I used colour-coding to distinguish associated chunks of data and related notes from the matrix.

4.4.3 Coding the data This was probably the most arduous and lengthy part of my data analysis. As I started developing a deeper understanding of my data, I adopted a working definition of a code as a label or phrase “from which categories can be derived” (Richards 2003: 273), describing a consistent, explicit unit of data. After repeated readings of the data with my notes, I began to notice and code identifiable labels emerging from the mass of data. For example, I identified and noted the word “parents” all three student informants used when discussing their university choices to stress family influence on them. Another example was “eye contact”, a label I used in reference to how students were interacting with each other in a mixed gender classroom, based on my observation notes.

Richards refers to this process as “rough initial coding” (2003: 274), designed to “generate a number of possible categories” (ibid.). Building meaningful categories and themes was the next stage of my data analysis.

119

4.4.4 Generating categories and themes Next, I further systematised the now more clearly displayed and coded chunks of data, putting it into segments which would feed into my units of analysis. That in turn allowed me to begin forming new understandings of my research findings in all their complexity. Thus, I grouped coded portions such as “eye contact”, “addressing the teacher” under a broader category (Richards 2003: 274), which in this case was “body language”.

At this stage, I started producing analytical comments and memoes, “drawing attention to points that might be relevant to the analysis” (Richards 2003: 278).

4.4.5 Interpreting the data According to Rossman and Rallis, interpretation is “a complex and reflexive process” (2003: 288), akin to “storytelling” (ibid.), creative and open. Along similar lines, Holliday places “emergences and submission at the centre of the whole process of moving from data to writing” (2008: 93), meaning that a researcher “must submit herself to emerging patterns of data and be free to engage strategically and creatively with the complexities of realities that go beyond her initial design” (ibid.). I strived to turn these principles into practice in my research through self-reflection and constantly referring to participants’ voices, as well as creating thick description to provide sufficient detail supporting my interpretation. This was because the abductive approach I adopted, based on reasoning to the best explanation, required “the greatest possible amount of environmental data, which are then (albeit subconsciously) interpreted and used to arrive at a meaningful conclusion (Reichertz 2014: 7).

4.4.6 Search for alternative understandings Abductive analysis involves doubt (Reichertz 2014: 5). The researcher’s doubt is understood as a significant factor in research and interpretation, leading to challenging patterns that seem apparent in the analysis (Rossman and Rallis 2003: 289). This means asking questions about alternative plausible interpretations and understandings. Such questions concern the strength of the researcher’s argument in the light of other explanations, examine if the presented data is sufficient to support the argument, and

120 probe the credibility of the study. Working on interpreting the data, I was asking myself these questions in order to formulate an interpretation that would be persuasive and meaningful, yet strongly grounded in the data.

4.5 Analytical procedures In the following sections, I provide a summary of the analytical procedures I conducted while working with the material collected and generated throughout my research. I show how I recorded data and how I moved from raw data towards specific categories to be used for interpretation. I use the data on the topic of co-education to illustrate that process.

4.5.1 Observation notes During all of my scheduled unstructured observations of English classes in the ABP, I took extensive notes. To organise them for interpretation, I went back to the original hand-written notes and typed them up verbatim. I would revise and turn those raw notes into a more narrative form later, for use in the thesis. Working with typed-up notes, I used a table with two columns to separate my observation notes (column 1) from analytical comments (column 2), adding more material to the main themes, extracting relevant labels to identify emergent new threads, if any.

The example below comes from the observation notes in an AE class from the data on co-education. It includes my actual notes taken while I observed the class and subsequent analytical comments, coding portions of the data, in this case, regarding co- education (descriptions of male-female interactions in class) and articulating specific labels, such as seating arrangements. The comments accompanying those labels in Column 2 result from my own understanding of the observed context, based on my experience as a teacher. Matching labels with comments from different data sources were later grouped together, printed out, and cross-referenced. In this way, I gradually combined corresponding labels obtained from various sources. I could then see a more global picture of the evidence my data provided. Below I provide a screenshot of a sample page of my observation notes after the above treatment (Image 7), with identified labels and my comments.

121

Image 7: Screenshot of my observation notes with coding labels and notes

4.5.2 Questionnaire 2 Questionnaire 2 (Appendix 6), intended for my three student informants and used in January 2013, was derived from Questionnaire 1 (see: Chapter 3, Section 3.7.2), administered in August 2012. The main purpose of Questionnaire 2 was to serve as a starting point for interviews/conversations with the three student informants and I needed to analyse and interpret their responses provided in it before I could proceed with subsequent research activities.

Thus, after receiving my student informants’ written responses, I typed them up verbatim and analysed them using a table with three columns: one for a question from the questionnaire, the second one for responses to the question (colour coded for each informant38), and the third one for analytical comments with labels arising from preliminary coding, to be explored in subsequent meetings with the student informants.

38 Pink – Aisha; blue – Abdulla; orange – Hamad

122

Below I provide two screenshots (Images 8a and 8b) of sample pages with my analytical notes on the Questionnaire 2 responses. They included my preliminary interpretative remarks, questions and emerging labels which became topics for further discussion with the three participating students. Based on the analysis of the data extracted from the three student informants, I was able to identify a common category: change in views on co-education. This was then discussed with each informant to determine how their views on co-education may have changed as a result of their respective experiences in the ABP, to facilitate an understanding how they might relate to Othering.

Image 8a: Screenshot of analytical notes on Questionnaire 2 responses, with labels

123

Image 8b: Screenshot of analytical notes on Questionnaire 2 responses, with labels

4.5.3 Student informants class observations Below I provide an image of ‘raw’ notes made while observing an English class with one of the three case study participants (Image 9). The observation notes are accompanied by my pre-coding comments (yellow stick-on page) related to co- education. The comments summarised what I had observed in his class, relating that to the other two key informants. I attached the pre-coding comments to the page with my class observation notes to be able to see more clearly what labels could be extracted from the notes and how they would compare to the other two informants. This was before I transferred my remarks to the matrix described earlier.

124

Image 9: Fragment of observation notes from a student informant’s class (white page), with pre-coding comments (yellow page)

Finally, working with related chunks of data, I was able to identify the following labels, which emerged after analysing and coding the bulk of data compiled from all research activities and related to co-education and student interactions:

 Initial reactions: self-segregation and seating arrangements  Body language and participation  Changing behaviour in response to co-education  Dress code  Gender mixing: respect  Gender mixing: judgement  Gender mixing: dangerous freedom

125

The approach I took to analysing and interpreting my data resulted from my research methodology, but also reflected my own thinking based on years of teaching experience in Qatar. At every stage of my research, I found it helpful to write extensive notes and notes on notes, member-checked and cross-referenced with raw data. Combined with my background knowledge, they enabled me to make sense of my data, shaping final interpretation, based on reasoning to the best explanation.

Concluding remarks Chapter 4 gives an overview of my approach to data, details the kind of data my research yielded, and describes my data interpretation procedures. In Chapter 5, I present an ethnographic thick description of the research context, constructed from the field data including observations, interviews/conversations, documentary analysis, my Teacher Notes and Researcher Journal, together with data provided by the key student informants.

126

Chapter 5: The place, the students, the experiences

Introduction Chapter 5 focuses on the research setting and students’ experiences within that setting, based on the fieldwork I conducted in the ABP in the academic year of 2012/13. I start with a description of the ABP’s physical environment (Section 5.1). I then present students’ initial responses to the key dimensions of the ABP, based on Questionnaire 1 results (Section 5.2), and, in Section 5.3, provide a discussion of their independent school background in relation to those dimensions. Section 5.4 narrates students’ experiences in the ABP setting, focusing on the key dimensions of the new ABP educational culture (co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, critical thinking and independent learning, teacher feedback and university applications). Finally, Section 5.5 presents summary comments by the three student informants of their overall experiences in the new academic environment of the ABP, together with the views expressed by their teachers.

5.1 The place: Liberal Arts and Sciences building (LAS) The building hosting the ABP can stand as a metaphor for the entire Education City which tries to merge indigenous with foreign educational approaches. Although modern in design, the Liberal Arts and Sciences (LAS) building includes elements of traditional Arab and Islamic architecture. Its striking façade (Image 10) was designed by renowned Japanese architects, Kazuhiro Kojima and Kazuko Akamatsu (Rostron, R. J., 2012: 12), incorporating an arabesque “double-skin” exterior and Arabian wind towers (ibid: 15- 16). It also features small, symmetrically positioned windows on the inside wall, resembling windows in traditional courtyard houses in the region (ibid: 18). Another local component is blended into its interior design: it consists of aluminium screens with an abstract pattern, installed around walls and staircases (Image 11), where they “act as visual barriers and block out excessive daylight” (ibid: 16). In designing them, the architects drew inspiration from traditional Arabic mashrabiyas, or indoor partitions with carved wood latticework (ibid.). Originally, they served as both decorative shields ensuring privacy and shade-giving structures.

127

Image 10: LAS building façade with wind towers on the roof

Inside, the LAS building is light and airy. Its classrooms are spacious, each with modern furniture, a computer, projector and an interactive white board (Image 12). The ABP also has a dedicated English Room for additional English tutoring and an open space Learning Resource Centre (LRC) where students can study on their own or ask for help from subject teachers. Every teacher has their own individual office, including a PC, printer and office phone. I mention this as a significant part of the working environment, because having one’s own private office space expedites development of strong connections with current as well as former students, who visit them regularly.

Most classrooms and offices in the ABP have glass walls, which can be interpreted as a sign of transparency and communal inter-dependence, but also as a way of ensuring that in this mixed-gender environment all interactions are publicly visible.

128

Image 11: Inside the LAS building: patterned aluminium screens (2015)

Image 12: One of the ABP classrooms

129

5.2 The students: initial responses to key dimensions of ABP culture In this section, based on Questionnaire 1 data, I sketch a broad picture of the ABP cohort 2012/13, starting from a demographic summary and focusing on students’ initial responses to the key dimensions of the ABP academic culture: co-education, English instruction, academic integrity, independent study, teacher feedback, and university applications (Sections 5.2.2 – 5.2.5). The responses were recorded at the start of the academic year.

5.2.1 Questionnaire 1: demographic summary Questionnaire 1 was completed by thirty eight students, with thirteen from Foundation 1

(F1), and twelve each from Foundation 2 (F2) and Academic English (AE) levels. Based on their responses, the ABP student population in 2012/13 was composed chiefly of Qataris (over 80%), with majority females (nearly 70%), as confirmed by the ABP statistics for the year. Most (twenty seven) came from gender-segregated local independent schools: fewer in the AE level, with majority in F1 and F2 levels.

5.2.2 Co-education: positive initial response A majority of the respondents had studied in gender-segregated schools (twenty seven out of thirty eight). Only those who had come from international schools had previous experience of a co-educational environment. In the questionnaire, thirty four out of thirty eight students said that they were happy studying in a mixed gender environment, even though to many independent school graduates co-education would be a new experience and one of the most significant elements of practical classroom encounters, such as working in mixed pairs or participation in class activities and discussions in front of the opposite gender.

5.2.3 Language: recognition of the relevance of English Former independent school students stated that in their pre-ABP school they had studied in both languages, Arabic and English. That was due to the then-mandatory use of English as a medium of instruction in independent schools in Qatar, before the decision to switch back to Arabic was implemented in September 2012. The students from international schools had had their instruction exclusively in English, with some taking additional Arabic lessons. All questionnaire respondents said they were happy about

130 studying in English, giving various explanations: “It’s fun, and helps me in life”; “English is needed everywhere”; “English is my favorite subject”; “I like English and it’s [an] important language to learn”; “I want to apply to English-speaking universities”; “All the world concentrate (sic) about English, all studies and jobs need English.” The responses suggested students’ recognition of the relevance of English to their university and professional plans, and their perception of its aspirational value and status in their life.

5.2.4 Academic concepts and practices: varied degrees of familiarity with plagiarism, independent study, critical feedback Linked to the type of their previous schooling, ABP students’ familiarity with concepts and practices regarded as part of the ABP ethos seemed to vary.

One such concept was plagiarism, linked with academic integrity. Twenty out of the lower level F1 and F2 students answered the question about the meaning of plagiarism by ticking the box “I don’t know”, while all twelve advanced AE level students explained it correctly. These diverse responses seemed to have some basis in the differing language levels among respondents: the higher the language level, the more familiar the students were with the concept. Surprisingly, their answers to a related question about using citation at school did not follow the above pattern of plagiarism answers. In fact, an opposite pattern of answers became visible, with as many as fourteen out of twenty six F1 and F2 students claiming to have used citations at school, and only four out of twelve AE students saying the same. Based on my colleagues’ comments and my own professional experience in the ABP, this result was confusing. Our teaching practice indicated that F1 and F2 students tended to be less familiar (or even unfamiliar) with citations, than AE students.

Also, many lower level students did not know what “independent study” was: most F1 and F2 students answered this question by ticking the box “I don’t know” (twenty out of twenty six). In the top level, out of twelve AE respondents, ten defined it correctly (“depending on yourself”, “self-learning”, etc.), and only two said they did not know

131 the term. Hence, it would appear that students were mostly able to recognise the meaning of the phrase if their English level was sufficiently advanced.

Another point of interest concerned critical teacher feedback. According to the Q1 respondents, feedback from teachers in their previous schools was mostly positive (which seemed unusual), although five claimed to have received no feedback at all and eight omitted the question or provided irrelevant answers (e.g. “Yes, […], pictures, ideas”, “I don’t know”) indicating they may have not understood the word “feedback”, despite an oral Arabic translation provided with the questionnaire.

5.2.5 University plans: applying to English-language universities in EC and abroad Most students entered the ABP with an intention to apply to one of the branch campuses in Education City. They saw the ABP’s connection with EC universities as an increased chance of being accepted at one of them and stressed the need to improve their English skills in order to gain university admission (indicated also in the answers concerned with studying in English). The ABP was “a key to QF’s universities”, as one respondent put it.

The next section deals with students’ local independent school background in relation to the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture.

5.3 Independent school background Although a number of ABP students completed international schools with a British or American curriculum, most came from local independent schools (twenty seven), according to the data from Questionnaire 1, as confirmed by the ABP 2012/13 statistics. This was the case with my three student informants. I thought it relevant to briefly present a view of the independent schools education, to provide some context for students’ initial responses to and later experiences of the new ABP setting with its key dimensions. The data came from interviews with two ABP administrators: Alia, Director’s Special Assistant and former Qatari independent school English teacher in Doha, and Fatma, head of ABP Student Services, formerly an independent school headmistress.

132

5.3.1 Transition from gender-segregation to co-education In her comments on co-education, Fatma stated that many students initially found it difficult to cope with exposure to a co-educational environment, having studied in segregated independent schools. However, most did get used to it: “after they start working on academic materials together it becomes easier to them to deal with each other.” Fatma pointed to some cultural and social complexities and controversies surrounding student interactions in a co-educational environment due to its relatively new presence in the Qatari educational context where all national schools are gender segregated.

5.3.2 English teaching issues: lack of materials and preparedness Alia described her former school where she had taught English as a place where “there [were] no textbooks, so teachers [were] required to produce their own materials for each class”, mostly downloading them from the Internet. Very often, she added, there was no coordination between what teachers were using, so the same materials could be used inaccurately, for example, for teaching at different levels of English. That had happened to her when a colleague used the same materials for a higher grade English class.

According to Fatma, the other ABP administrator interviewee, this weak performance of independent schools in Qatar was largely a result of a cost-cutting strategy employed by their operators39: “the school operator wanted to save money” by, for example, making teachers use photocopied materials from the Internet instead of textbooks. Alia added that there was also pressure to deliver exam results performing to “national benchmarks”40, which resulted in rushed and overloaded teaching schedules. Furthermore, she mentioned inadequate opportunities for professional development, particularly when it came to teaching in English in which many teachers were not fluent.

39 According to the Education for a New Era terminology, independent school operators are individuals or bodies contracted by the government (Brewer et al. 2007: 60-61). 40 For more details, see: http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9248/index1.html http://www.sec.gov.qa/En/SECInstitutes/EducationInstitute/Offices/Pages/CurriculumStandardsOffice.aspx

133

Fatma pointed out the rapid switch from Arabic to English instruction and unpreparedness of most teachers to teach their subjects in English. As a result, she stated, students were receiving “a very shallow education” as they were forced to start studying maths and science in English although they had previously (i.e. before the reform) had studied those subjects only in Arabic: “From my experience I can say that the independent schools put the educational future of most of the students in danger by the sudden change they applied to the schools.”

5.3.3 Academic integrity: lack of concern Academic integrity, according to Fatma, was not taught in Qatari schools, therefore students coming to the ABP form the independent system were mostly unfamiliar with it. She wrote:

I think that the students who came from independent schools are not raised to know academic integrity. I am sure that most of them never heard that expression when they were studying in schools.

Alia confirmed that view, emphasising lack of concern with academic integrity in independent schools, where teachers did not usually require students to adhere to it.

5.3.4 Learning during school time Alia commented that, in her experience of independent schools, parents and teachers generally believed that students should gain education at school, while time outside schools should be devoted to family matters. The concept of independent learning was not common. In fact, she said, that many teachers were reluctant even to give students homework to do.

5.3.5 Teacher disenchantment and changing demographics According to Alia, in independent schools “teachers didn’t really care about students”, as she put it. She explained the reasons behind it: lacking adequate training and overworked, teachers did not have time to engage with students on an individual level or properly prepare their lessons. She referred to “shoddy teaching, lack of materials and low discipline and motivation among students” as the main difficulties faced by independent schools in Qatar. While she felt that “low student motivation was a

134 common problem in the ABP”, she stressed that the situation in independent schools was, “based on [her] experience, much worse”, also affecting teacher motivation and job satisfaction.

Combined with a lack of training, those problems pushed many Qatari teachers out of the profession, resulting in a significant drop in the number of Qatari teachers in local schools, Fatma added. Supporting this view, the 2011-12 report41 by Qatar’s Supreme Education Council (SEC) cites the percentage of Qataris in independent schools as 27, with an overall number of Qatari teachers employed in all K-12 schools in Qatar as 21%, compared with 60% of other Arab nationalities and 20% of non-Arabs (Image 13).

5.3.6 Negative impact on university admission Overall, Alia and Fatma were both critical of the impact of the educational reform on local students and their educational prospects. According to Fatma, the substandard education students were getting was impeding their chances of getting into university: “[it] affected their ability to join higher education”. Alia said that ultimately, it was the students who paid the price for the state of education in the country as they became disenchanted and demotivated, with poor education and low academic skills, especially in English (see also: Khatri 2013a; 2013b; Walker 2015).

41 For more details, see: http://www.sec.gov.qa/Statistical%20Report/2011-2012.pdf

135

Image 13: Percentages of Qatari teachers in various types of schools, 2011-12, SEC report42

This rather negative depiction of local independent schools given by two ABP Qatari administrators was further corroborated by data taken from other sources (e.g. Guarino and Tanner 2012; Paschyn 2013a; 2013b), evidence from students recorded in my Teacher Notes, and articles in the local media (Are Qatar’s independent schools broken? 2013; Sparking debate… 2012). Data from the three key informants suggested similar views: they each commented separately on inadequate English teaching and resulting low English skills among students impacting on their chances to study in English language universities, as well as lack of teacher feedback, of concern for academic integrity, and of independent study requirement. They also stated that the segregated nature of independent schools resulted in various forms of discomfort in classroom interactions in the co-educational ABP setting.

42 For more details, see: ibid.

136

5.4 Students’ experiences: What goes on here? Having sketched a broad view of students’ initial responses to the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture and presented their related school background, in the next section, I describe their actual experiences in encounters with those dimensions during their studies in the ABP. Thus, I move from contextual data to descriptions of particular experiences, in an attempt to give the reader a sense of connection between different sets of data. The descriptions of students’ experiences are derived from the data obtained from the three key informants, interviews with other research participants, field observations, and analysis of relevant documents, as well as selected vignettes of critical incidents and significant scenes from the ABP life, taken from my Teacher Notes.

5.4.1 Profiles of study key informants The three key informants participating in my study were a part of the 2012/13 cohort, each with an independent school education prior to entering the ABP. In this section, I present their detailed profiles.

Abdulla came to the ABP from a gender-segregated local school and studied Foundation 1 English which meant that upon admission into the ABP his language level was in the lowest bracket of proficiency (he had an entry IELTS score of 4.5 in August 2012). He usually wore his traditional Qatari white thobe (robe) and guthra (head covering), but occasionally I could see him in jeans and a t-shirt. He was very polite and pleasantly-mannered. Like many other young Qatari men, he would greet me by asking about my well-being and expressing hope that everything was going well in my life. Arab greetings can be very elaborate and take a while. At the end of each meeting, he would say goodbye and promise to see me soon, insha’allah, God willing.

During our introductory meeting in my office, I had an impression he was ill at ease. He seemed positive about the ABP, but did not elaborate. His answers to my ‘warm-up’ questions were short and he would not look at me. Yes, he liked the ABP. The teachers were very nice and his English was improving. The other students were very nice, too. No, he did not have any problems although everything was rather difficult and a lot of

137 homework was given, more than at school. He wanted to study engineering at Texas A&M, since it was his parents’ wish. Did he have any other comments? No, no other comments. I wondered how our collaboration would develop and whether he would want to tell me anything more about his experiences in the ABP. Before I gave him the questionnaire I explained the questions orally to make sure they were clear. Abdulla thanked me and said he hoped I would be “happy with his answers”. When he brought them back a week later he himself was happy, because he said he felt he had learnt some new words and “it made him think about his studies”. Each time we met after that, Abdulla seemed more relaxed and willing to talk. After another week, which I spent considering his responses and preparing follow-up questions, we scheduled a meeting for a more in-depth post-questionnaire discussion. During that post-questionnaire meeting as well as two subsequent meetings with him, I took notes following the member-checking procedures described in Chapter 3, Section 3.9.1. The same course of action was implemented with each key participant.

My second informant was Hamad, a student taking Foundation 2 English courses, with intermediate English (IELTS of 5.5). Students in Foundation 2 stand a chance of being ‘promoted’ to the highest, Academic level, which is a gateway to English-language university admission in EC. In the spring semester of 2013, Hamad was one of the so- called ‘jump-up’ students moved up to the top level: he completed the first semester with high grades (GPA of 3.8) and was placed in Academic English (AE) courses as a result.

Hamad also came from an independent school and soon became known as a student with a sharp mind, excellent study habits, and a friendly disposition. Exceedingly polite, he had a sense of humour, was helpful and courteous to teachers and other students alike, while being modest and unassuming – qualities confirmed by his English teacher whom I interviewed after observing Hamad in her class. In our first meeting he told me how much his parents wanted him to study medicine to make them proud as the first doctor in the family.

138

My third key informant was Aisha. I first met her when she was a student in my Academic Composition class in the autumn of 2012. Bound by the ethical limitations of my research, I did not approach her with a request for participation in the study at the time. I could not have anticipated, however, that she would volunteer herself to take part in it when I was no longer her teacher in the spring 2013.

In her own words, Aisha came from a “highly educated family”: “everyone in my family has degree, engineering or doctors”, she said in the introductory meeting conducted in February 2013. They expected her to study computer science at an EC university (Carnegie Mellon or Texas A&M). Her shayla was tightly wrapped around her hair and, unlike some other Qatari girls, she did not seem to feel the need to adjust it all the time. She wore a simple black abaya, wide and buttoned up all the way, unadorned by any additional elements such as embroidery, sequins or patches of colour other than black. Occasionally one could see a glimpse of the blue jeans she usually wore underneath the abaya, but Aisha took care to cover herself as thoroughly as she could. I never saw her wear high-heeled shoes or sport a fancy handbag or flashy sunglasses. She was often in trainers or some other kind of flat shoes that covered her entire feet, never open-toe sandals. Her face was free of make-up, with sallow skin and serious expression. She wore big glasses which made her look older than her eighteen years of age, stern and resolute. Aisha seemed to look disapprovingly at those Qatari females whose abayas were worn open or shaylas hung loose revealing their hair. She never sat next to a boy in the classroom and more than once made unfavourable comments to me about those Qatari girls in the ABP who did.

In the autumn semester 2012, she took Academic Composition with me as her teacher. In class, I found her a passive, quiet student. Initially, she did not want to participate in any discussions, even if asked a specific question by me as part of a general class activity. She would then simply shake her head or say “I don’t know”. Despite her solemn appearance and reticent behaviour in class, she had a pleasant, polite manner in our conversations outside the classroom, in the privacy of my office. Before my research, she occasionally came to see me to enquire after her grades and ask me for

139 help with a specific writing problem. I tried to encourage her to be more active in class, but she said she did not feel comfortable interacting with boys and did not like to speak to girls “who didn’t dress correct”, i.e. wore loose shaylas and open abayas.

At the time, several of her classmates had come from co-educational, international schools and mixed easily with the opposite gender. Some girls also sported less traditional abayas, in colours other than black or with an open front. Aisha repeatedly told me that was “wrong” or “bad” in Qatari culture. Gradually, she did become more vocal in our classroom exchanges and more interactive towards her classmates, but she continued to sit alone, as if distancing herself from both the “bad girls” and the male students in her class. Coincidentally, I recorded some of her remarks in my Teacher Notes out of a habit of writing down things related to my teaching, before I knew she would volunteer to take part in my research as a case study. The phrase “bad girls” was used by Aisha in several informal conversations with me, prior to the research as well as during the research. I noted it, because she was not the only student using it in reference to those Qatari females in the ABP who displayed a less conventional style of dress and did not mind interacting with male students.

As her teacher, I had an impression she did not particularly enjoy my academic writing course, focused on citation, independent reading, and class discussions concerning topics she did not seem to be interested in or know much about (cultural dimensions of plagiarism; Arabic versus English in education; globalisation; overpopulation, etc.). She complained to me a few times that the course was hard and “the vocabularies were too much difficult” (from Teacher Notes), rendering some of the topics incomprehensible or even alien to her. In the autumn 2012, Aisha struggled all semester not only with English vocabulary, sentence structure and grammar, but also with new concepts and academic terms we increasingly used in class. Despite additional language support she received during my office hours sessions with her, she still found the Academic level challenging, especially the writing. She ended up with a D as her final course grade in December 2012.

140

The last thing I expected her to do was to volunteer for my research. But in January 2013, no longer my student, Aisha came to ask me if she could participate. She told me she was interested in taking part because she hoped to improve her English in that way. Since in the spring of 2013 she was registered to take new English courses with other English teachers and not in my class, I was free to recruit her.

Unlike the other two case study participants, Aisha responded to the Q2 via email. Following my usual procedures, I read and considered Aisha’s answers, writing down analytical comments, and noting questions for further conversations.

As narrated by the three student informants (Abdulla, Hamad, and Aisha) and demonstrated through data from other sources (ABP administrators: Alia and Fatma; English teachers: Sara and Chris; field notes; and documents) in Sections 5.4.2 – 5.4.7, students’ experiences of encounters with the key dimensions of the new ABP educational culture are grouped thematically, following the main topics which guided my research: co- education (5.4.2), instruction in English (5.4.3), academic integrity (5.4.4), critical thinking and independent learning (5.4.5), teacher feedback (5.4.6) and university applications (5.4.7). Within each of those main topics, specific themes emerged after analysis. These emergent, sometimes overlapping, themes are used as subtitles in each section, foregrounding a discussion of them in Chapter 6.

5.4.2 Co-education Gender segregation is prevalent in Qatari public life and mandatory in local schools. As a result, many students coming to the ABP from the independent secondary system may struggle with adjustment to co-education in practical classroom situations, even if their initial responses recorded in Questionnaire 1 do not reflect that.

5.4.2.1 Initial reactions: self-segregation and seating arrangements The initial reaction to co-education was self-segregation through separate seating in the classroom. This was a pattern repeated in every class I observed during the autumn semester: one of my first observations took place in a big classroom which felt not only overwhelming in size, but also very cold, physically and metaphorically. I had a vague

141 sense of discomfort, perhaps caused by the air conditioning in the room, but possibly intensified by the small number of students there, sitting at a distance from each other. In my notes, I wrote that the way they sat made them look “scattered” and “isolated”. In the classroom fit for at least twice as many people, there were five Qatari females, including a completely veiled one, and two boys. Four girls sat next to each other, close to the door and as far away from the boys as possible. The veiled girl chose to sit by herself, away from the other students. She never spoke a word during the class, not even to the teacher who knew better than to bother her with any questions.

In all of my observations this self-regulated conduct on the part of the students was in evidence: boys and girls mostly chose to sit away from each other, in separate clusters. This was true on every level, including the lowest, F1 class I observed. There, too, males and females sat separately, with almost all students of Qatari nationality, judging by the traditional outfits they were wearing.

The teachers I observed did not push for any changes in the seating arrangements set by the students. One of them explained that it would be unwise and possibly counter- productive to force students to work in mixed pairs too early on in the semester, when they were still “freaked out”, as she put it, about the new co-educational set-up.

5.4.2.2 Body language and participation In a top level AE class I observed in the autumn semester, one female student was visibly ‘un-integrated’. During the class, the teacher had to speak directly to her as the girl would not answer any questions addressed to the whole class. When there was finally an exchange of comments between the students, the girl avoided eye contact with the boys, but looked only at the teacher, even as she responded to something one of the boys had said. I noticed the same body language in the other classes I visited.

Another thing I noted during class observations was the inaudibility of what some female students were saying: many tended to speak so softly that sometimes the teacher had to stand next to them to hear their answers. It seemed that female students often

142 resisted speaking in a public situation such as their ABP classroom – after many years of segregated education, they were probably still too “shy” to perform in the presence of males. In one class, a female student never said a word at all. She was wearing a customary black abaya and shayla, both very conservatively styled. She sat alone. Her teacher explained to me later that the three female students who usually attended her class had all expressed uneasiness and embarrassment at being in a mixed-gender setting, having come from segregated local schools.

In general, in classroom interactions I observed, boys volunteered more than girls and they offered correct answers more frequently. In one Foundation 2 class I observed, female students simply shook their head or said “I don’t know”, when asked a question by the teacher. Similarly to other classes, the boys in that group seemed more relaxed and comfortable than the females, who remained mostly on the quiet, passive side. “Ask questions if you don’t understand”, the teacher kept encouraging them. I noted that the boys “seemed to lead the class either answering or asking questions”, while the girls looked on in silence. However, once or twice, a girl without her hair covering (shayla) came up with a response or corrected a boy when he got it wrong. The shayla-less girl was more active than the other girls, more conservatively dressed.

Responding in an email interview to the question of co-education, Sara noted the initial discomfort experienced by many students in the co-educational environment of the ABP and females’ reticence to perform in front of classmates: “In terms of participation, few of the females are comfortable with completing a task in front of classmates”, she wrote. However, she also noticed and commented favourably on the fact that most ABP students were female: “The students are predominately female, which I think is fantastic for such a patriarchal society”.

143

5.4.2.3 Changing behaviour in response to co-education Over the course of the academic year, the nature of male-female interactions in the classroom underwent some change. In many cases, the initial tension eased off and boys and girls gradually got used to working together, even in small mixed groups or pairs.

Commenting on co-education, Aisha seemed to have changed her attitude towards studying with boys, as compared to what I remembered from the autumn semester when she was my student. She stated that she had got used to having boys around, although she still preferred not to talk to them outside class time, because she felt everyone was staring at her and judging her if she did speak with male students.

Abdulla, on the other hand, was uneasy about co-education throughout the entire academic year, although he gradually became a little more used to it. At first, he was very reluctant to speak to girls in the ABP. In fact, he avoided it altogether. Now, he could see that there was nothing wrong with studying with girls, but was still really unsure how to interact with them, especially outside of class. In class, his teachers were helping him to overcome his shyness, they were patient with him and others like him, he stated.

Unlike Abdulla and Aisha, Hamad was unreservedly glad about co-education, he said, because that would also help him in his future university studies. He remarked that it did not take him long to begin to be comfortable around girls and speak with girls more freely. During the first days of the ABP he was very shy to sit next to girls, but gradually became more social. “Before I thought it was bad to be with girls in the same school, but now I can see that I learn something from them, from both boys and girls”, Hamad said.

A corresponding view of co-education was revealed in a class essay by an Academic English student. I copied an excerpt from it into my Teacher Notes (Vignette 1) because it seemed to express a fairly common attitude among ABP students: negative before entering the ABP (in this case, it appeared extremely negative), it was modified and

144 became more constructive as a result of studying with the opposite gender in the Program. The female student, describing how her views on co-education had changed, stressed her increased self-confidence and ability to talk to “strangers” as definite advantages of co-education.

Vignette 1 (excerpt from a student essay)

“Even though I have always disliked (hated will be too powerful a word) co- education, especially in our age, in this culture, I found out that as every other thing, it has some advantages too. It boosted my confidence and I do not hyperventilate when I am alone with a man in an elevator anymore. Yet, my uncle says that is not a good indication; that girls must always be aware of the presence of a strange man. I might be too naïve and inexperienced, but I think that is completely ridiculous, especially here in Qatar. I think that and the fact that I can actually talk to a stranger without hesitation is what co-education helped me with…”

(Teacher Notes, November 2012)

Sara also noticed that students’ behaviour in class changed over time as they gradually got used to the co-educational setting of the ABP:

Many students seemed quite uncomfortable by this at the beginning of the semester. However, I am pleased to say that only a minority of female students still seem uncomfortable. Most have adapted. They still choose to be seated by gender, yet when I ask them to work in groups, nobody seems to panic by having to work in a mixed group. (Sara, email interview, Dec 2012).

Regarding co-education, Chris wrote that students coped with it well considering their lack of previous exposure to mixed-gender environments.

I think they handle it very well considering it is so unusual for them. They are very shy at first, but they eventually get used to it. They regulate themselves based on their cultural norms, e.g. sitting on opposite sides of the room. However, when asked to work together, there usually isn’t a problem. (Chris, email interview, Dec 2012)

145

5.4.2.4 Dress code Related to co-education was the issue of dress code. The ABP dress code follows the rules and regulations stipulated in the related QF policy (Walker 2014), which expects “Qatar Foundation community members [to be] dressed appropriately and according to accepted norms and cultural standards” (Qatar Foundation Dress Code Policy). In practical terms, it means national dress for local students and conservative formal attire for other individuals (Image 14).

Image 14: Screenshot of an ABP email to students about the required dress code

In the ABP, most Qatari males wore their customary national white clothing (thoube) and Bedouin headdress (guthra), as seen in Image 15. Other Arab students usually wore Western clothes, namely jeans and t-shirts. All Qatari girls wore traditional black cloaks (abayas) and black headscarves called shaylas. Usually, no hair was showing and the

146 robes were styled conservatively, buttoned up and ankle long Image 16). There were some, very few, wearing a niqab, or a full face-covering veil. Female students of other nationalities were mostly Muslim. Many, though not all, tended to cover their hair, often with white or coloured scarves, but generally preferred not to wear abayas. Provided they were non-Qatari, non-Gulf Arab students, their style of clothing did not meet with local students’ disapproval.

Image 15: Male ABP students dressed in national attire, LAS building

It seemed that for Qataris, different socio-cultural standards applied to male versus female dress code requirements. For example, it was acceptable for Qatari men to wear Western attire, which some did occasionally. Abdulla and Hamad, both Qatari, sometimes opted for jeans and a t-shirt, instead of their national dress. When asked about it, Hamad said that, overall, the Qatari male dress code was more relaxed than the female one, and it was “up to men to decide what they wanted to wear, a thobe or jeans”, while females were generally expected to conform to strict covering rules.

147

Thus, wearing Western clothes – jeans and a top without an abaya and/or shayla – was completely unacceptable for Qatari girls. Some did try to assert their more liberal identity by wearing differently styled abayas: either fully open or with patches of colour or other decorative motifs on the black background. There were a small number of girls who either wore loose shaylas, allowing for their hair to be seen, or who wore no shayla at all, drawing disapproving looks and negative comments from their more conservative colleagues, both male and female.

Image 16: Female ABP students (conservatively dressed and photographed sitting separately from male classmates)

5.4.2.5 Gender mixing: respect “Is it OK to talk to male students about your studies?” I asked Aisha. She said she thought it was, but she was confused about it because it all depended on how a girl talked to a boy. My next question concerned how a female student should talk to a male student to make sure it was proper. “It has to be professional, with respect, so no smiling or looking directly in the eyes”, she explained, “otherwise it’s bad.” Men and women who were not each other’s relations should not mix or “become friends”, according to Islam, Aisha said, adding that there must be mutual respect in male-female

148 interactions. She stated that for men and women even to look directly at each other showed a lack of respect in her culture. She found it “strange” that some of her fellow students seemed to overcome such barriers soon after starting the ABP. When asked to explain further what she meant by respect, she told me that respect meant no bad thoughts, but would not elaborate further. I guessed she might be embarrassed possibly having to delve into the topic of flirting or anything vaguely related to sexuality (“bad thoughts” would seem to suggest that) and did not want to make her uncomfortable by probing the issue further.

Abdulla also touched upon the issue of respect, stressing that “respect is important”. To illustrate how he understood respect, he said he was careful how he talked to girls: if he ever talked to them it was only about their studies, not anything else. He still preferred not to look at them directly because it would be disrespectful if he did. That was because in Qatari culture, men and women did not commonly interact with each other socially unless they were from the same family.

Abdulla recognised that the ability to operate in a mixed gender environment was necessary because things in Qatar were changing and men and women were now expected to study and work together. This was both good and bad, he said. Good because the country had to modernise and be more like the rest of the world, so males and females needed to work together “to make Qatar stronger”. But the change was also negative because it could lead to “bad behaviour”, like flirting and affairs. That was why young Qataris “had to be careful in places like the ABP” and avoid that kind of conduct through mutual respect, Abdulla explained.

Fatma reported related issues that Students Services had to deal with during the academic year:

Sometimes we face problems with a few who misunderstand the relation of being colleagues in one school and think in making it more emotional relations. I had some complaints from some girls that some boys embarrassed them by saying

149

unsuitable things. These problems became less [sic] as the academic year pass [sic] on.

When later asked for clarification what she meant by “unsuitable things”, she explained that it could be, for example, a boy inviting a girl to go out with him, a boy asking a girl for a phone number, commenting on a girl’s looks, etc. Fatma considered academic collaboration to be the only acceptable and respectable form of gender interactions in a co-educational environment. 5.4.2.6 Gender mixing: judgement As an ABP teacher, I have heard female Qatari students state that they sometimes felt “judged” by their male counterparts for choosing a co-educational option, especially if the latter came from more traditional families, where gender segregation was strictly observed even during family social events. The following incident, related in my Teacher Notes (Vignette 2), illustrates that point.

Vignette 2

In a small writing class of six students, AR is the only Qatari male. He sits some distance from the girls and is usually very quiet, never participating in discussions without being asked to do so, whereupon he obligingly answers a specific question and falls back into silence again. This time, the students have finished the first draft of their essay on social change in Qatar and are working in pairs revising each other’s essay, before submission.

AR is working with S, a female Qatari student. He is uncomfortable and looks away, as if ignoring her presence. S’s essay is on the situation of women in Qatar. I join each pair in turn, listening to their exchanges and offering advice if necessary. Finally, I sit down with AR and S. He reluctantly reviews her essay in terms of structure and mechanics, making helpful remarks.

However, when it comes to discussing S’s thesis statement (“Despite introducing co-education and giving more political and economic rights to women, culturally Qatar is still closed-minded in regard to their position, with many women having no personal or social freedom and their lives being controlled by men”), AR simply criticises it as untrue. He is asked by S to indicate the “untrue” part of her thesis, but he doesn’t. S asks for an explanation and his views on the topic.

150

AR replies that globalisation and modernisation in Qatar have had negative effects on the society because it’s bad and immoral for men and women to study or work in a mixed environment, and adds that he wouldn’t allow his sister or future wife to do that. He also wouldn’t allow them to drive or to travel abroad to study. He adds that men and women do not mix in his family and says that, in this way, men only try to protect women from what is bad for them.

S points out that he is himself studying in a co-educational institution, can drive his car without asking anyone for permission and has applied to a university in the US to study business. “Isn’t it all bad for you too?” S’s question makes AR laugh. The other girls are now listening to the conversation intently. “Of course not”, he says. They ask, why? “I trust myself not to do anything wrong.” “Don’t you trust women, your sister or your future wife?” S asks almost indignantly. “I don’t trust other men”, says AR. “So, our culture is all about men not trusting each other and protecting women from men by controlling women”, Sara sums it up in what sounds like a paradox.

We all laugh, but from then on, the character of this class is increasingly defined by the inverted imbalance between the five women and one man – although numerically the girls are in majority and successfully put their points across in class discussions, they seem resigned to the fact that he represents a culturally stronger position within their common society outside our class. Each time he enters the classroom, the girls’ behaviour changes, they pull their shaylas (head covers) tightly over their hair and behave in a more timid way, avoiding eye contact and verbal interactions with him. Pair work is all but abandoned.

(Teacher Notes, no date)

Abdulla remarked that even he, as a young Qatari male, was subject to that judgement. The idea of unrelated men and women mixing freely was considered a bad thing, an un- Islamic thing, even in an educational context. That was what Abdulla was told by “some relatives and friends from school” when they heard he was going to the ABP. He felt they disapproved of his choice. Fortunately, Abdulla’s parents supported his ABP studies because they wanted him to get admitted into a good university, such as Texas

151

A&M in Education City (EC), to study engineering, like his older brother. In EC, all universities were co-educational, so studying with girls would be unavoidable.

5.4.2.7 Gender mixing: dangerous freedom Chris noticed that some of the most positive aspects of students’ ABP experiences seemed to be related to their developing social life in the ABP and a new sense of freedom they did not have at school.

However, that new sense of social freedom could result in tension and conflict. Vignette 3 below is taken from my Teacher Notes. It describes a classroom confrontation related to male-female interactions in the ABP. In that incident, hidden forces and actions previously imperceptible to me as part of the classroom’s culture implicit rules were made explicit following an unexpected comment by a student.

152

Vignette 3

Today in class, L let them have it. We were discussing social position of women in Saudi Arabia. She brought the issue home.

“I know what you think of me”, she said to the students. The class went silent. We all waited for what was to come next. “I know you call me bad names but I don’t care”, she blurted. “I come from an open-minded family and have five brothers. I’m used to boys. I’m the only girl, but I’m strong and I can do what I want. Anyway, why shouldn’t I talk to boys? I’m not doing anything wrong. If you think I am then it’s your problem.”

If that wasn’t a feminist statement, I don’t know what is. Nobody said anything in response. Too stunned or embarrassed to take her on, I wondered? She openly questioned the accepted norms – too openly perhaps?

In the end, I stepped in and thanked her for her comment, making sure not to offend anyone or make matters worse through a careless remark. We went back to the clearly much safer topic of women’s oppression in Saudi.

Teacher Notes, February 2013

L was a Qatari girl who chose not to cover her hair and wore her abaya wide open, revealing causal t-shirts and leggings underneath. Unlike more traditional, all-black abayas, hers had squares of grey material sewn into it in a symmetrical pattern. I often saw her sitting and chatting with boys outside the class, in different places around the ABP. Apparently, her conduct drew very negative reactions from many other girls, especially in her English class, although I was not aware of those reactions or how strong they were. I did notice that she usually sat alone or close to the boys in her class, never with the other girls, but did not understand the significance of that situation until L’s outburst during one of our lessons.

The situation described above revealed hidden and subtle divisions among Qataris, indicating forces opaque to an outsider. The interplay of those forces could result in creating seemingly spontaneous, but in fact quite deliberate, male-female seating arrangements described earlier in this section and forms of mutual interactions which

153 took place during and after class time. They were complex and deep forces, related to the perceptions of co-education prevalent within local society, namely among students’ families and/or tribes. They reflected what was culturally acceptable versus unacceptable in terms of female reputation and gender interactions in the ABP, and could bring about various forms of exclusion, with female students, who did not seem to conform to the local dress and conduct codes, negatively stereotyped since they questioned or even defied local sex-segregation norms.

5.4.3 English versus Arabic Issues concerning the language of instruction in schools and other educational institutions in Qatar were numerous and complex. Some of them have already been mentioned earlier in the thesis (Chapter 1, Section 1.2.2) as relating to wider cultural and societal matters.

5.4.3.1 Weak English skills, lack of self-confidence, and low participation Sara and Chris, both English teachers, were concerned about their students’ English language skills. Sara thought they were weak:

Overall I find their written expression in English to be quite poor in terms of grammar with sentences that drag on and on. Also few are able to express themselves with precise and concise thoughts. (Sara, email interview, Dec 2012)

Chris also commented on his students’ language skills. As a grammar teacher, he wrote in his email interview that in his classes, students could do well if they simply came to class and did the work. However, one of their problems was “that many times they aren’t able to apply what they learn in their other courses or in real life”. He hoped that through improving their grammar, their writing skills would also improve. “Reading, writing, and critical thinking” were the skills that needed to be worked on more, he thought, for them to stand a chance of being admitted into an English-language university. Overall, he felt they had improved in his course, but not to the extent that he would have liked, especially that they “[had] many fossilized errors due to growing up in this culture and it’s difficult for them to change.”

154

Sara mentioned other significant aspects of ABP students’ experiences related to weak language skills, as seen by her in her English classes. She pointed out problems with self-confidence in class, possibly due to the perceived intimidating character of the AE level courses and lack of previous exposure to tasks such as essay writing:

I find few students have great self-confidence within the classroom, though they may appear incredibly confident and assured outside of the classroom. I think academic composition scares them a bit. Many have only ever written at the most 2 paragraphs in English, prior to entering ABP. Suddenly they are faced with having to write a proper essay. (Sara, email interview, Dec 2012)

She saw low class participation as another major problem resulting from weak English skills:

Very few hands are raised when trying to elicit classroom conversation. I can teach a concept to the class, such as how to draft a thesis statement, and some are actively engaged, others not so much. So when it comes time to write a thesis statement, not all are capable of applying what was just taught to their individual work. Yet they all want me to help them individually and "hold their hand" as they struggle to write. (Sara, email interview, Dec 2012)

5.4.3.2 Positive attitude to English studies in the ABP Abdulla was mostly positive when it came to studying English and in English in the ABP. He explained that taking separate courses in English grammar, writing, and reading43 was helping him with his language skills a great deal, because he needed to improve in each area. At school everything was taught together, he said, and it was confusing. He also explained that he needed English terminology in maths and science, since he wanted to study marine engineering. He had not been able to study those subjects in English at school. His teachers’ English was not good, he said, so he was mostly taught in Arabic, even though the school was supposed to be teaching students in English44. In the ABP, he was finally improving his English.

43 At the Foundation 1 and 2 levels in the ABP, English is taught in four modules, Grammar, Writing, Reading, and Extensive Reading http://www.abp.edu.qa/academics/english 44 As stipulated in the education reform “Education for the New Era” (Brewer et al. 2007), before a return to Arabic as a language of instruction (see Chapter 1).

155

Similarly to Abdulla, Hamad had a positive view of his English classes in the ABP, stressing the benefits of being taught English in “four parts” (modules), just like Abdulla did. I asked him to elaborate and he echoed Abdulla’s views that at his school no attention was paid to the separate language skills and therefore his English was not strong. Maybe a different course was needed for each skill, he thought, to really improve students’ English. In his school, they had only one English course for everything, grammar, reading, writing and speaking, and every year a new teacher came to teach them, but never a native speaker. Now he could see that maybe he had not been taught English well at school, Hamad said.

Trying to find out more about Aisha’s English learning background, I asked about a comment she made in her questionnaire response about drawing things in the English class at school. She confirmed that in her last year at school her English teacher was not really qualified to teach English, so the class was divided into groups and each group had to present a topic visually. Aisha explained that the students usually had to illustrate words they were made to memorise for a test or an exam. She dismissed that teaching method as old-fashioned and “useless” in contrast to methods in the ABP. She added that at school she hated books, but in the ABP she had to start reading in English and “it was not too bad”.

5.4.3.3 English: academic aspirations, status, relevance Similarly to Abdulla and Hamad, Aisha wanted to get better at English to be able to get into a good university, preferably in Education City, either Texas A&M or CMU to study computer science. She only liked computers, she said, and her family thought she was very clever with computers and should study computer science or programming. She enjoyed participating in the Robotics Club in the ABP and wanted a related career. She needed English for that and was glad to be studying it in the ABP, because “maybe now [she] would have a better chance” of going to a foreign university, like her brothers and sisters. Her family considered that path more successful than attending Qatar University which was not “prestigious” like EC universities, she said. English was very important now, she said, necessary for good education and well-paying jobs.

156

5.4.3.4 Sense of empowerment In the questionnaire, Aisha remarked on her overall experience of studying English in the ABP, stating: “I learned how to use my English in a proper way for example essay and [discussion] not only to order pizza”. She said that now, to her, English was becoming a language she could use to learn about new things, like computers or stories that she read in her Literature class. Before, the only way she could use it was for simple things, instructions to her housemaid or ordering a home delivery from Pizza Hut. I then looked again at another statement she made in the questionnaire responses: “English in the ABP is something you learn from”. She developed that further saying that reading articles in English allowed her to learn about the world and English was no longer just a string of words to learn by heart for a test, but something more, a tool that helped her to gain knowledge. Although I did not feel that Aisha saw her ABP experiences in an overall positive light, it appeared that she felt empowered by her developing English language skills which were giving her greater access to learning.

5.4.3.5 Impact on Arabic skills The reverse side of English language learning in the ABP was the students’ Arabic skills. For example, despite improving his English, Abdulla was worried that he was not “progressing Arabic”, as he put it, adding that it was a negative thing about studying in the ABP. “Do you talk with your friends in English?” I asked him. “No, of course not”, he replied somewhat amused, “only in Arabic”. But, that was not enough to advance his Arabic, he said, since like everyone else in casual conversations he used the Qatari dialect, as opposed to the formal variety of Arabic, known as “Classical (Modern Standard) Arabic” (Nydell 2006: 94)45, or Fus’ha, required for education, used in the media and official speech. He was worried that without studying Fus’ha he could “lose it”. He seemed confused about which language he would consider more important for his future job: “I don’t know, because I will work in Qatar, so I will need Arabic”, he said, but added that English was now required to get a better paid job in the country even in Qatari companies.

45 Nydell points out that “the reverence for Arabic pertains only to Classical Arabic” while “Arabic dialects have no prestige” (2006: 95).

157

Not everyone saw emphasis on English in a negative light though: Hamad was not concerned about not advancing his formal Arabic: “I want to study in English, in a British or American university, and then in my job I will not need that much Arabic”, he stated.

5.4.3.6 Wider language issues: personal versus religious use Although many students, similarly to Abdulla, still used Arabic for personal communication, in some cases, there was growing reliance on English even in personal exchanges, at the cost of local Qatari dialect of Arabic, and not just formal Arabic, as was Abdulla’s concern. In the Teacher Notes of March 2012, I noted the phenomenon of Qatari students’ claiming that English was their first language and describing it as “their” language in which they found it easier to express themselves than in Arabic (Vignette 4).

Vignette 4

Talking about differences between English and Arabic for our comparison essay, K (from the ruling family) announced in class today that for her, it was easier to use English than Arabic to express herself. She said that English, not Arabic, was her first language: “My nannies and cousins all spoke English to me, and I went to an English nursery and then an English school”, she said.

A couple of other students, from the same family, affirmed that. Some people looked at them with disbelief. Two female, fully-veiled students openly criticised that statement stressing that Arabic should take priority in the life of every Muslim as the language of the Koran.

Teacher Notes, March 2013

The special status of Arabic as the original sacred language of the Koran was often raised as one of the main matters in that context. ABP students who were seen to favour English could encounter a very negative feedback from others, particularly when it came to reading or reciting the Koran and related religious matters. While ruling and upper class Qataris could usually afford to ignore pejorative comments from their more

158 orthodox classmates, most avoided making any open statements to that effect for fear of disapproval and exclusion.

Criticism of English taking priority over Arabic concerned a number of resulting issues and was expressed not only in ABP classroom discussions, but also in informal exchanges and casual remarks made by students, as well as in public discourse outside the ABP, as discussed in Chapter 1, Sections 1.2.2 and 1.3.1.When the government decreed a return to Arabic as the medium of instruction at QU and independent schools in 2012, the debate went on unabated. The opinion expressed below, which I recorded in Vignette 5 in my Teacher Notes, was representative of another side of the polemic that went on in Qatari society for several months after the decision to switch back from English to Arabic:

Vignette 5

During a break between the scheduled writing tests, a former student comes for a visit. Majed is Qatari and has been admitted into Georgetown University in Education City where he will study international politics. Today he is in the ABP with his younger female cousin, our new student. In a community as closely-knit as the Qatari society, word of mouth and an older relative’s experience in the ABP are often more effective forms of advertising for us than expensive announcements in the media. Majed tells me that he is “against Arabic at QU and in independent schools in Qatar” because neglecting English “will damage Qatari students’ chances of getting into foreign universities and is bad for jobs in the future”. That is why he wanted his cousin to come to the ABP to improve her English: “I convinced her parents to send her here”, he says with some pride.

Teacher Notes August 2013

5.4.3.7 Wider language issues: hidden societal divisions This use of English for personal communication was more typical of students from a higher social background, such as children of high-ranking Qatari diplomats or members of the ruling family. Vignette 6 below is an example of classroom dynamisms related to local social divisions, but previously invisible to me as an expat teacher.

159

Revealed through a classroom interaction described here, a language-related aspect of tribal hierarchies manifested itself in a seemingly insignificant comment:

Vignette 6

In class, students are not allowed to use mobile phones46. K is a male Qatari student who generally works hard and doesn’t cause problems. Occasionally he yawns, stretches or says something (“Teacher, it’s time to go now...”) which draws disapproving looks from another student, F, a sophisticated Qatari male from the ruling family.

When K’s father calls him on his mobile during my class, K asks for permission to answer. At first, I refuse, but the phone keeps on ringing and K becomes agitated, saying he must answer because it’s a call from his father. I finally allow him to take the call outside to stop disrupting the class. K disappears for a while, then comes back and sits in silence until the end of the class when he apologises and promises not to do it again.

As he leaves the classroom, I’m joined by the student from the ruling family. “Don’t worry about him, miss”, he says reassuringly. “He is only a Bedu and has no manners. They are all like that, so just ignore him. In fact, I didn’t even know they could speak English…”

Teacher Notes, no date

Over the course of the semester, F proceeded to tell me about local tribes, families, names, former slaves (Abd), Huwala47, nomadic Bedouin, and sedentary people. All that explained a lot about the inner structure of the Qatari society, opaque to a foreigner, who usually only sees uniformly dressed students (males in white and females in black) with no immediately obvious outer indicators of social status other than cars. Given general affluence of Qatari society, even those external signs can be misleading. But the internal cultural and social divisions of this society, however concealed, were still present in my classroom, as shown in F’s comment about the Bedouin not speaking

46 See Appendix 3 for ABP classroom policies. as referring to those (الهولة :F and other Qatari students explained the meaning of Huwala to me (Arabic 47 Gulf Arab/Qatari Sunni Muslims who, at some point, migrated to Persia, only to come back to Qatar and other Gulf Arab states. They are recognised by their family names by local people. I have not researched the term any further as it is not relevant to my study.

160

English. Thus, F and students from his family circle interacted mostly with each other, or several carefully selected members of other high-ranking families, speaking almost exclusively in English. F never sat next to K and I never saw them have a conversation with each other.

Based on my observations recorded in the Teacher Notes, many students from the ruling family or families recognised as more prominent in Qatar often behaved and performed in class somewhat differently from ‘lower-status’ students, although it was only through subtle signs that those differences were revealed. For example, such students might appear more at ease interacting with the opposite gender or foreign teachers. They were also more likely to participate in class discussions and showed more self-confidence in such classroom exchanges. Moreover, they usually seemed to have come from an international educational background, had broader general knowledge, and frequently displayed better English skills. These factors inadvertently shaped what went on in the classroom, further affecting the seating arrangements and interactions between students.

5.4.4 Academic integrity Academic integrity is one of the key elements of the ABP educational culture. It precludes plagiarism and all forms of academic cheating, such as copying someone else’s homework or helping each other to pass test or quizzes. Many students coming to the ABP from local schools were unfamiliar with it and, at least initially, found it a challenge.

5.4.4.1 Lack of preparation for and knowledge of academic integrity I asked Abdulla bluntly if he had cheated at school. “No, yes, sometimes”, he laughed. His teachers did not pay attention and students did it to get better grades, he said, echoing Alia’s comments about the situation in independent schools. In a parallel remark, Hamad added that academic honesty rules were not applied at his school. Instead, students “copied and pasted homework and other assignments”. In the ABP, “they check homework carefully”, but at school teachers did not bother, so students used the internet to do it knowing that they would get a full grade for simply handing an assignment in. “Here, they may fire [sic] you for plagiarism”, he said.

161

Aisha said she now knew that foreign universities required academic honesty at all times, but this requirement was too strict, she thought, and should not be imposed on Qatari students who did not have to care about it at school, because “teachers didn’t care” either, according to Aisha. This view suggested that plagiarism was not part of her previous schooling, either.

Sara saw that a significant number of students came to the ABP without any notion of what academic integrity was. They were mostly unfamiliar with the concept of academic integrity and related expectations placed on them in the ABP. She considered it useful to draw students’ attention to it at the beginning of the first semester, because many of them had no prior knowledge of how to cite sources, having been allowed to copy and paste before:

Many have only ever copied information or summarized; few have ever had to write about themselves or share their opinions. (Sara, email interview, Dec 2012)

Chris thought his students did not give it sufficient consideration.

Many students don’t take academic integrity seriously. Part of the problem is [their] not understanding how serious it is, but some just don’t care. If the students are always looking for the easiest way to get something done, academic dishonesty is appealing to them. (Chris, email interview, Dec 2012)

He identified some other problems connected with academic honesty, indicating a number of reasons why students might disregard it as unimportant:

The students can be lazy. They want everything handed to them and they are not independent learners. Lack of motivation is an issue that we constantly deal with. Unfortunately, due to the above factors, academic honesty is a common problem at the ABP. (ibid.)

162

5.4.4.2 Adjustment to academic integrity requirements Many students soon managed to adjust to the academic integrity requirement and started to see it in a positive light as enhancing their learning. Thus, Abdulla recognised that ABP teachers wanted students to learn and therefore did not allow them to cheat. It is better to be honest in academic work, because “it’s helping the student”, as he wrote in the Questionnaire. He repeated the same point when asked about it again. “Well, you learn properly, learn for yourself”, he said, and finally get higher grades because of that.

The academic integrity code practised in the ABP met with Hamad’s positive response: “It helps us after ABP, for universities”, he said, adding that it was a good experience to learn about avoiding plagiarism, again beneficial in the future if a student wanted to study in an “American college”.

5.4.4.3 Rejection and alienation When I discussed the topic of academic integrity with Aisha, she said it was “stupid” because in the ABP she would get into trouble for taking just one sentence from the Internet. She was bothered that she would get a zero as a result and did not think it would be justified. Having all those rules against plagiarism only made her want to break them, she said. It was not a problem at school where it was fine to copy and paste material from the Internet. Why make such a big deal out of it in the ABP?

Aisha’s remarks illustrated a sense of alienation some students experienced when dealing with the academic integrity rules in the ABP, since they may have felt – like Aisha – unable or unwilling to conform to the new culture of mandatory citation and individual work without the help of others.

5.4.4.4 Self-imposed isolation Another aspect of the academic integrity issue was experienced by those students who were expected to “help” their classmates with assignments. In my teaching experience in the ABP, I found the idea of “helping each other” to be quite common among students, at least initially. In numerous conversations conducted over the years and related to academic integrity, students admitted to feelings of discomfort if asked to

163

“give someone [their] homework or show answers on a quiz”, as I recorded in Teacher Notes. Many stated their inability to refuse such help, particularly if it involved helping an academically weaker person. The reason for this was because students perceived as “nerds”, or those with top grades, were expected to help others with homework assignments, quizzes and tests. That could lead to resentment or self-imposed isolation, with a student who had been put in that position choosing to avoid classmates rather than telling them openly they could not use her or his work. Such explicit refusal to comply would be considered bad-mannered or even un-Islamic (based on Teacher Notes). The following note (Vignette 7) records a related situation I observed in one of my classes:

Vignette 7

F, a female Indian student, is always in the classroom before everyone else, sitting there by herself and waiting for me. I asked her why she came to class so early and sat there alone instead of hanging out with other students in Starbucks or the LRC. She replied that very often students tried to get her to show them her homework and she was “sick of giving people my work”. “The same used to happen at school”, she said. “But I can’t tell them I don’t want to do it, because it’s rude and against my religion. I’m supposed to help people who need it, but I think they are using me, because they can’t do their own work and it’s easier to take mine.”

Teacher Notes, October 2012

5.3.5 Independent study / critical thinking In the ABP teaching approach, active, personalised and autonomous student involvement in their own learning was seen as one of the most effective methodological elements. Initially, as indicated by several research participants, some students found it challenging to get used to the independent study idea, since they were used to studying only what was assigned to them, as they claimed was the norm at school

164

5.3.5.1 Time management and family issues Sara stressed students’ weak time management skills:

One of the biggest struggles my students have faced is time management. They repeatedly find themselves in situations where they cannot manage all that is required of them by several subjects at once. In response, many give up, others just cry and cry, and others respond by working to succeed in only one or two classes and give up on the demands from the others. This is when I often find students skipping my class to prepare for a math test or a group project or something they did not take care of until the last minute. I suppose I should be thankful that they are honest enough with me to tell me the truth? (Sara, email interview, Dec 2012)

Echoing Sara’s views, Chris referred to problems with independent study, stating that students did not manage it successfully, which he contributed to poor time management skills and insufficient motivation.

The students must be constantly guided and managed by the teacher. They frequently wait until right before the class to study or complete an assignment. Due to their lack of motivation, any type of learning on their own that goes beyond the lesson is very unusual. (Chris, email interview, Dec 2012)

Abdulla thought independent learning was a good idea: “it teaches the student how to work in the right way and how to work on his own”. What was “the right way”? I asked. The right way was to study without having the teacher helping him all the time and telling him what to do in his studies. It would help him at university, too, he added, if he was able to study on his own and do his own “researches”. Was he good at it, I wanted to know. He admitted that he was not really motivated to study on his own and his time was often taken up by his social and family life. Also, he admitted he was often struggling to motivate himself to study, especially that he did not qualify for promotion from the lowest F1 level to the higher F2 in the spring semester because of low grades.

Hamad said that it was in the ABP that he had learnt about studying independently: “I can rely on myself” was his answer to the related question in the Questionnaire. In a post-Questionnaire meeting I asked him what he had meant by it. He replied that in the ABP he had developed a habit of studying beyond and above what he learnt in class and

165 relied more on himself to find out additional information about things that interested him. Hamad said he simply enjoyed learning and exploring different subjects, such as science. However, he tried to do it mostly in the ABP Learning Resource Centre (LRC), because it was more difficult at home, with a big family and various related social obligations which could take a lot of his time. As the eldest son, Hamad explained, he had to put his family members first, before his own needs, for example occasionally having to drive his mother or sisters shopping instead of studying. Hamad stressed the importance of family in his life as a Qatari: he was expected to attend all family gatherings, not only during major religious celebrations, such as Ramadan, Eid al Fitr or Eid al Adha, but also Friday family lunches at his grandmother’s house. “Sometimes it’s hard to study and do all that”, he sighed.

Aisha, on the other hand, told me that the idea of independent study did not appeal to her since she felt she should “learn everything” in class and spend the rest of the time doing her own things, like “going on the computer” or spending time with her family. She believed she had good management skills and tried not to be late with any assignments, despite various family engagements, like weddings. She did not like reading or studying outside of what was required for each class.

5.3.5.2 Teachers’ expectations and background knowledge In many teachers’ view, independent study skills were related to background knowledge. It was often described by them as inadequate, as exemplified in the interviews with Sara and Chris, who pointed out lack of motivation among ABP students to learn on their own, outside specific course assignments.

For instance, Sara linked independent learning to background knowledge and described it as lacking:

I find that students don't seem that knowledgeable about the world at large. For instance I was using a written piece by Muhammed Yunus as a focal point one day, and only 2 students (both male) had heard of him. I started explaining the concept of microloans and there was no recognition of this concept from the other students. If I contrast this with students at several of the previous schools where I

166

have worked, they would not have necessarily known the name Yunus, but they certainly would have acknowledged what I was talking about as I mentioned phrases such as Grameen Bank, microfinancing, etc. as many of them ran community service organizations based on the very principle. (Sara, email interview, Dec 2012)

Sometimes teachers’ expectations were unrealistic, which resulted in student discouragement or alienation. An entry in my Teacher Notes (Vignette 8) shows an example of my own unrealistic assumptions of my students’ background knowledge of Burma.

Vignette 8

In my Composition class, students prepare for writing an essay on the topic of “Wearing a Mask”. One of the metaphorical masks discussed in class is the mask of social forms, compliance, obedience, enforced by conventions, political oppression, fear, etc. I want them to analyse short excerpts from a book by Andrew Marshall The Trouser People (2003) about Burma. Although the fragments chosen for discussion seem – to me – wonderfully rich in meaning, highlighting how a totalitarian system forces citizens to wear various masks in daily life, they generate no response from my students, who sit in confused silence.

I get increasingly frustrated. They seem to know nothing about the country’s military regime, National League for Democracy, Aung San Suu Kyi, etc. The class is switched off, nobody is following me. I’m frustrated and disheartened. My carefully prepared lesson has been rendered futile, but I don’t realise just how futile until finally someone asks a crucial question: “What is Burma?”

Teacher Notes, March 2012

167

5.3.5.3 Critical thinking as an aspect of Western education Sara also commented on her students’ critical thinking skills as a problematic area of her teaching, pointing out their weakness. According to Chris, the ability to think critically was related to certain “aspects of Western education” that they had not been exposed to before:

academically, the students [were] weak (...), seriously lacking critical thinking skills, and they have very poor reading and writing ability. They were not brought up in a reading culture, so academic work is very challenging for them. (Chris, email interview, Dec 2012)

Students’ varying levels of critical thinking skills and background knowledge sometimes manifested themselves in classroom interactions as sources of negative stereotyping. Those who had studied in Western schools in Qatar or abroad, had often been taught critical thinking skills and their general knowledge was usually broader than former independent school students. Sometimes, their differing educational histories could affect the classroom environment, when, for example, ‘international school’ students sat together and kept their distance from the rest of the class. They might occasionally be openly dismissive of their fellow students’ class participation or conduct, giggling or whispering while a ‘local school’ student struggled to answer a teacher’s question related to thinking critically of an analysed text or issue. That attitude, adopted by some students from international schools, of looking down on former independent school students, could result in inner tensions within the classroom presenting teachers with potentially precarious situations. I demonstrate it in the following excerpt from my Teacher Notes (Vignette 9).

168

Vignette 9

R is one of my top students in Academic Composition. Her English is excellent and her written work is superb. She knows she is better at English than many of her classmates, because she studied in an American school abroad while her father was posted there as Qatari ambassador. Like other “international schoolers”, she also has much wider background knowledge (history, geography, literature, current affairs, etc.) than independent school students. She talks to boys freely and sometimes deliberately provokes other, more conservative students. In class, she can have an intimidating manner and show impatience or oven contempt when someone makes a mistake, for example, speaking in a discussion. She sits together with a couple of other girls like herself, from a similar, international school background and they often giggle when a student from outside their circle says something in class. Even though I appreciate their spirit, participation and general knowledge, I often have to ask her and her friends to tone it down, because it discourages or even scares other students off from speaking in front of them.

Teacher Notes, October 2012

5.3.6 Critical teacher feedback Critical feedback, understood by ABP teachers as constructive criticism necessary for academic improvement, was not always received well by Qatari students who were mostly unused to it, especially its “critical” part. Their initial comments on teacher feedback seemed unusual (Questionnaire 1, Section 5.2.4), because they stated that the feedback or evaluation of assignments they received from teachers in their previous schools was mostly positive. Consequently, they were not well equipped to cope with detailed critical assessment practised by ABP teachers.

5.3.6.1 Varied responses to criticism Both Abdulla and Hamad seemed to welcome teachers’ critical feedback which they saw as helpful, designed to help them improve. Aisha, however, had less positive comments regarding critical teacher feedback. She told me that in the ABP, the teachers were strict marking students’ papers and it was upsetting to get feedback with her many mistakes highlighted, even if it was to help her improve her language skills. At school, she said, she always got full marks if she delivered homework on time, without any

169 corrections or comments by teachers. She did not much like the criticisms she received from her ABP teachers, Aisha stated.

An extremely negative reaction to critical feedback is described in Vignette 10 as recorded in my Teacher Notes.

Vignette 10

In the English Room today, I unwittingly reduced a student to tears. She brought her essay and asked for a review before she submitted it, so I highlighted mistakes and prepared to discuss them with her. She started crying instead, because she had “never been treated so badly by a teacher”.

When I managed to calm her down, she explained that at school (she gave me the name of an independent school she had attended), her mistakes were never highlighted like that and she got full marks for simply handing her homework in. So she thought she never made any mistakes writing in English (“my writing was perfect”).

We talked and I think she understood that constructive criticism was necessary for improvement. I stressed “constructive”, but she still said “criticism” was bad because it could upset or insult people. In the end, we went over her essay again and she left to edit it and bring it back for another review.

Teacher Notes, March 2012

However, Sara stressed that most students gradually got used to and responded well to individual, detailed feedback:

They certainly respond well to individual feedback. When I first used a rubric to grade their written work, they were appalled that I hadn't 'graded' their work. "But, Miss, there are no marks on my paper. How do I know what is wrong?" I had to explain how the rubric worked moving from basic to advanced in categories such as thesis/lead in, sentence fluency, grammar and mechanics, etc. I had to explain that if a score was low in the conclusion column, then the conclusion is what they needed to work on to improve. That was a foreign concept to them in terms of teacher feedback, yet they eventually seemed to grasp onto the concept. (Sara, email interview, Dec 2012)

170

5.3.6.2 Power in the classroom Aisha commented that ABP teachers were “mean with grades” while at school, she could get the grades she wanted by persuading her teachers to change them from lower to higher. She said she didn’t have that power in the ABP and that’s why her grades were so low there.

I asked Aisha to explain how she managed to get her teachers to give her better grades. She said it depended on the nationality of the teacher. She then told me about her and her classmates’ perceptions of their high school teachers, based on the teachers’ nationality or ethnic origin: “(NATIONALITY 1) teachers, well, miss, they were just stupid, so we didn’t listen to them. We also had (NATIONALITY 2) teachers – but you know, with (NATIONALITY 2), we can do what we want, go out, talk in the class, you know, we don’t respect (NATIONALITY 2). We only listened to Qataris, we were scared because they can tell our parents.” When asked about their perceptions of Western teachers, she said: “Oh no, we didn’t have any white [sic] teachers, it would be different, but no white teachers in my school.” She then said her friends in other Qatari schools had a similar attitude to teachers and also tended to judge them based on nationality. Plus, she said, all of her teachers were female which made things easier in terms of interacting with them. That gave Qatari students power. That was the “power” Aisha felt she had at school as a Qatari, where she could argue about her grades and “make” teachers give her better ones:

In school every Qatari person has power. Yes, that’s because of my nationality. But it’s also because of the nationality of the teacher. For example, if the teacher is Qatari, none of the students can do something wrong. Then the Qatari administration could do something serious, like tell our parents, so students are scared to do anything with Qatari teachers. But with other nationalities, nobody cares. Here, ABP is so different than what I thought, teachers shout and the student can’t do anything. I care about my grade and at high school I don’t have to worry about it if I did something wrong to the teacher, but at ABP I have to be perfect. (Interview Notes)

To illustrate her point, Aisha told me she had encountered a problem with one of her ABP teachers who, she said, “insulted her in public”. What that meant, she explained

171 when I asked her to elaborate, was that the teacher in question criticised her writing in front of her classmates. It was something she considered an insult and felt helpless about because “he was a man” and therefore she could not answer him back. This caused her some considerable anguish. She decided to complain to the (American) administration of the ABP, but the whole thing was dismissed as a misunderstanding and she was told to talk to her teacher to address the issue. Distraught and angry, she found herself unable to do so. Finally, she got her older sister to help resolve the matter. Aisha said that helped to smooth the situation over, but also expressed an opinion that the teacher had been used to treating students “like dirt”, only she could not “handle it”. The last thing she said was: “That’s why power is important. If this happened in school I could simply remove the teacher from the school.”

The issue of power is deep and complex and relates not only to ABP classroom dynamics, but is also connected with wider cultural and societal matters. Although Aisha articulated this theme in the context of teacher-student interactions, it impacted many aspects of students’ educational experiences in the ABP, shaping them in positive and negative ways through implicit and explicit socio-cultural connections and relationships, as signalled in Chapter 2, Section 2.3.

5.3.6.3 Positive interactions with teachers beyond critical feedback It seemed that it was more effective to offer critical feedback to students on an individual basis and not in front of the whole class. Sara stressed students’ need for individual attention from teachers:

Each student is quite eager for one on one help, whether that is in my office, the English room, at the computers, or during independent work time during class. They seem to really desire that individual attention from the teacher. (ibid.)

ABP students’ need for individual attention from teachers was not limited to critical feedback on assignments. They regularly availed themselves of their teachers’ “office hours” coming to talk about academic, but also personal matters, as mentioned in Section 5.1 of this chapter. Those interactions were always strictly professional, yet

172 often resulted in long-lasting relationships, which extended beyond two semesters at ABP, with former students regularly visiting their teachers several years after graduating, as confirmed through my own experience and that of many other ABP teachers. This could be due to a highly personalised teaching approach practised in the ABP exemplified in Vignette 11 below. Vignette 11

In my office, A commented casually that his ABP teachers “seem to like [their] job and are personally interested in the students they teach.” He sounded surprised, but his remark led us to a conversation about degree and future job choices, and “doing things you like” in a professional capacity, including teachers. A confessed that before the ABP he had not really met any teachers who liked teaching. “It feels different in class when you like your teacher and you know that the teacher likes you and enjoys teaching you”, he told me.

Teacher Notes, no date

Abdulla said he really liked his teachers here in the ABP. They cared about students and were “nice” to them, which was unlike his teachers had been at school: “Too much work for them maybe, so they don’t care if students learn or not”, he remarked. What did he mean by ABP teachers’ being “nice”? Polite and friendly, and always helpful, he explained, but strict. Hamad echoed Abdulla’s comments to a large extent, pointing out how much academic and personal support he had received from his ABP teachers during his studies there.

Chris highlighted the fact that many ABP students valued individual teachers’ dedication and passion for teaching:

They do respond positively to my energy and enthusiasm. They also know that I genuinely care about them, and that makes them willing to participate in the class. (Chris, email interview, Dec 2012)

Asked about his overall perceptions of students’ experiences on his English course in the ABP (F2), Chris commented on the behavioural aspect of it, describing them as

173

“very kind and respectful”. However, he did note some minor discipline problems, “such as talking/texting on their mobiles”, or “tardiness”. For example, before one of my observations in his class, Chris warned me that he had had “a bad class with them last time”. He said: “I lost it with them, maybe because I was in bad mood. But they wouldn’t settle, were coming late, unprepared, you know. So I let them have it. Just so you know that it might be a bit awkward” (observation notes). Chris began that lesson by talking to the students in an informal way and referred to their previous class when, he said, “he was so angry with them”. He used humour to disperse any remaining unpleasantness and shook hands with the student who apparently was in trouble before. “No hard feelings. You are not allowed to hate me”, joked Chris. His students took it in good faith and the class started. I thought the students must have liked their teacher because nobody seemed to bear a grudge and they all just got on with work.

5.3.7 University application The ABP prepares students for entry to English-language universities in Qatar’s Education City and abroad. Applying to university to can sometimes be less than straightforward, with parental pressure, issues of sponsorship, student attrition and reactions to rejection.

5.3.7.1 Motivation to apply to university: parental pressure and sponsorship According to students’ comments recorded in my Teacher Notes, a number of ABP students felt compelled to apply to university by family pressure, without much intrinsic motivation. Or, they may have preferred to study courses other than those chosen for them by their parents. Business, computing, engineering, and medicine were seen as particularly practical as they promised well-paying jobs in the future, preferably in the government sector where work schedule was more favourable and benefits and retirements plans for Qataris much more generous than in the private sector (Al-Subaiey 2010). The example below (Vignette 12) refers to the strong impact of family expectations on students’ university choices. This was the case with all three key informants, Abdulla, Hamad, and Aisha (Section 5.4.1).

174

Vignette 12

I had a conversation with F today. She came to my office in some distress over her grades, saying that she “must get into Cornell” to be the first doctor in the family. I asked her if she wanted to be a doctor. Her reply: “Yes, it’s the best path for me. That’s what my parents want.” So, my next question was: “If they didn’t want you to be a doctor and if it were up to you, what would you like to be?”

F (without hesitation): “An archaeologist.”

Teacher Notes, March 2013

Hamad came to our last meeting to tell me the happy news that he had been admitted into the Weill Cornell Medical College Foundation Programme. He had fulfilled his dream, all thanks to the ABP, he said, and his relatives were so proud of him: he was going to be the first doctor in the family, just as they wished for him. When asked if he wanted that path too, he simply said that he wanted the same as his parents. In his case, their wishes coincided.

Apart from family pressure, additional factors affecting students’ university choices were related to the issue of sponsorship and fee payment. Qatari students could obtain government sponsorship through the Ministry of Education or, alternatively, company sponsorship. The former gave them a free choice of a degree programme, while the latter tied them to a specialisation wanted by the sponsoring company which also guaranteed a job upon successful completion of university studies (see Chapter 1, Section 1.1).

Like most other Qatari students in the ABP, Abdulla was a sponsored student. In his case, it was a Qatari company, not the Ministry of Education that paid his ABP fees. He was worried that his sponsorship might be withdrawn if his GPA was too low and if he did not gain admission to Texas A&M. Half-way through the semester, however, Abdulla secured a deal with his sponsoring company to go to a university in Oman, where he would study marine engineering, a specialisation needed by the company. His

175 admission there was guaranteed, he said. Also, his future employment was guaranteed as he would work for the sponsoring company. He felt he finally had a clear path ahead and thought his motivation to study and complete the ABP successfully was now much stronger.

5.3.7.2 University rejection Aisha’s story did not end as well as the other two informants’. When she came to our last informal interview in late April, she told me that she had been rejected by the EC universities she had applied to, Texas A&M and Carnegie Mellon, to study computer engineering/computer science or information systems. It was an emotional meeting: Aisha was close to tears, clearly very upset, but also resentful. “It’s all in vain, it’s been for nothing, this whole year in the ABP, waste of time, I hate it here, am going to QU to study computers there, that’s what I love.” “Maybe you’ll be able to transfer to Texas or CMU later on”, I suggested, but she dismissed the idea indignantly. “I’ll never apply again, I hate them now, I’ve wasted a year”, she said tearing up and added that she was pulling out of the ABP where “everybody was looking down on her now”. I did not see her in the ABP after that meeting.

5.3.7.3 Student attrition Despite plans to apply to EC universities, a significant number of them left the ABP throughout the academic year without completing the application process. “This class is tiny and shrinking”, Sara said before my first observation in early October 2012. “Two students left to go to QU”, she added (observation notes). Her remark reflected a major concern in the ABP that year: the student numbers were considerably lower in August 2012 than a year earlier and some were already withdrawing. While some withdrawals are expected to happen every semester due to reasons including low academic performance, family matters, or university acceptances abroad, in the fall of 2012, the number of students pulling out of the ABP was higher than in previous years. As the academic year unfolded, administrators as well as teachers became aware that attrition rate this time was higher than usual. Commenting on her “shrinking class” Sara echoed her fellow teachers who were noticing the same phenomenon in their various courses.

176

“They are dropping like flies”, said Chris about his students (observation notes). In his class, some students had been dismissed due to poor grades and some had decided to withdraw from the ABP to go to Qatar University instead.

Commenting on student attrition, Fatma remarked that, in her view, the 2012/13 student cohort was characterised by lower motivation than in previous years and seemed uninterested in participating in ABP-organised social events:

I noticed that our students this year in general are less motivated than our students in previous years. Lots of them dropped out all along the academic year because of different reasons such as finding the curriculum difficult or because of lots of homework or because of family reasons. I also noticed that most of them didn’t have an interest in participating in the ABP social events such as students’ gatherings, trips or competitions. Very few of them volunteered to help in community events or in Student Services events.

5.4 Key informants’ summary comments with their teachers’ views

5.4.1 Abdulla Abdulla’s overall experience of the ABP was positive. His English skills had improved: “the best thing about the ABP was the English classes”, he said. He enjoyed IT and maths much less because there was “too much homework”. He thought that he had become a “real student, not like at school”. He was now more independent and better at managing his time. Also, he had “learnt more knowledge about the world”, met new people and made new friends. He rated his ABP experiences as valuable and said he “had a great time” in the ABP.

In his English class I observed, Abdulla did not participate as actively as other students, preferring to stay silent and only responding when directly asked by his teacher. He avoided eye contact with the female students and chatted with another boy until the teacher told him off. In a post-observation informal interview, his teacher (Cristina) commented on what she perceived as Abdulla’s low motivation in her class, added more details to the remarks he made in conversations with me. It turned out that he wanted to drop out of the ABP at the beginning of the spring semester, so disheartened was he at

177 not being allowed to join a higher level of English: “he tried hard in the fall, hoping to be a jump-up student, but stopped trying after he was left in F1.” He often missed classes because he did not drive and sometimes did not have anyone to bring him to the ABP. When the teacher suggested he should take a taxi, he told her he would not do that because Qataris did not take taxis. She felt that he did not put in sufficient effort, although had good potential to succeed and occasionally excelled at some assignments, such as a video presentation which he had spent 16 hours editing. The teacher thought the class had students with varied English skills and Abdulla was in the weaker group. I felt Abdulla’s story to an extent reflected the experiences of some other ABP students. Having enrolled with a hopeful attitude, when faced with the amount of homework and English language level required for EC universities admission, many lost heart, opting instead to go to QU or another Arabic university in the region. That was especially true in the case of F1 students as their English level (usually 4.5 on IELTS upon entry into the ABP) was not sufficient for the EC university admission requirements, with an IELTS score of at least 6.5-7. Furthermore, Abdulla’s story touched upon some significant issues that were present in other students’ experiences: studying English and in English at the cost of proficiency in formal Arabic, methodology and level of teaching English at school as opposed to the ABP, lack of academic integrity training at school, co-education and its cultural repercussions, and, last but not least, family influence on degree choices.

5.4.2 Hamad Hamad’s experience was a success story to a much larger extent than Abdulla’s who did not end up studying in Education City although he secured a place at a university in Oman. In response to a question about his overall experience of studying in the ABP, Hamad said: “It opened my eyes onto a new and different greater world than before”. What did he mean? He struggled to find more precise words, but mentioned that he saw that learning could be fun, that studying with girls was OK, that his teachers really cared about him and were passionate about their teaching. Most importantly, he was accepted at Cornell to study medicine.

178

In the class I observed, Hamad was one of the most active students. During a pair activity, he was asked to work with a female student which he did without showing any discomfort. He was the only boy working with a girl in the class. Hamad’s teacher, Alice, was enthusiastic about Hamad as a student. She stressed his thoughtfulness and high level of motivation and said that in his class students motivated each other by being competitive and actively interested in improving their English. Hamad was a top student (“driven for grades”) and distinguished himself not only academically, but also on a personal level as a deep thinker, an open-minded, considerate person with a cheerful, optimistic outlook.

During our final conversation, Hamad said that it had been a wonderful year for him. In fact, he would like to extend the ABP to two years. He had nice memories of everything and everybody. Even the lower points, such as hard assignments, time management issues, and stress about university applications, taught him valuable lessons how to persevere under pressure and never give up. His view of the ABP experiences mirrored the views of many other students who successfully completed their ABP studies and were either admitted into one of the EC universities or went to study in an English- language university abroad. They too were usually proud and positive, and reflected on their ABP experiences as leading to better academic prospects.

5.4.3 Aisha Aisha’s story was a story of frustration, alienation, and rejection – experiences that also take place in the ABP. When I observed her in her literature class, she was a discussion leader in a seminar-like setup. Together with her partner, she had prepared a set of questions for their fellow students. Most of the questions had been designed in such a way that they did not really generate a discussion, only undisputed answers found by referring back to the text. Some students in that class spoke like native speakers and demonstrated excellent understanding of the text. Aisha seemed intimidated and spoke softly and almost reluctantly. Later, Aisha’s teacher (Nina) commented on her performance in class stressing her good study skills: Aisha always came early and never missed a lesson or an assignment. However, she often admitted she did not understand issues or topics examined in class, but was unwilling to ask for extra help or do any

179 extra work, as suggested by Nina. In class, Aisha would sometimes refuse to answer questions. If she did answer them, it was usually in one sentence, without a further explanation. She would not expand or develop her points, but simply say something, and then go silent again. She seemed detached most of the time and her English skills were weaker than most of the students’ in her class. She sat away from the boys and never spoke to them. She did not seem to “hang out” with anyone and cut a somewhat lonely figure, Nina stated.

Throughout my encounters with Aisha I increasingly thought of her story as exemplifying a less positive kind of ABP experience than what I saw in Abdulla’s and Hamad’s cases. She reminded me of some other students I knew, who had found themselves in similar circumstances, full of hurt pride, bitterness and often anger, upon being rejected by an EC university. One such student said to me, “our government is paying for these universities to be here, so why do they reject Qatari students?” (Teacher Notes, April 2012). The only answer I could offer was that the Qatari government was paying for them to deliver the same quality education as in the US and as they were some of the top American universities, they could not admit students who were not up to their standards. The student responded, “But they should lower their requirements to have more Qatari students, otherwise what are they doing here?” She repeated the statement about the Qatari government paying them to be here for the Qataris. This seemed to be a rising conundrum of the internationalised higher education setting in Qatar (based on my Teacher Notes, April 2013).

Concluding remarks Chapter 3 presented my study data, with the key informants’ voices given prominence to highlight students’ experiences in the ABP. The data will be discussed and interpreted through the lens of Othering in Chapter 6.

180

Chapter 6: Students’ experiences interpreted through the lens of Othering

Introduction Chapter 6 presents my discussion of the study data seen from the perspective of Othering, focusing on the first two research questions: What forms of Othering can be identified in local students’ experiences of the new educational culture they encounter in the ABP and, how these forms of Othering might relate to educational processes taking place in this setting. I provide a summary of the themes emerging after analysis (Section 6.1) and explain four areas of student experiences (6.2). Next, I interpret each theme through the lens of Othering in the context of the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture: co-education (Section 6.3); English instruction (Section 6.4); academic integrity (Section 6.5); independent study and critical thinking (Section 6.6); critical teacher feedback (Section 6.7); and university application (Section 6.8). Section 6.9 defines deep action and discusses its manifestations in the context of Othering in the ABP. Finally, in Section 6.10, I discuss relevant aspects of the host cultural complex surrounding small ABP classroom cultures to demonstrate the main contextual factors important in students’ experiences of Othering in the ABP setting.

6.1 Main themes emerging in student experiences in the ABP After coding and categorising my data into recurring meaningful clusters, I identified emergent themes related to students’ encounters with the key dimensions of the new ABP educational culture. I selected the themes I considered to be most relevant in the context of my study. My choices were data-driven: the selected themes were the most prominent ones, i.e. those consistently re-emerging from various chunks of data. But the theme selection was also supported by my in-depth background knowledge of the research context and each theme’s relevance was considered in the light of my teaching experience, articulated through my Teacher Notes. The justification for using my knowledge and experience as a guiding factor in my interpretation of data is provided in Chapter 3, Section 3.7.5. Table 3 below shows the emerging themes grouped according to the key dimensions of the ABP educational culture.

181

Key dimensions of the Themes ABP educational culture  Initial reactions: self-segregation and seating Co-education arrangements  Body language and participation  Changing behaviour in response to co- education  Dress code  Gender mixing: respect / judgement / dangerous freedom

 Weak English skills, lack of self-confidence, English versus Arabic and low participation  Positive attitude to English studies in the ABP  English: academic aspirations, status, relevance  Sense of empowerment  Impact on Arabic skills  Language of personal communication  Wider language issues: hidden societal divisions

 Lack of preparation for and knowledge of Academic integrity academic integrity  Adjustment to academic integrity requirements  Rejection and alienation  Self-imposed isolation

 Time management issues Independent study  Teachers’ expectations and background and critical thinking knowledge  Critical thinking as an aspect of Western education

 Varied responses to criticism Critical teacher feedback  Positive interactions with teachers beyond critical feedback  Power in the classroom

 Motivation to apply to university: parental University application pressure and sponsorship  University rejection  Student attrition

Table 3: Themes emerging from my data

182

6.2 Four areas of student experiences Considering my research findings, I saw that students’ experiences of Othering in response to the key dimensions of the new ABP setting took place within four areas of interactions: personal, instructional, local, and global. Personal experiences were related to individual relationships with fellow students and teachers, reactions to new people, motivation to study, family influence on university choice, etc. Instructional experiences were linked to academic outcomes and development, including language proficiency, participation in class, university application success rate, attrition, etc. Local experiences were localized in the classroom environment of the ABP, but took place outside the strictly instructional/linguistic or personal experiences, and included some cultural and social developments, responses to co-education, classroom actions, etc. Global experiences were related to the wider institutional, cultural, social, political dimensions of the ABP, or its host culture, such as the national school reform, political discourse, language and culture debates taking place in the country.

The four areas overlapped and influenced each other. Together, they shaped small classroom cultures in the ABP linking them to the wider host cultural environment. Demonstrating the interconnectivity between the four levels of student experiences, the same themes reappeared in different areas, crossing over from instructional to personal, to local, to global, with a different meaning in each area.

6.3 Co-education and Othering Co-education was a key dimension of the ABP setting and as such featured prominently in students’ experiences there. It was evident in all four areas. On the global level, it was related to social norms and traditions prevalent in Qatar as well as the government- sanctioned gender segregation in Qatari independent schools. Despite a seemingly positive initial attitude demonstrated in responses to Questionnaire 1, in reality, many students from those schools struggled with it in classroom interactions, which affected their instructional and local experiences in the ABP. Co-education was also part of social interactions outside

183 the strictly academic perimeters of the classroom, influencing personal experiences. Encounters with co-education resulted in various forms of Othering.

Analysing data related to the area of co-education in students’ experiences in the ABP revealed several themes identified after coding. They included:

A common initial reaction to co-education was self-segregation practised through separate seating in class. It seemed that seating arrangements were almost the same in each classroom, with boys and girls sitting in separate groups, with varying degrees of distance. Instructionally, this could affect pair/group work, with extra care taken by teachers not to put males and females together, at least early in the first semester. On a local level, such seating arrangements made an impact on overall classroom interactions. Even though this form of self-regulation became more relaxed with time, it was practised routinely throughout the academic year in most ABP classes and remained unquestioned by students or teachers. Golkowska states that Qatari female students tend not to acknowledge, or prefer not to discuss, social restrictions on their agency (2017: 7). Many also opt not to challenge “the traditional division between males and females in private and public space”, choosing instead to show manifest their respect for the gender division and “modifying verbal and non-verbal behaviour […] to comply with the Islamic principle of modesty” (ibid.). Self-regulated separate seating arrangements of ABP students seemed to exemplify the attitude described by Golkowska.

This self-imposed gender-segregation can be interpreted as an example of implicit Othering of women, present in the culture itself and discussed at length by female Arab

184 writers commenting on strict segregation of the sexes based on “local traditions and narrowly interpreted rules of Islam” (Al-Fassi 2011: 158) leading to cases of women’s alienation from public life and participation in academic or professional activities. This form of tacit Othering was prevalent in students’ experiences and expressed itself also through body language. Sitting away from the male students, avoiding eye contact, even speaking in an inaudible voice were actions related to body language, impacting classroom participation, with some female students either refusing to participate or participating in a way that involved only themselves and the teacher, while excluding their male counterparts. Those body language modes seemed to signal passivity and reticence habitual for or expected from female students: “the prohibition against attracting the male gaze regulates female body language and behaviour in a mixed gender environment” (Golkowska 2017: 2). Yet, paradoxically, in implementing such body expressions, the girls seemed to be showing some form of agency in the way they purposefully presented themselves in public as “good girls”, with modest manners, testifying to their respectable family background. Seen from this perspective, they may be said to be distancing themselves from their new Western co-educational environment, practising what Mann calls a “Leave Me Alone” strategy, using self-alienation to ensure own safety and security in the new, unknown world of foreign education (2001: 15). It is “safer not to engage” (ibid.), staying within the constraints of the well-established order and unity of the old system of values and acceptable conduct.

Yet, in the course of the academic year, many male and female students attending the ABP gradually changed their behaviour and adjusted to co-education, learning to interact and collaborate with each other during class. For example, Hamad soon managed to relate to the opposite gender with ease and confidence in classroom exchanges. He voiced positive thoughts related to sharing study space with girls and stressed the importance of the ability to interact with them in the context of his future education and profession. His encounters with co-education took place on an instructional level, but also had an impact in the local and global areas: Hamad’s positive response to co-education manifested itself in his active cooperation in class and reflected wider changes slowly taking place in Qatari society. Hamad, seen as increasingly interacting with girls, did not

185 appear to be subjected to the same kind of criticism as some of the girls, who seemed to “be caught between their own beliefs about gender equality and larger Qatari societal norms” (Qutteina et al. 2016, cited in Golkowska 2017: 7).

For other students, adjustment to co-education and interactions with the opposite gender did not happen without difficulties and even conflicts, as demonstrated in the examples of Abdulla and Aisha: they both found it hard, if not impossible, to function comfortably in a co-educational environment, on personal and instructional levels. Unlike Hamad, Abdulla practised self-alienation to ensure his own comfort and counteract negative feedback from some relatives and friends which could alienate him from his own society and/or family, without being overly critical of ABP students who were more prepared to embrace co-education and interact with the other sex. Aisha remained critical of her fellow students, particularly female ones, who found it easy to engage with the opposite gender. Her view of them suggested a form of Othering practised towards local females who were seen as defying established religious traditions and social mores by behaving in ways which might stain the family honour instead of upholding it. Since “women are perceived as bearers of the family honour” (Golkowska 2017: 2), it is their obligation to maintain prescribed social mores at all times.

Adherence to conservative dress code was generally seen as mandatory for women. For example, Aisha commented unfavourably on the way some Qatari girls preferred less traditional attire (coloured, open abayas, loose shaylas), referring to them as “bad girls”, as opposed to “good girls” who tended to be more conservatively dressed and not engaged in co-educational interactions (also: Chapter 5, Vignette 3). This was not an inconsequential remark, since it could lead to a girl’s reputation being ruined beyond the ABP setting. Qatari community is quite small and the “reputation” of a female relates not just to her as an individual, but is also linked with her family and tribe. The consequences could be serious for the concerned girl, including being pulled out of the ABP, not allowed to apply to foreign universities, married off early, or beaten up. I have known cases or threats of each treatment while teaching in the ABP. Therefore, the dress code was especially significant for females who were expected to wear a black abaya and

186 shayla, arranged in such a way as not to reveal even a strand of hair. Otherwise they risked becoming subject to criticism and isolation, resulting in Othering them as “bad girls”.

The issue of appropriate or proper attire for women went beyond the small culture of the ABP classroom as into the global area of experiences, given the conservative nature of Qatari society: in Qatar and other Gulf countries “traditional Arab and Muslim values are strictly adhered to and […] wearing traditional clothing by both men and women is seen as an essential requirement for cultural integrity and an affirmation of citizenship” (Sobh, Belk and Gressell 2010: 906). Although most male Qatari students wore the traditional Qatari clothing (white thoube and guthra), they seemed much more in control of their dress code choices with no negative judgement or social rejection administered to those who opted for Western style clothing: it was “up to them”, as Hamad said. For those young women who desired to break away from loyalty to local culture and adherence to conservative Muslim dress code (ibid.) by adopting new, more liberal styles and adornment practices (ibid.), the resulting tensions were complicated to negotiate and could end in Othering by their fellow (usually female) students.

However, it can be argued that despite attempts by some young women to modernise the traditional, un-adorned, all-black abaya through the use of elements of colour, an innovatively sculpted shape, and additional ornamentation, the very essence of female clothing remained culturally restricted and compliant with “the Islamic patriarchal hegemonic order [with] ideological constructions of femininity as defined by influential religious scholars” (Al-Qasimi 2010: 49). Al-Qasimi writes that “while the abaya-as- fashion lends a platform for the articulation of embodied subjectivities, through its preservation of full length and the color black the abaya is only disrupted, never displaced. This process engenders a legitimized form of subordination which simulates advancement beyond an older form of oppression.” (ibid.: 69). Still, even if it could be perceived as only fragmentary and spurious, manifesting any form of defiance against the dominant established dress code could result in Othering, as experienced by some females in the ABP, impacting them on a personal, local, and global level through

187 individual reactions, classroom behaviours, and socio-cultural discourses of reputation and family honour, taking place within Qatari society.

Gender mixing outside the classroom remained controversial, affecting the local area of experiences. The issue of respect was brought up by Abdulla and Aisha. They both indicated that respect meant strictly academic or professional exchanges between men and women students – a view confirmed by a Qatari ABP administrator. Respect had to do with how males and females looked at or talked to each other. The social requirement of gender segregation and mutual low- or non-engagement played a role in the perceptions of those students who did not observe it, opting instead for more open and less serious exchanges, outside the purely academic ones. They were often subjected to direct or tacit Othering through negative comments, particularly visible in the case of young women, such as those criticised by Aisha. The fear of negative judgement and/or Othering by fellow students could be inferred from many girls’ purposeful avoidance of class participation in front of male students and their manifest unwillingness to get involved in any form of interaction with boys. Those women students who felt free to do so within the ABP environment where co-education was officially sanctioned, practised their dangerous freedom at the risk of being socially ostracised and seen as the disreputable Other, influenced by Western social norms regarded as incompatible with local ones (Al-Fassi 2011; Golkowska 2017). The prevalent cultural perception of women as “weak and dependent, in need of protection of men, lacking authority, and responsible for preserving the honor of men” (Al- Ghanim 2009: 91) made it difficult for some more liberally-minded female students to utilise social opportunities afforded them by the co-educational setting of the ABP since by doing so they might be endangering their family’s honour.

Thus, exploring the co-educational aspect of the ABP setting through the lens of small culture and host culture complex revealed an intricate interplay of micro- and macro- cultural forces resulting in students’ experiences of Othering. It showed how the position, role, and perceptions of women in local society were reflected through specific interactions and judgements taking place in the classroom, highlighting prevalent

188 stereotypes and implicit or explicit sense of female Otherness (e.g. Al-Qasimi 2010; Findlow 2013; Curtiss 1996; Golkowska 2017).

6.4 Language and Othering The most significant themes related to the language of instruction that emerged after my data analysis were the following:

 Weak English skills, lack of self-confidence, and low participation  Positive attitude to English studies in the ABP  English: academic aspirations, status, relevance  Sense of empowerment  Impact on Arabic skills  Wider language issues: hidden societal divisions  Language of personal communication

Some ABP teachers commented on their students’ weak English skills combined with lack of self confidence in oral academic exchanges in the classroom. The resulting low level of participation in class activities was reflected in how such students were perceived by both their teachers and classmates. Othering of linguistically weaker students took place on the instructional and local level, with more proficient students in class demonstrating their perceived superiority through facial expressions or even verbal comments, which could put their less advanced classmates in a position of the inferior Other, thus discouraging them from future efforts, prohibiting improvement, and breeding resentment. In some cases, this kind of treatment led to withdrawal from the ABP, especially if the teachers also dissociated themselves from weaker students by branding them as academically poor, unable to express their thoughts accurately and correctly in English. Syed remarks that “linguistic and cultural distance between learners and teachers is a serious factor in the Gulf EFL classroom” (2003: 338), leading to learners’ alienation and Othering.

189

At the same time, there was a generally hopeful, positive attitude towards studying in English, most likely related to the way students seemed to equate English with higher professional and social status. Many agreed that the study of the English language was necessary to develop their English proficiency needed to fulfil their aspirations to study in a Western, English-language university which would ensure better-paid jobs and higher social status in the future. In some cases, a sense of empowerment and intellectual agency stemmed from students’ encounters with English language education: Aisha’s statement that “English in the ABP is something you learn from” (Chapter 5, Section 5.4.3.4) testifies to the perceived power of knowing the world through English as something that seemed to enrich her life, whereby she could use the newly acquired or sharpened English skills for tasks other than purely functional communication in daily life. This constructive, creative, epistemological power of English language acquisition was articulated by Kabel in his response to Karmani (2005): “Instead of considering English in its putative hegemonic discourses as inhibitive and imposed encumbrance, we need to take into account how the language is constantly and unpredictably appropriated and creatively reshaped and expropriated to give voice to emerging agencies and subjectivities” (2005: 136). This is echoed in Golkowska’s exploration of students’ reflections after a first-year English writing course at one of EC universities, indicating a “transformative experience” (Golkowska 2018: 106). Thus, the encounter with linguistic and educational Otherness could potentially bring about increased engagement and wider opportunities for growth, in instructional, personal and global terms, even if in Aisha’s case, it was only a momentary occurrence.

190

Despite such advantages, a number of students studying in the ABP noted how emphasis on studying in English had a negative impact on their proficiency in Arabic: “A common fear throughout the Gulf is the loss and degradation of Arabic as a written and spoken language” (Weber 2011: 63). The predominance of English in Qatari education was determined by the 2001 national school reform (Education for a New Era), instigated by the recommendations submitted by RAND. The impact it had on students’ Arabic skills became a controversial and widely debated topic in the country (Khatri 2013a; Walker 2016; Walker and Sheble 2016), mirroring similar debates elsewhere in the region (Burden-Leahy 2009; Findlow 2006; Karmani 2005). Some ABP students, for example Abdulla, were concerned about their loss of formal academic Arabic skills (Fus’ha), which could exclude them from formal public discourses and scholarly exchanges, thus alienating them from their own cultural and educational affiliations and background, and, possibly, even from their religious roots. More religious students made references to the fact that Arabic was the language of the Koran, the holy book of Islam, and as such should be given priority over English (Chapter 5, Vignette 4). Weber states that English is seen as a symbol of Western culture and perpetrator of linguistic imperialism fuelling the “less Islam and more English” debate (2011: 62) in the Gulf region. The connection between Arabic and Islam is considered by Muslims to be unassailable and the encroachment of English into Muslim/Arab culture, science, and education evokes growing unease, if not outright hostility, among many local stakeholders (Weber 2011: 62). Many Gulf nationals express fear that “English in the region has an underlying proselytizing, missionary and value laden subtext that may be at variance with or even contrary to Islamic values” (ibid.), thus potentially leading to cultural alienation of those who practise it at the expense of Arabic, and becoming the Other in their own culture.

At the same time, students increasingly seemed to engage with English-language communication, mainly through TV shows and social media. This resulted in their stronger English verbal skills, and rather weaker writing and reading ones, as noticed by one of the interviewed teachers who found “their written expression in English to be

191 quite poor”. Combined with deficient knowledge of Fus’ha, some appeared to have difficulties with both languages in their academic versions. This was a linguistic paradox with a potential to affect students’ university options, thus operating on the personal and instructional levels.

To complicate matters even more, English was used for personal communication by many students, particularly those from the ruling family and/or more liberal or Westernised families, e.g. those with a diplomatic background (Chapter 5, Vignettes 4, 5, and 8). Qatari students from such families were often fluent speakers of English. In some cases, they considered English to be their first language, shunning Arabic and distancing themselves from those who preferred communication in Arabic or its Qatari dialect. Their sense of ownership of English was illustrated in Vignette 4, but was also signalled through an attitude of superiority adopted in front of classmates from ‘local’ schools, whose English was usually weaker (Vignette 9) or those from what was considered a lower social background (Vignette 6). This situation affected students in personal and instructional areas and affected classroom dynamics, sometimes creating areas of slight but detectable conflict and intimidation, as demonstrated in the data. These forms of Othering, based on one’s perceived or actual linguistic fluency impacted on classroom interactions and personal connections between students, as well as revealing hidden societal hierarchies and divisions.

The language controversy played a role in the global area of students’ experiences, involving cultural, social and political issues. The first language change, from Arabic to English, with the onset of educational reform in 2001, resulted in growing public dissatisfaction with the reform and uneasiness about prominence of English over Arabic in educational discourse in Qatar (e.g. Arab students in Qatar struggle to learn Arabic 2012; English versus Arabic… 2012, etc.). However, in a 2012 decision by Supreme Education Council, the government decreed a return to Arabic as language of instruction at QU and in independent schools. The decision was taken to re-emphasise the prime place of Arabic in Qatari culture and education, and improve standards of Arabic among Qatari students through increased hours of Arabic lessons at school. It

192 was also aimed to address popular criticisms that large numbers of local students had been unable to gain admission into QU because of their poor English skills: similarly to Qatar’s independent schools, QU started teaching in English in the early 2000s, making it difficult for many nationals to get in if their English level did not meet QU entry requirements. While using English as a medium of instruction sparked controversy and debate in the country, the decision to go back to Arabic resulted in further polemics. Qatari students voiced their own concerns regarding changing the language of instruction from English back into Arabic. Some expressed fear of lowering their chances of admission into Western universities and negatively affecting their prospects on the future job market.

The problem of the medium of instruction in local schools and at QU continues to be debated, even though Arabic has returned as the language of schooling and there are no signs of further changes. Its wide repercussions meant that the themes related to the topic of the language of instruction, was visible in all four areas of students’ experiences, with deep inner classroom divisions reflecting social hierarchies and leading to various forms of Othering. Viewed from the perspective of small culture and host culture complex, the issue of Othering through language use in the internationalised educational setting of the ABP can be seen as reflecting deeper and more tacit cultural values and perceptions of modernisation seen as Westernisation through English, while also showing positive aspects in terms of student empowerment, intellectual agency, status, and relevance (e.g. Karmani 2005; Golkowska 2018; Wasserman 2017; Weber 2011a).

6.5 Academic integrity and Othering The themes I identified after coding the research data related to academic integrity included:

 Lack of preparation for and knowledge of academic integrity  Adjustment to academic integrity requirements

193

 Rejection and alienation  Self-imposed isolation

Plagiarism is an academic offence in the West, but not all cultures and educational systems view it in the same way. The resulting clash of interests between respecting cultural differences and trying to uphold academic standards characterises many Western academic establishments catering for international students who come from non-Western educational environments. The ABP and EC universities experience a similar situation (Fawley 2012; McHarg 2013). Many ABP students seemed to come to the ABP unprepared for the challenge of academic integrity, having previously studied in local schools where the notion of academic integrity was not known and/or not practised. This was stated by different participants, including student informants, an ABP administrator with former experience of Qatari independent schools, and both ABP teachers I interviewed. One of them observed that students did not take the issue seriously and some might not even care, while looking for the easiest option in terms of doing their assignments and passing courses. This would suggest that teaching students about citing sources and punishing for plagiarism may not be enough for them to internalise academic integrity as an intrinsic value of education and research. However, some students, such as Abdulla and Hamad who discussed this issue in our interview meetings, seemed to gradually acknowledge that academic integrity was now a new rule and they had to abide by it. In fact, based on my experience, most ABP students eventually adjusted to academic integrity requirements, even if they do not know or understand it initially, or do not internalise it fully even after two semesters in the ABP.

At the same time, however, a number of students seemed to feel estranged from their own learning having entered an institution that did not afford them a sense of “the ownership of the learning process” (Mann 2001: 13) by virtue of imposing foreign academic practises on them. They might thus become the Other in the new educational setting of the ABP, with its new academic rules and requirements, impacting the instructional area of their experiences. Hence, Aisha, for example, appeared to reject the notion altogether as unfamiliar to her and never practised at school. She voiced frustration at the strict

194 treatment of plagiarism in the ABP, even it was “just one sentence” taken from the Internet, calling it “stupid”. Aisha’s comments indicated her dislike of this particular aspect of internationalised ABP education, possibly shared with other students, and alienating her and other students like her from the learning process.

Those students who were expected to “help” their classmates by making their own work available for copying, sometimes opted for self-imposed isolation, distancing themselves from the rest of the group and disengaging from social activities outside the classroom to avoid situations where they might be compelled to share their work with others. Their self-isolation and refusal to share work meant potentially risking Othering by being branded unhelpful or selfish, as they appeared to disregard the moral obligation, deeply rooted in local tradition, to help a friend in need (Leki 1992: 72), thus ignoring mutual interdependence characteristic of Bedouin system of values (Hamady 1960: 28).

The academic integrity practice generated significant experiences of Othering in the ABP classroom, as seen through the small web of classroom cultures embodied in student behaviours and reactions. Exploring related aspects of the host culture complex impacting on the classroom dynamisms (Fawley 2012; McHarg 2013) revealed how external forces shaped students’ educational experiences in the ABP resulting in various forms of Othering.

6.6 Independent study/critical thinking and Othering The emergent sub-themes were:

 Time management issues  Teachers’ expectations and background knowledge  Critical thinking as an aspect of Western education

Students’ time management issues often revolved around the obligations placed on them by their families: “generally prioritization of the familial and tribal obligations

195 over individualistic goals is expected of all members of the society” (Golkowska 2017: 7). Such obligations as weddings, social gatherings, celebrations of religious holidays, or even duties related to driving female members of the family could affect students’ ability to study on their own, outside of the ABP, limiting their learning time to class time. Teachers’ expectations of independent study capacity of their students clashed with the socio-cultural reality of local daily life dynamics which dictated students’ priorities in that respect. Such expectations could generate a sense of disappointment on the part of the teachers, but also a growing recognition that local students’ ability to initiate and undertake independent, autonomous learning could not be presumed (Wasserman 2017: 64).

Similarly, some teachers’ expectations of ABP students’ background knowledge and critical thinking skills seemed unrealistically high when confronted with classroom reality. This could have a detrimental effect on students who might feel embarrassed or annoyed over their lack of knowledge, resulting in their alienation from the learning process, and altering classroom culture if they chose to sit in silence instead of being active participants. Such heightened expectations cut across the instructional, local and global areas of students’ experiences. My own teaching example (Chapter 5, Vignette 8) appeared to confirm this point: students stopped participating in class when they felt that the topic was completely unfamiliar to them. I was discouraged by their apparent unawareness of what seemed an important international issue to me at the time. However, I had not bothered to test its importance to them, taking it for granted instead. Thus, at the time, I failed to adjust my teaching to the classroom circumstances, bringing about discomfort and disappointment on both sides. Faced with similar situations in other courses, some Qatari students might end up feeling estranged from their English education, “like strangers in a foreign land” (Mann 2001: 11). At the same time, their teachers would see them as uninformed and unprepared for university, thus Othering them as a result.

As expressed in interviews, some ABP teachers did appear to consider their students’ background knowledge inadequate. It was an unspoken understanding that background

196 knowledge was connected to independent study skills with motivation to learn for the sake of self-improvement and broadening one’s intellectual horizons rather than just grades and, consequently, as a possible (if unofficial) predictor of academic success. Many students “[were] not independent learners” and “want[ed] everything handed to them”, as one teacher stated. The same teacher stressed lack of motivation as a major factor: “Due to their lack of motivation, any type of learning on their own that goes beyond the lesson is very unusual.” This low motivation on the part of ABP students to pursue learning on their own was often seen as one of possible factors decreasing their chances of getting into one of the EC branch campuses, which in most cases was the university they aspired to. It needs to be noted that the American branch campuses in EC were some of the highest ranking universities in the US, highly competitive and seeking candidates who would fit into and thrive in their demanding academic ethos (Dedinsky 2017; Wasserman 2017).

At the same time, background knowledge was understood in Western terms, as awareness of Western or international (meaning, non-local) affairs, presumed to be of significance simply because most ABP students aspired to studying in Western, English-language universities, either in EC or in the US or the UK. This understanding was unquestioned and presupposed by both ABP teachers and students. It may have contributed to a feeling of alienation some students experienced while in the ABP, as exemplified in Aisha’s case. It also seemed to reinforce teachers’ criticism of their Qatari students as not being sufficiently “knowledgeable about the world”, according to one of the teachers I interviewed. This was an area of mutual Othering, with local students possibly perceiving their English education as somehow alien to them, unrelated to their prior learning in independent schools and their teachers as unreasonably demanding; and foreign teachers stereotyping Qatari students as lacking what they considered essential general knowledge. While teachers’ complaints about their students’ insufficient background knowledge are quite common in many other educational institutions all over the world, the resulting subtle Othering of students in the ABP setting had an additional dimension to it given the presumed Western focus of that knowledge versus students’ Arab culture and previous education (Wasserman 2017: 65).

197

Western teachers of English who come to work in the Gulf often have inadequate “cultural and linguistic knowledge necessary to bridge the sometimes wide gap in the teacher-student relationship” (Syed 2003, cited in Weber 2011:63), which may lead to stereotyping their Gulf Arab students. Research by Borrero, Yeh, Cruz, and Suda (2012); Palfreyman (2005) and Rich and Troudi (2006), among others, has also demonstrated that non-Western students may be stereotyped by expatriate instructors, either in students’ or teachers’ home cultures. Ahmadi states that “the recurring codes are that [Qatari students] are ‘lazy’, ‘spoiled’, and ‘arrogant’” (2015: 447). Furthermore, Ahmadi reports that in his study conducted in an EFL programme in Qatar he found that foreign English teachers had “either no or limited knowledge of their college students’ educational background” (ibid.: 449). Many also felt that “their students are not prepared for college” (ibid.). “Since the native students are not familiar with the type of preparedness that their expatriate instructors expect from them, the possibility of their falling victim to the “lazy” stereotype is high” (ibid.). Thus, Othering of local students can happen as an almost inadvertent consequence of teachers’ seemingly unfulfilled but in fact unrealistic expectations in the classroom.

Developing critical thinking skills has been an element of the Education for a New Era reform in Qatar, included as one of its stipulations at the recommendation of the American RAND team (Brewer et al. 2007; Romanowski and Nasser 2012; 2012B). However, in terms of teaching them in Qatari independent schools, it has not been a straightforward operation. In fact, it has been described as weakly defined, poorly resourced and deficient in methodology and described as an element of Western approach to education, transplanted into Qatar without sufficient teacher preparation (Romanowski and Nasser 2012a: 83-86).

EC universities as well as English-medium universities abroad require their students to practise criticality and apply an analytical approach to texts and concepts, taking it for granted that the students have had sufficient training at school to be able to engage in meaningful discussions, reading, and writing. Since the ABP prepared local students for

198 entry into EC or other similar universities, critical thinking skills were included in the English courses syllabi, but teaching them was not always effective, due to students’ “very poor reading and writing ability”, as one of the interviewed teachers stated, adding that they were “seriously lacking critical thinking skills.” In the ABP context, lack of critical thinking generally meant inability to see the complexity of a problem, infer information, detect irony, or acknowledge multiple perspectives or connections between ideas. As in the case of insufficient background knowledge, experiencing such obstacles in terms of critical thinking skills, students could withdraw from participation in class, altering classroom dynamics. They might also develop a sense of frustration and decreased self-esteem at the resulting low grades. Finally, they may get discouraged at the perceived level of difficulty and ultimately pull out of the ABP altogether, often harbouring a feeling of resentment at having “wasted their time”, like in Aisha’s case. I saw this theme as an element mainly of the instructional area, but with an impact on the local area of classroom performance and the personal area in terms of students’ affective response to tasks in class.

This multi-layered impact of issues related to critical thinking and independent study was made clearer when interpreted via Holliday’s conceptualisation of small culture and host culture complex since it revealed profound mutual interactions between various micro- and macro-cultures affecting students’ understanding and practice of critical thinking and independent study, while expanding on previous research in this area (Çelik and Gömleksiz 2000; Romanowski and Nasser 2012a; 2012b).

6.7 Critical teacher feedback and Othering The themes I found after data analysis were:

 Varied responses to criticism  Positive interactions with teachers beyond critical feedback  Power in the classroom

199

According to my three student informants, critical teacher feedback they had received at school was mostly ineffective in terms of indicating ways to address mistakes, possibly because it was virtually non-existent. Critical corrective feedback was a new aspect of their education in the ABP and students demonstrated varied responses to it. Abdulla and Hamad seemed to appreciate the feedback given to them by their ABP teachers which they thought was helpful and informative. However, as illustrated in Aisha’s conflict with one of her teachers and my own experience with a student in the English Room (Chapter 5, Vignette 10), feedback needed to be handled with cultural sensitivity. This was due to Qatari interpretation of overt criticism as offensive, particularly in public, in front of classmates. With apparently little, if any, “critical” feedback given at school, many students were accustomed to receiving full marks for homework merely delivered on time, with the resulting assumption of their work being perfect, as stated by Aisha and as I noticed while teaching in the ABP. The issue of criticism interpreted as unacceptable in public surfaced in various classroom situations, such as peer revision, which often met with resistance due to fears of being embarrassed in front of fellow students. This cultural background could explain Aisha’s distress caused by her teacher’s “public comments” about her work. Many other students reported similarly negative experiences with critical feedback while in the ABP. In my Teacher Notes I recorded teaching situations when students would admit discomfort participating in peer revision (“I don’t want anybody to see my writing except for my teacher”) or even refuse to submit their work for open critique in class. Such reactions tended to affect classroom functioning by reducing cooperation and putting the ‘criticised’ student on the spot, possibly hurting his or her position within the group.

However, individual feedback given in the privacy of a teacher’s office, the English Room, or even discreetly in class, was received differently by the concerned student: students “certainly respond[ed] well to individual feedback […]. They seem[ed] to really desire that individual attention from the teacher”, as one of the interviewed teachers said. In the ABP, teachers’ office hours meant a dedicated time for students’ visits. Those visits would usually start as individual feedback sessions focused on academic matters, but often went beyond that, when students discovered they could

200

“chat” with their teachers about more personal matters, engendering positive interactions with teachers beyond critical feedback. I found that was the case even with my key student informants, who were not my regular students. Although we had scheduled conversations as part of my research, they (Hamad and Abdulla) would occasionally come in without a prior arrangement, just to talk. This rather informal aspect of the ABP stemmed from the availability of teachers and general trust that the students developed towards them, but was also an unexpected by-product of critical feedback given to students on an individual basis. Thus, the critical feedback theme was related to all four areas of students’ experiences. On the instructional level, it facilitated academic progress. Locally, it could affect the functioning of the classroom depending on the mode of feedback delivery. Globally, it was linked with cultural sensitivities of Qatari students within the framework of the host culture complex. Finally, on a personal level, it could result in the formation of a strong link between a student and their teacher/s, which, in some cases, could develop into long-lasting friendships after the ABP. However, in Aisha’s case, the conflict between her and her teacher remained unresolved and probably contributed to her sense of Othering and alienation, culminating in her withdrawal from the ABP.

Aisha was the only informant who articulated the theme of power in the classroom, but it was a theme that in more or less explicit ways was present in many forms of Othering (e.g. Al-Subaiey 2010; Althani and Romanowski 2013; Harding 2014; Fromherz 2012; Kamrava 2009; 2013; Rostron 2009; 2014; Said 1978/2003; Spivak 1985; Telafici, Martinez and Telafici 2014; Woodworth 2014). I discussed the role of power in Othering in Chapter 2, Section 2.3, with various frameworks or hierarchies of power existing in my research context, including political, socio-cultural, professional, and personal. They manifested themselves in small classroom cultures of the ABP, as well as in diverse discourses present in the host culture complex, playing a role in students’ experiences of Othering, such as in Aisha’s encounter with what she perceived as a new power hierarchy in the ABP. Her interpretation was not entirely accurate: Aisha understood a classroom interaction with her male, American teacher as a demonstration of his power and her helplessness, made more intolerable since it was conducted in public. At that moment in

201 the classroom, the teacher did seem to have the upper hand in terms of his professional power. Overall, however, in real terms, the locus of power was situated outside her expatriate teacher’s sphere of influence, culturally, socially, and politically, simply because of his being a foreigner contracted to work in Qatar, and not a citizen with full legal, but also unwritten social, rights.

Qatar Foundation’s Education City offers Qatari students a chance to study in foreign university – at home. In that environment, foreign teachers yield very little cultural, social, or political power, since they are mostly unfamiliar with the local bureaucracy, principles, hierarchy and procedures. Thus, power, whether cultural, social or political, by default sits with the host institution setting boundaries of tolerable behaviour in and outside of class, determining permissible teaching materials and acceptable pedagogies. In general, EC university teachers enjoy a much greater degree of academic freedom than, for instance, the ABP, which, after all, is part of a ‘local’ organizational structure, but they too are subject to various local socio-cultural constraints, including expressive body language and ways of addressing students (Woodworth 2014).

This lack of power on the part of foreign teachers is illustrated in the case of a Nepalese teacher in a QF school who was helpless to fight against accusations made by his young students claiming he had disrespected their culture and religion. As a result of their accusations, he was sacked from his job after spending 10 days in prison48. While it is reasonable to expect foreign teachers in Qatar to respect local social code and culture and avoid open criticism of the country and its people, in some instances, the position of an expat teacher demonstrates a clear reversal of roles and power relations, as in the example of the Nepalese teacher.

48 Links to related articles with the full story are included below: http://dohanews.co/post/49928962182/qatar-academy-teachers-fret-as-former-colleague-jailed#disqus_thread http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/05/09/qatar-jails-a-nepali-teacher-on-charges-of- insulting-islam/ http://www.arabianbusiness.com/qatar-teacher-jailed-for-insulting-muslims-500996.html

202

Aisha’s story, on the other hand, seemed to provide a commentary on the perceived loss of power; power that was apparently held by Qatari students at school, before they entered the ABP with their foreign (Western) faculty. It needs to be stressed that some remarks made by Aisha were potentially racist in nature, as they concerned Qatari students’ power over teachers of specific non-Western nationalities (details of which I omitted from the thesis). This is an indication of some deep-seated, but hardly ever discussed, social and cultural issues that are still present in Qatari private discourse, usually inaccessible to external criticism which might be seen as offensive. The theme of power in the classroom could possibly be considered on all four levels of students’ experiences, academic; personal, local and global, since it appeared to affect instruction; individual relationships with teachers and students; classroom behaviour; and was related to wider societal dimensions of gender relations and social hierarchy, as indicated for example in Vignettes 2, 4 and 5, in Chapter 5.

As a result of her experience, Aisha seemed to feel both disempowered and Otherised by the teacher, a Western male, a stranger in her country, who demonstrated her weakness in public, in front of her classmates, as if usurping the power she considered to be hers. Thus she was “disciplined into docility” (Mann 2001: 14), receiving assessment which openly located her in the area of failure, questioning her academic, personal and social worth (ibid.: 15). The resulting sense of Othering only added to her already less than positive encounters with English language instruction and co- education in the ABP.

The critical teacher feedback dimension of the ABP educational setting seemed to expose students to additional forms of Othering impacting on small classroom dynamics and reflecting potent external forces forming a part of the host culture complex (Nydell 1988/2006; Patai 2002; Pryce-Jones 2000).

203

6.8 University application and Othering The following themes emerged after analysis of data related to the theme of university application:

 Motivation to apply to university: parental pressure and sponsorship  University rejection  Student attrition

University choice is the main element of the university application process. Upon entry into the ABP, new students are immediately made aware of the main purpose of their ABP education: to get admitted into one of the EC universities or an English-medium university abroad, in the UK or the US. During the academic year, they are constantly reminded of that goal through class instruction, university application workshops, meetings with EC universities admissions staff, etc. The first essential step is for students to state their preferred university choices since that will determine the scope and style of personal statements and letters of recommendation from their teachers. My study showed that this process might be less than straightforward when it comes to university choices, which often do not reflect the student’s personal preferences, but rather are suggested or even imposed on them by their families.

Students’ motivation to study in the ABP and apply to university could be linked to parental influence and government or company sponsorship. In the literature, two dominant models of university choice are defined: one is rooted in economic reasons, the other in sociological reasons (e.g. Chatfield, Lee and Chatfield 2012; Fernandez 2010; Somers, Haines and Keen 2006, cited in Al-Ali et al. 2018). The former explains university choice as related to perceived costs and benefits, while the latter includes “students’ gender, academic ability, socioeconomic status, the school context, and the opinions of significant others [as] the prime factors that influence their choice of HEI” (Al-Ali et al. 2018: 2). Based on those two models, in their research conducted in Qatar, Al-Ali et al. identified three major factors influencing university choices made by local students: quality of education, cultural values, and cost of education (ibid.: 8). For most

204

ABP students, the most important factors were quality of education and cultural values. Thus, they aspired to study in an American branch campus in EC, where the quality of education was assured by each university’s high position in academic rankings in the US and globally. By applying for admission in degree programmes preferred by their families, students were obeying parental wishes to secure a high status job in the future, such as a doctor or engineer, enhancing family honour and fulfilling familial and tribal obligations as expected by their culture and society. Regarding the cost of their ABP and university education, as Qatari citizens, students were eligible for government or company sponsorship which basically meant that their expensive Western university tuition would be cost-free.

Students allowed to make their own choices based on personal interests rather than family expectations seemed more motivated to study than those studying for extrinsic motives. But extrinsic motivation with the parental role in it could be a very powerful stimulus for a student to study so that his/her family or tribe can be made proud rather than shamed by their performance. This was clear in the research data, as articulated by students themselves (Abdulla, Hamad and Aisha) or noted in my Teacher Notes (Chapter 5, Vignette 12). Though powerful and stimulating, the external influence on a student’s university choice could also result in that choice being forced rather than preferred. This could the lead to misguided choices, opting for degree programs to please parents and extended family, instead of choosing something more in line with own interests and strengths, as illustrated in Vignette 12 in Chapter 5, where I described an ABP student ‘designated’ to be the first doctor in the family, a role she apparently could not escape, despite a lack of personal inclination to study that degree course. Abdulla’s story illustrates that, too, as does Aisha’s. In both cases there was some family pressure for them to gain admission into an EC university. In that sense, university choice per se could be seen as a major part of students’ experiences in the ABP, but taking place mostly on a personal level. Going against the preferred parental choices might result in some conflict, with the student possibly alienating himself or herself from the family in the process. Given social restrictions put on females, it

205 might also mean their inability to study at all if not granted family approval (Golkowska 2017).

The university application theme affected all four areas of students’ experiences as their major and complex element. On the instructional level it involved students’ language level and admission chances being directly determined by it. On the personal level it was to do with students’ individual choice and motivations. On the local level, it could affect students’ interactions in the classroom, depending on whether they were admitted or rejected and resulting in withdrawal, embarrassment, feelings of isolation and Othering as failures. Finally, on the global level, it involved students’ exposure to varying perceptions of EC universities seen in opposition to QU by the wider Qatari community.

Aisha’s story showed another aspect of the university application process, that ending in rejection. Her response to that experience was very negative. Many other students rejected by EC universities reacted in a similar way, as I have observed through the years of teaching in the ABP. Bitterly disappointed, they would blame the ABP for wasting their time or, more commonly, the EC universities for denying them what they considered to be their right as Qatari citizens whose government was paying for that education to be offered them unconditionally, as they understood it. The complexity of this aspect of ABP students’ experience made it a significant element in three areas: instructional where it reflected her lack of academic improvement, personal, involving potential family disappointment and/or loss of face among classmates admitted to EC, and local, since it affected classroom functioning via its altered dynamics with Aisha’s withdrawal.

Student attrition was a major problem for the ABP in 2012/13. The high number of students leaving the ABP for QU that year was an indirect result of the switch to Arabic as a language of instruction at QU. That was mostly true about lower level students (F1 and F2), but even some AE students found the ABP work too demanding and chose QU as an easier option. However, in informal conversations I conducted during my field

206 research, many students stated that going to QU would be their last resort as they had set their sights at foreign universities as their top options: in their eyes a degree from an English-language university would guarantee them better jobs in Qatar in the future than from Qatar University (Latest Qatar University criticism… 2012). Abdulla’s story illustrated the dilemma some students faced in the ABP when they began to realise that their chances of being accepted at EC were not very strong. As mentioned by his teacher, Abdulla had also thought of dropping out. Fortunately for him, a university option in Oman was offered and so he stayed. But for a number of other ABP students, QU was an easier and more accessible solution. Student attrition can be seen as related to Othering in those cases where the student found the academic load too challenging and was left feeling unable to keep pace with classmates, thus leading to feelings of inadequacy and inferiority.

The student attrition theme was visible in the personal and local areas of students’ experience. On the personal level, dropping out of the ABP took on an affective meaning suggesting some negative individual experiences or disappointments on the part of the student, as shown in Abdulla’s story, even though he ultimately decided to stay in the ABP. On the local level, the decreasing class size had an impact on the classroom culture through modified teaching approaches and students’ behaviour, as seen in Sara’s “ever shrinking” class. As a trend present within the institution, student attrition rate during that academic year caused some anxiety among ABP teachers concerned about the security of their jobs and long-term professional prospects in the ABP.

Thus, the emphasis on preparing ABP student for entry into English-language universities had a multifaceted effect on the functioning of the classroom, while also reflecting outside social hierarchies and political complexities present in the host culture complex (Al-Ali et al. 2018; Anderson 2015a; Asquith 2006; Dedinsky 2017; Stanfield 2014).

207

6.9 Deep action and Othering Aisha’s reference to “bad girls” indicated some hidden divisions existing in each classroom, related to students’ educational background, social/tribal status, and upbringing. For example, based on the data, international school students generally seemed to more at ease interacting with the opposite gender in and outside the classroom. Also, many Qataris from the ruling family or other prominent families seemed more accustomed to a mixed gender environment, as did many non-national students. This could possibly be linked to a more liberal upbringing in some branches of the ruling family or diplomatic circles due to travelling, parental level of education, exposure to other lifestyles, and, again, international schooling. Such differences became visible through students’ interactions in the classroom as I observed them or experienced them as a teacher, and comments by the students themselves. As recorded in my Teacher Notes, this aspect of students’ experiences was quite complex, involving deep and surface action and happening in all four areas of experiences. On the personal level, it simply meant forming friendships with other similarly-minded ABP students, like Abdulla who perhaps valued the social side of the ABP more than the academic one. But, for some students, it could mean the opposite: refraining from developing new relationships, like in Aisha’s case, who appeared to prefer her former school friends and chose not to engage with students in the ABP, at least as far as I was aware through our conversations and her teacher’s comments. Her disapproval of the way some Qatari females dressed and behaved in front of male students could have prevented her from befriending such girls. However, based on what she revealed in our informal interviews, she did not form any stronger friendships with any of the more conservative female students. Ultimately, she may have been isolating herself, practising self-alienation, or may have been subjected to implicit forms of Othering conducted by some of her more liberal, savvy fellow students distancing themselves from her.

Those hidden divisions within the classroom, either societal or inherent to the ABP environment, were part of deep action phenomena and affected classroom cultures through student interactions. The concept of deep versus surface action belongs to Holliday’s descriptive typology describing different classroom cultures (1994: 34-40),

208 and can be used to illustrate “cultural variety in classrooms” (ibid. 51). In my view, the concept of deep and surface action carries significant explanatory power helpful in understanding the ABP setting and forces of Othering operating within it. Although formulated as a result of Holliday’s research in “Egyptian university classrooms” (ibid. 34), it explains some important characteristics of the ABP setting revealed through my data.

The distinction between deep and surface action refers to phenomena that are either unobservable to outsiders and “perhaps only tacitly understood by insiders to the culture” (ibid. 40) or open and “plain to see” (ibid. 40), respectively. An example of deep action can be “the tacit rules for communication evident in the more traditional, small-class culture, (…) difficult to fathom by the outsider observer” (ibid. 40). Other instances of deep action identified by Holliday in Egyptian classrooms are related to the “rules for giving classroom instructions” (ibid. 41), or the way the local teacher may communicate with her students who are familiar with the protocols and do not require explicit guidance about class activities and conduct: he calls it “hidden communication” (ibid. 40-41), noticing that instances of deep action are not “formally acknowledged by either insiders or outsiders to the situation” (ibid. 41). Finally, Holliday describes “the paradoxical relation between lesson sanctity and the overall hospitality offered by the classroom culture” (ibid. 42), which he noticed as a classroom observer in Egypt where he was welcomed rather than being seen as an intruder.

Holliday’s exploration of deep action prompts him to suggest that the reality of a classroom functioning in an unfamiliar cultural context may ultimately be opaque to its outsider observer (ibid. 40). This was confirmed ‘in reverse’ in my research, which I conducted as an embedded researcher rather than a complete outsider. For example, during class observations, I had to refer to my own “embedded” background knowledge of the context to detect certain ‘deep action’ phenomena happening there. Without that prior knowledge I would have probably been unable to acknowledge them. I believe that my status as an on-site researcher, with many years of teaching practice in Qatar, put me in a good position to “disturb the surface” [and] “dig deeper and reveal the

209 hidden and the counter” ((Holliday 2004c: 278), drawing on my background knowledge of the context to uncover tacit dimensions and unwritten rules which define this context.

For example, as a manifestation of deep action, transient classroom groups could assemble spontaneously, in response to co-education or other new dimensions of the ABP culture, reflecting students’ liberal or conservative upbringing and background. They influenced the way students related to each other and interacted in class exchanges, as described in my Teacher Notes (Chapter 5, Vignette 3). Another dividing factor was the female dress code, as described above. Those girls who wore colourful or open abayas and showed their hair tended to form separate, albeit much smaller groups, as most females followed conventional (i.e. conservative) style of clothing. The social/tribal status would often decide how ABP students went about organising themselves in terms of collaborating in class or forming social connections outside. Mostly, students knew where they belonged in the wider Qatari society, and were aware of the unspoken rules regarding whom they were allowed or not allowed to marry based on tribal heritage, and considered those internal societal divisions natural and unchangeable. Again, these deep, hidden forces operated throughout the four areas of experiences: globally, in connection with wider societal dimensions of the host culture; locally, in terms of classroom interactions; personally, in relation to choice of friends; and instructionally, linked to academic performance in the classroom, participation or group work.

6.9.1 Liquid alliances, hidden hostilities and Othering Drawing on the deep and surface action typology, I developed new descriptive categories, even more specific to my researched context. Based on my data, I felt I needed such additional descriptive categories to illustrate the complexity of “different combinations or weightings of influences” (Holliday 1994: 34), which affected those small cultures with their deep action (discussed in Chapter 2). The categories I proposed were liquid alliances, hidden hostilities, and empty spaces.

I used the notions of liquid alliances and hidden hostilities to describe how small classroom culture was shaped through variations in students’ behaviour, which changed

210 according to the coalitions or antagonisms they developed in the classroom based on both their immediate reactions to events in class and external descriptors such as the ones discussed above: educational background (local versus international school), female dress code (traditional versus liberal), and social or tribal origin.

Liquid alliances and hidden hostilities were a key deep action force affecting such aspects of the classroom culture as patterns of student interactions with peers and the teacher, modes of class participation and engagement with materials and content, seating arrangements and lesson procedures. They were all the more significant given that most Qatari students adhered to a standard dress code49 and consequently appeared almost identical within the two gender groups. It would have been easy to assume that their cultural loyalties and associations in class or outside it were also uniform and stable. Large culture constructs would prompt such interpretations. Yet, underneath that homogeneous surface, diverse, fluctuating group affiliations took place among ABP students. Although previous schooling, fashion style or tribal lineage seemed the strongest factors in liquid alliance formation, other forces came into play, too. For instance, they could form along the lines of gender or social differences, as illustrated in Vignettes 2 and 5 in Chapter 5.

Those changing, liquid alliances and hidden hostilities could materialise in response to particular teaching situations, such as topics covered in class or types of assignment. Thus, as confirmed by my data (Chapter 5, Vignette 9) students from an international school background would demonstrate their familiarity with foreign (usually British or American) literary works, history, or current affairs, while their independent school colleagues would sit silently, as if ‘shamed’ by the ‘international’ students. A double- edged sword, a liquid alliance could generate either a cooperative or resistant classroom culture. As a teacher, sometimes I, too, would become a part of an alliance, usually that of the classroom females versus males. In a jokingly competitive way, it was a stimulating arrangement, normally encouraging positive participation and facilitating group work. However, in some situations, it could also indicate deep-seated, larger

49 A black abaya and shayla for Qatari women, a white thobe and gutra for Qatari men (Chapter 1).

211 cultural and social conflicts of values and interests, and turn counter-productive in terms of teaching and learning, such as in the case of my class where one male managed to dominate the females in the class (Chapter 5, Vignette 2).

6.9.2 Empty spaces and self-alienation I also observed a form of behaviour, confirmed through my teaching experience in the ABP, characterised by academic and cultural ‘dis-involvement’, which seemed to fall in between various zones of engagement, such as those created by liquid alliances or hidden hostilities. These areas of indifference, of non-engagement with the surrounding classroom cultures and their participants, I termed empty spaces. They comprised students generally uninterested in any type of classroom activity or interaction where some educational or cultural exchange took place. An educational or cultural exchange could mean a situation where a new idea, new thought, new form of behaviour was actively and consciously considered in class, and some response was offered. I saw empty spaces as the areas of combined passivity, rejection, and self-alienation, such as demonstrated by Aisha or Abdulla. The rejection of or suspension from participation in classroom culture meant that there might be no significant impact on a student’s experiences on a personal, local or global level, although there was usually at least a minimal change in the instructional area. If no instructional development was in evidence, the student would most likely leave the ABP without completion.

Furthermore, that self-alienation also implied an effort to distance oneself from Western learning (Mann 2001:16). As one Qatari student once put it: “I want to study at an American university and get American education, but don’t want any of their western ideas” (from my Teacher Notes). In this case, the student seemed to understand ‘education’ as ‘knowledge’ detached from ‘culture’, a utilitarian body of information for purely technical purposes, His understanding of “American education” appeared to be similar to Abdulla’s. Some others, like Aisha, actively rejected Western education after she herself had been rejected by a Western university, categorically dismissing any future possibility of re-applying to one of EC universities. Conversely, for some

212 students, ABP education was amalgamated with culture and had some transformative, cultural effect on them, as in the case of Hamad.

Thus, through deep and surface action, co-education and other student interactions constituted one of the main markers of the ABP students’ classroom experiences of Othering, in all four areas: instructional/academic, personal, local, and global. It was instructional because of being linked to academic exchanges in class; personal because it related to individual behaviour and relationships with others; local – since it was part of the ABP in- and outside-classroom environment; and global – because its significance went beyond the ABP, to the surrounding culture and social code of behaviour.

6.10 Host culture context of Othering The ABP English classroom, with its transient and changeable internal character, functioned vis-à-vis the surrounding environment, which affected it through various external institutional, cultural and societal factors. I discuss them briefly below, drawing on Holliday’s concept of the host culture complex, which comprises such aspects of the classroom’s environment as student cultures, host organisational culture, professional and international education-related, and wider national cultures. It played a significant role in shaping ABP students’ experiences of Othering, as their rich and interactive background where students’ encounters with key dimensions of the ABP educational culture took place.

One significant area of the ABP environment was the professional-academic ethos of its teachers, particularly in the English Department. This dimension was internally quite cohesive, since most ABP EFL faculty members shared similar academic and professional roots (American), and only five (British; partially-American-educated Philippine; Croatian, Romanian, Polish) came from different national/cultural backgrounds, but with some common characteristics. Those characteristics included practising a teaching approach based on active student participation, independent study skills; offering constructive criticism; treating academic integrity as an essential element of education. Given the ABP’s mission to prepare Qatari students for English-language

213 universities abroad and in Qatar, familiarity with Western academic culture and rules of conduct was considered an essential element of ABP education. Consequently, a culture-specific orientation was adopted in all ABP classes, particularly in the higher level, focusing mainly on awareness of the specific culture of the academic environment in the English-speaking West, with emphasis on its aspects listed above. The ABP student culture seemed to be conditioned by the impact of peer, reference and identity groups (Holliday 1994, 2004a; Adler 1998) – fellow Qatari students, parents, families, former schools, etc. – reflecting mostly local culture/s and affiliations. However, young Qataris were becoming increasingly ‘globalised’ via the media, e- technology, universal fashion trends, interactions with a growing number of foreigners, and through Western education brought into or set up within the country, including the ABP, with its foreign teachers.

Apart from foreign teachers, a large number of students on campus were non-Qatari. Qataris constituted approximately 60% of the EC student population, but about 80% of the ABP population. There were representatives of some fifty nationalities among almost one thousand students of EC colleges. They included Arabic speakers (Palestinians, Egyptians, Tunisians, Lebanese, Iraqis, Tunisians, Syrians, Omanis, Yemenis, etc.), and non-Arabic speakers (Indians, Bangladeshis, Pakistanis, Afghanis, Iranians as well as some Americans and Europeans).

This added yet another dimension into the ABP student culture: interactions between multi-national teachers and students using English as medium of communication. In the ethnically diverse context of Education City, English naturally functioned as the lingua franca, with Arabic a close second. Therefore, in the ABP, English was taught and practised as an ‘international’ language, with the teaching and learning taking place within as well as outside the classroom, through academic and social interactions.

Through its glass walls, the ABP English classroom looked on to the rest of the institution, located at the heart of Education City, “the largest enclave of American universities overseas” (Lewin 2008: 1). As stated in Chapter 1, the American branch

214 campuses housed there had been hand-picked by the QF for the quality of education they provided and their usefulness for the country in need of well qualified professionals. The ABP functioned as their feeder programme, literally bridging the gap between Qatari secondary education and American university.

Both EC universities and the ABP were hosted by the QF. Within this educational and institutional setting, the universities were perceived as having academic autonomy and control over their operations (Anderson 2015; Lewin 2008; Lindsey 2013a) whereas the ABP was an integral part of the QF and followed its corporate policies, including QF’s control over the ABP finances, employees’ contracts, and infrastructure. This indicated that the foreign universities largely practised their own, “international education-related cultures” (Holliday 1994: 29), in the Qatari environment hosting them, while the ABP was closely tied to the local institutional procedures, at least in the organisational aspect. Based on my teaching practice, however, methodologically, academically, and professionally, the ABP was more aligned with the EC American universities, with its mission statement expressing that connection through putting “special emphasis on preparing students for the universities in Qatar Foundation’s Education City”50, and its curriculum explicitly restating that goal and comprising courses designed to achieve it51. It needs to be noted, though, that some aspects of academic instruction, such as the choice of topics or materials to be used in class still seemed to fall under QF’s purview. Thus, unlike in EC universities, sex, religion and politics were to be avoided, according to the unspoken rule attributed by the ABP administration to the QF and generally observed by ABP teachers in classroom activities, particularly at lower levels of English, F1 and F2. This may have seemed like an apparent contradiction, but, in fact, it was quite understandable for a bridging programme to combine elements of both cultures, local and international. These diverse characteristics contributed to a dual nature of the ABP as an institution taking students from the school stage (local) to the university stage (international).

50 For more details, see: http://www.abp.edu.qa/about-abp/mission-n-vision 51 For more details, see: http://ds7075ze07gjo.cloudfront.net/app/media/1819

215

The QF endorsed principles and values of the national educational environment including Qatari/Arab/Islamic culture and traditions which continued to impact the local education system in terms of curricula, methodologies, teachers and administration, despite the on-going reform and efforts at modernisation. As mentioned earlier in this thesis (Chapter 1, Section 1.3.1 and Chapter 2, Section 2.1), educational developments in Qatar are seen by some as ‘Westernisation’ rather than ‘modernisation’: “American universities in the Arab world have contributed immensely to spreading the influence of Westernisation in the region. (…) Globalisation being the latest incarnation of colonialism threatens to undermine the Islamic identity and poses a threat of cultural invasion to the region” (Westernisation biggest threat, 2006).

The adherence to national traditions made the QF-directed educational environment both interesting and formidable for guest institutions functioning within it, including the ABP and American branch campuses: “Education City is in many ways a study in contradictions...” (Lewin 2008: 1). While mindful of the local large culture, they came with small and larger cultures of their own, professional-academic, organisational, national, and international. In the EC those diverse currents clashed and challenged each other as well as meeting and engaging in a dialogue; where teachers and students alike were “experiencing cultural differences in the classroom” (Pusch 2000: 4) on a daily basis. On the institutional level, mutual interactions between them and the QF could be further complicated by the different styles of professional and organisational cultures they practised (Rostron 2009: 227). The interactions and occurrences taking place in the ABP English classroom reflected to a large extent the wider cultural and social factors, unique to Qatar, and described in Chapter 1. They included generally practised gender segregation (in local schools as well as in many families and/or some government institutions), religious affiliations, tribal or ethnic background, as indicated in the data I gathered (observations, interviews, Teacher Notes).

The interactions between the multiple agents and forces present in the host cultural complex of the ABP reflected the interplay between various frameworks of power existing in the country as they shaped students’ experiences of Othering. The political

216 frameworks of power manifested themselves through the close links between Qatar Foundation, ABP’s umbrella organisation, and the top leadership whose ideal of education QF was seen to embody. Socio-cultural frameworks of power were noticed through encounters between traditional social mores and values and new, Western concepts such as co-education or teaching approaches. Professional and institutional frameworks of power could be detected in the way the ABP teaching methodologies interacted with QF-driven parameters of academic freedom or bureaucracy styles. Finally, personal frameworks of power were visible in classroom and interpersonal dynamics highlighting students’ varying educational and social backgrounds as well as gender and lineage.

Concluding remarks Chapter 6 answered my first two research questions: What forms of Othering can be identified in local students’ experiences of the new educational culture they encounter in the ABP, and how they might relate to educational processes taking place in this setting. I discussed the themes emerging from my data analysis and their role in students’ ABP experiences of Othering in the four areas where those experiences developed, connecting them to small classroom cultures and host culture complex. In Chapter 7, I propose conclusions, by returning to my third, more interpretative, research question and examining the issue of Othering experienced by ABP students in the context of its possible implications for Qatar’s vision of knowledge-based society educated to Western standards. By articulating those conclusions and implications, my study aims to contribute to wider debates on internationalised English education in Qatar and beyond.

217

Chapter 7: Conclusions and implications for internationalised educational settings in Qatar and beyond

Introduction In Chapter 7, I consider conclusions and implications that can be drawn from the insights gained through my study’s findings. I show their relevance for Qatar’s vision of education and knowledge-based society as articulated in QNV 2030, thus attempting to answer my third research question. Also, extrapolating from the specific Qatari setting, I demonstrate how my findings are relevant to other, parallel settings in an internationalised educational context. I start from presenting an overview of the key points of the study in Section 7.1. Next, in Section 7.2, I articulate conclusions related to cultural Otherness as experienced by local students in the ABP. I move on to conclusions linking cultural Otherness in the ABP to its forms present in internationalised English education in the region as discussed in the relevant literature (Section 7.3). I then discuss Otherness as a potential source of dialogue and transformation (Section 7.4) and examine the applicability of the idea of transformative education in the context of my research (Section 7.5). Finally, I articulate possible implications of cultural Otherness related to subversiveness of internationalised English education, which I infer, to the best explanation, from my findings, related literature, teaching experience, and background knowledge of my research context (Section 7.6).

7.1 Key points of my study My study found that, while studying English in the ABP, students’ experienced various forms of Othering taking place in four distinct yet inter-connected areas: instructional, personal, local and global. The various forms of Othering shaped emergent classroom cultures and reflected a myriad of influences from the ABP’s host cultural environment, including the existing external frameworks of power in political and socio-cultural spheres. The key points of the study included a discussion of ABP students’ varied responses to the themes of co-education, academic integrity, critical feedback, independent learning, studying through the medium of English, and university choices. An examination of students’ experiences in the ABP through the lens of Othering

218 revealed their multi-layered character, with spaces of alienation, tension, conflict and withdrawal, as well as potential for dialogue, growth and transformation. The discussion presented in this chapter attempts to answer my third research question: what can the insights gained from responses to research questions about students’ experiences of Othering mean in terms of Qatar’s idealistic vision of education and knowledge-based society, as expressed through the government publication Qatar National Vision 2030, “an ambitious and idealistic document that claims to [define] broad future trends and reflects the aspirations, objectives and culture of the Qatari people” (Harding 2014: 515). I start from summarising my conclusions, contextual, related to the ABP, and broader, related to internationalised English education.

7.2 Contextual conclusions: cultural Otherness in the ABP The contextual conclusions arising from my study data refer to the context of my research, the ABP and its host institution, Qatar Foundation with Education City universities. It is in the ABP that local students come into contact with new Western dimensions of the ABP setting: co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, independent learning and critical thinking, critical teacher feedback, as well as emphasis on studying in foreign universities. Most Qatari students join the ABP straight from local independent schools and their experiences in the ABP can initially be shaped by their previous education. But their previous school is not the only force affecting their encounters with new pedagogical practices they find in the ABP. Another factor involved in their experiences is related to their cultural and social background. This was demonstrated through interviews with participants, my field observations, and reflections from my Teacher Notes. Holliday’s concept of a host culture complex (1994; 1999) helps to illustrate how the small classroom culture created in the ABP environment is affected by various micro- and macro-cultural energies and frameworks of power resulting in various forms of Othering and a sense of cultural Otherness which seemed to constitute a part of students’ educational experiences in the ABP.

Drawing on Mann’s view of “the student as an outsider” (2001: 11), I define cultural Otherness as being perceived or perceiving oneself as alienated from various aspects of the educational process one is engaged in: “the student, by entering the new land of

219 academy, can be said to be estranged both from this new land, but also from their own language, culture and desire” (ibid.: 12). While Mann states that this definition describes various “non-traditional students” (ibid.: 11), it seems to accurately grasp the essence of local students’ experiences in the ABP, where they can undergo instances of Othering by foreign teachers as well as compatriot classmates or even family members disapproving of their choice to pursue Western education. Various forms of Othering, explicit or implicit, took place in the ABP classroom, based on presumed common values and conduct norms acceptable within the Qatari community. Teaching and learning could be affected by such tacit Othering, since it often made an impact on classroom dynamics. Based on my data presented in Chapter 5 and discussion in Chapter 6, the signs of Othering in local students’ experiences in the ABP could include feelings of social and/or intellectual alienation and inferiority, inability to function successfully in English, unwillingness to engage in the academic process – sometimes leading to withdrawal from the programme or rejection of its educational framework.

At the same time, cultural Otherness may also appear in more positive configurations, generating curiosity and dialogue, facilitating mutual understanding (e.g., Buber 1947/2002; Golkowska 2017; Gurevitch 1988; Wasserman 2017), and stimulating change by subverting the existing ways of thinking. Thus, it can be seen as transformational rather than engendering inferiority, hostility, rejection, or indifference. In some cases, it is possible to infer that cultural Otherness experienced in an internationalised English education setting may lead to various unanticipated consequences, including socio-cultural subversiveness expressed through the questioning of received social norms and hierarchies.

The main aspects of cultural Otherness and related forms of Othering were linked to educational, cultural and social forces at play in the ABP classroom and include academic and language issues, as well as social interactions.

220

7.2.1 Academic and language issues Academically, Qatari students entering an institution such as the ABP are required to adjust to new expectations and teaching approaches, standards and demands, e.g. academic integrity, independent study, or critical feedback, often unfamiliar to those coming from the local schooling culture, who may find them confusing or intimidating, as indicated by my informants. Consequently, some students may become disappointed with and estranged from the very education they seek to obtain, such as in the case of Aisha’s ABP experiences. This process is a natural part of the transition between school and university in most academic settings, but in the ABP, students’ cultural and educational identities are exposed to unique and complex challenges intertwined with expected changes, as they embark on a foreign language education in foreign-run institutions in their own country. This could be seen as experiencing cultural Otherness in academic terms, as encountered within the ABP educational context.

Thus, according to my data, some local students, especially those who came from national schools, felt that they might not be fully prepared for the challenge of internationalised English language education. For example, their critical thinking skills, analytical reading proficiency, or background knowledge might not be sufficiently strong to engage in a meaningful way with more complex or controversial texts or issues studied in the ABP, as discussed in Chapter 6, Section 6.6. This was visible in Aisha’s account, and to some extent in Abdulla’s story. Similarly, the Qatari administrators and ABP teachers I interviewed agreed that the local independent school system did not equip Qatari students with adequate academic skills or English level. The changeable, “zigzagging education policies” in the country were seen as detrimental to their academic success (Paschyn 2013b). However, there were locally schooled students, such as Hamad, who overcame the initial feelings of Otherness and alienation and developed the ability to function successfully in the new ABP environment. Hamad recognised the merits of co-education even though it went against the accepted social norms in Qatar, and readily acknowledged the fact that overall, his ABP education afforded him excellent academic prospects by enabling him to gain

221 admission to Weill Cornell Medical College to study medicine in an Ivy League university.

Related to these issues was the language problem. Some of my study informants, for example Abdulla, seemed to struggle with the fact that English had replaced Arabic as medium of instruction and welcomed the government’s 2012 decision overturning that rule. Many feared loss of their cultural identity and argued that Arabic was the language of the holy book of Islam and as such should have a special status, as exemplified in Vignette 4 (Chapter 5). The ABP provided education in and through the English language which was likely also to be my participants’ academic and professional language in the future. If their level of English was insufficient for meaningful exchanges in class (such as in Aisha’s case or as seen through my observations), they often felt alienated and otherised by fellow students with greater English fluency, and may have rejected their English education as a result.

Seen from that perspective, Qatari students can be considered the cultural Other in the ABP context, trying, but not always succeeding, to find comfort and success within a foreign system, with foreign teachers, foreign methodologies, and a foreign language to study and study in. However, Qatari students can also be perceived as the ‘Otherisers’ in that setting, treating the new educational space as alien to them and imposed on them via political decisions taken outside their locus of control, as exemplified in Aisha’s story. In this sense, different forms of Othering took place in a multi-directional manner in the ABP context. For instance, based on Hamad’s account of his experiences in the ABP, this position of initial cultural Otherness in the ABP environment could also lead to some questioning of the previous schooling system and an intellectual transformation in terms of adopting new ways of learning: Hamad’s comment quoted above bears strong witness to that.

222

7.2.2 Social interactions Another aspect of possible cultural Otherness in the ABP context appears to be related to macro-forces outside the ABP, including gender segregation, local societal mores, codes and values stemming from the host culture. Co-education, student interactions, and dress code illustrate this aspect of Qatari students’ participation in ABP education, as demonstrated in my data in Chapter 5. Discussed in Chapter 6, some forms of deep action take place in the classroom, including formation of various transient groups, which I described as liquid alliances, hidden hostilities, and empty spaces (Sections 6.9.1 and 6.9.2). Those fast-changing groups were formed following shifts in students’ behaviour, depending on the affiliations and animosities they developed in the classroom based on both their immediate responses to developments in class and external divisions, such as educational background (local versus international school), female dress code (traditional versus liberal), and social or tribal origin. They reflected positive or negative engagement as well as indifference or isolation. Such fluctuating ephemeral groupings seem to suggest that for some local students, cultural Otherness could mean alienation from their own cultural background as they embraced new forms of thinking, conduct, and appearance, inviting criticism and rejection by the conforming majority (Chapter 5, Vignettes 1, 2, 3, 9). This hints at the subversive power of Otherness.

The ABP social environment was dynamic in that sense and demonstrated changing trends among the students. My research showed how the ABP education resulted in some young Qataris gradually beginning to question their position within their society, especially in the case of females (Chapter 5, Vignette 2) and practise new forms of conduct by engaging in interactions with the opposite gender (Chapter 5, Vignette 1) and/or wearing clothing which did not always fit in with the accepted conservative style (Chapter 5, Vignette 3). Other forms of such newly questioning attitudes could be seen in classroom discussions, with students openly challenging local social norms or expressing their preference for English over Arabic as shown in Vignettes 2, 3, and 4 (Chapter 5).

223

7.3 Internationalised English education-related conclusions This body of conclusions connects my study with discussions related to internationalised English language education and foreign students’ position within it, with focus on the Gulf. Although my conclusions have been inferred from my research, I drew inspiration from the existing literature concerning overseas branch campuses (e.g. Knight 2003; 2004; Telafici, Martinez and Telafici 2014; Tellis 2014; Wilkins and Huisman 2012; Woodworth 2014); English as the lingua franca of education in the region (Abdel-Jawad and Abu Radwan 2011; Al-Issa and Dahan 2011; Findlow 2006; Hopkyns 2014); the changing status of language teachers and resulting power relations (Johnston 1999; Rostron 2016); and Otherness/othering in educational settings (e.g. Kubota 2001; Palfreyman 2005; Rich and Troudi 2006).

7.3.1 Language and Otherness Internationalised English education has become an exportable and profitable commodity and is exemplified in projects such as the ABP and branch campuses established in Doha’s Education City (Telafici, Martinez and Telafici 2014; Tellis 2014; Woodworth 2014). It has not been an uncontroversial development in Qatar, with consequences seen in students’ educational experiences in the ABP. As discussed earlier, some local voices consider globalisation of education equivalent to Westernisation, echoing concerns elsewhere (Connolly 1996; Giddens 1990; Owolabi 2001; Said 1993), especially with indigenous education systems switching to English as the language of instruction and research. The resulting English-Arabic controversy is particularly true in the Gulf (Abdel-Jawad and Abu Radwan 2011; Al-Issa and Dahan 2011; Findlow 2006; Hopkyns 2014), and in Qatar, and has been discussed in this thesis on the basis of my data. It is strongly linked to the issue of cultural Otherness in language education.

The view of internationalised ‘English-ised’ education played an important role in how my Qatari participants perceived and responded to their encounters with it, experiencing cultural Otherness through that exposure, as shown in Abdulla’s and Aisha’s stories, as well as Vignettes 5 and 10 (Chapter 5). I find Findlow’s (2006) remarks particularly

224 relevant in this regard. Discussing the case of the United Arab Emirates in this context, Findlow emphasizes the role of Arabic as having “unique importance” (2006: 24) to the Emirati sense of collective national, political, and cultural identity, and points out that “the status of Arabic is tied to the role of Islam” (ibid. 25). However, the rise of internationalised English-medium education has eroded the significance of Arabic, even though it has not replaced it entirely. As a result, a linguistic dualism has emerged. Findlow characterises it as follows:

Arabic – ‘cultural authenticity, localism, tradition, emotions, religion. English – modernity, internationalism, business, materials status, secularism. (ibid.: 25)

In Qatar, a similar pattern of linguistic dualism can be detected with some consequences for the perceptions of internationalised English education embodied by the ABP and EC universities. The consequences could be seen, for instance, in the persistently negative view of EC institutions by local population as culturally other: elitist and alien (Comparisons between Education City, Qatar University spark controversy 2012; Survey: western education erodes Qatari culture 2011; Westernisation biggest threat 2006). EC branch campuses and ABP continue to use English as their medium of instruction, although local schools and QU have now gone back to teaching in Arabic (English versus Arabic…2012; Walker 2016) and Arabic has replaced English at all official events and in advertising, moving it to a second language position (Qatar’s Sheikha Moza: Arabs who lose their language lose their identity 2016; Walker 2016). Thus, it can be said that there are attempts to slowly push English as the lingua franca of education to a secondary place by an increased emphasis on Arabic (Findlow 2006; Hopkyns 2014; Syed 2003). What this means for English education in Qatar and the Gulf in the long term is not clear yet, especially that English is likely to remain the default language of instruction in institutions such as the ABP and foreign branch campuses, possibly alienating them and their students further from the mainstream society. This again suggests the subversive nature of internationalised English education.

225

7.3.2 Power and Otherness Internationalised English education has resulted in the changing position of English teachers which means new power relationships in the classroom and repositioning of students vis-à-vis teachers in language teaching situations. Until recently, many language learners sojourned to foreign, English-speaking countries, to study English there (e.g. Brown 2009; Chen and Barnett 2000; Forbes-Mewett and Nyland 2013; Lee and Rice 2007; Sherry, Thomas, Chui 2010), but nowadays, a growing number of ‘local’ students no longer have to “travel abroad to study in ‘foreign’ institutions there, because foreign institutions are brought home to them” (Rostron 2016). Branch campuses of American or British universities and language institutions operate in various places around the world (Knight 2003; 2004; 2020; 2011; 2015; Wilkins and Huisman 2012), including Qatar’s Education City. Many English teachers – native and non-native speakers alike – choose to work overseas, taking their methodologies and approaches with them. This may affect the character of interactions in the classroom, as was experienced by Aisha, who felt powerless in the ABP when exposed to a foreign teaching approach (public critical feedback), as opposed to her position in her previous school.

In most contemporary cultural/educational power discourse, deriving from Said’s Orientalism, power still resides with the English teacher, who is understood to come from a Western/capitalist/imperialist background (e.g. Canagarajah 2003; Edge 2003; 2006; Pennycook 1994; 1998) or be linked with a quasi-colonial “paymaster of EFL”, such as “the British Council and the United States Information office”, etc. (Johnston 1999: 266). It can be argued, however, that within the internationalised English education context, power frameworks are shifting away from the traditional understanding of the West as the Centre in hierarchical opposition to the marginalised, peripheral Orient, considered inferior and disenfranchised (Said 1978/2003). The newly forming frameworks of power can be seen in the changing position of a contractual English teacher working abroad, particularly in the oil-rich countries of the Gulf. Johnston discusses the growing marginalisation of peripatetic TESOL practitioners abroad as one of the key features of their post-modern condition as reborn paladins, knights errant of language education, eternal foreigners, nomads who eschew stability and long-term engagement with the host society in favour of

226 mobility and change (1999: 268-269). The contractual nature of their teaching posts adds significantly to the marginalisation and instability of many foreign teachers working in Qatar. The resulting powerlessness was evident in the incident involving the Nepalese teacher wrongly accused of insulting religion, as discussed in Chapter 6, Section 6.7. It is possible to infer some underlying racial tensions defining that case, as illustrated through Aisha’s narrative of the power she claimed to hold over foreign, non-Western, teachers at school (Section 5.3.6.2), but an additional implicit layer of power related to one’s religious affiliation can be identified as a significant factor in the new power hierarchy present in the non-Muslim expatriate teacher position in a Muslim country such as Qatar.

7.3.3 Othering in English language settings The issue of Othering in English language teaching settings has generated on-going discussions among practitioners and scholars. “Othering is important for TESOL professionals to consider because it shapes perceptions about many of the issues that administrators and teachers face” (Palfreyman 2005: 213), such as “classroom interaction [and] conceptions of what it is to be taught and how it would be assessed” (bid.). Thus, some experts use the concept of Othering to characterise classroom communication and conduct, educational goals, or teaching approaches. For example, Kubota (2001: 10) examines Othering of foreign students in an English language teaching context enacted “by essentializing their culture and language” in an American classroom, while Rich and Troudi (2006) discuss patterns of racialization and Othering of Arab students of English in the UK. Other aspects stem from what Palfreyman describes as processes of cultural Othering visible in “everyday generalizations about cultural groups” (2005: 211) that show up in ordinary utterances such “the students here are so reluctant to speak up in class” (ibid.).

In my research, this form of cultural Othering seemed to be reflected in the teachers’ view of Qatari students as “uninformed” or lacking background knowledge and critical thinking skills. At the same time, my data showed how Qatari students with an international school background could otherise their ‘local school’ classmates in that respect. Othering through practising unfamiliar teaching approaches and methods (e.g. co-education or critical feedback) is another example of how national students can

227 become alienated from their foreign English education. Furthermore, the growing linguistic dualism is one of the strongest Othering factors in internationalised education in Qatar, resulting in Qatari students experiencing English-medium education as cultural Others, but also Othering the new system themselves. This was confirmed through my study data, as discussed earlier.

Consequently, Otherness seems to take on new dimensions as a more multi-directional process happening on several levels and executed by diverse agents, for diverse reasons (Jensen 2011). Jensen talks of “the power to describe” in Othering processes (2011: 65) and further states that “in these processes, it is the centre that has the power to describe, and the other is constructed as inferior” (ibid., my italics). Given the changing parameters of internationalised English education in Qatar, including the existence of branch campuses, language debates, and influx of foreign methodologies, the issue of “the centre” with “the power to describe” calls for reconsideration and a more nuanced analysis as it may have unhooked itself from its traditional association with the Western teacher as its only source, stretching now to local students Othering each other or becoming cultural Others within their own society.

Whether in the more idiosyncratic context of the ABP, or broader context of internationalised English education, cultural Otherness may take various forms, either alienating local students from foreign educational processes or alienating local students from their own background through foreign educational processes. In the long term, it is the latter that can ultimately have a subversive effect on the social and cultural status quo. Before I discuss the potentially subversive long-term effect of foreign education on local students, I want to introduce the idea of Otherness as a source of dialogue and transformation (Section 7.4) and the concept of transformative education (Section 7.5).

228

7.4 Cultural Otherness as stimulus for dialogue and change Throughout the vast literature on Othering, Otherness and the Other, these notions come marked as intrinsically pejorative indicating alienation, inferiority, hostility, and division (e.g. de Beauvoir 1949/2011; Holliday 2011; 2013; Said 1978/2003; 1993; Spivak 1985). My research data mostly confirms this view. However, in some instances, such as in the experiences of Hamad, a more positive stance can be formulated, interpreting encounters with Otherness and the Other as potentially dialogic and transformative in nature.

Thus, some writers have proposed a more positive perception of Otherness and the Other, as generating curiosity and dialogue, and facilitating mutual understanding, especially in educational contexts. One of them is Martin Buber, whose somewhat mystical conceptualisation of dialogic engagement with the Other, expressed through a teacher-student interaction, was discussed in his 1947 essay on education, published in a volume Between Man and Man. Incorporating the concept of the Other into his thinking, Buber sees dialogue as a way of confirming an equitable relationship between Self and the Other based on inclusion, which he characterises in terms of “the complete presence of the reality in which one participates” (p. 115). According to Buber, education, is a practical reflection of such inclusive dialogue further rooted in trust, mutual giving and taking, and friendship. It also means practising “the experience of the other side”, being “limited by otherness” while standing “firm in it” (p. 119). The teacher must meet and embrace the student as the Other, engaging in a conversation with this otherness in an equitable and understanding way” (Rostron 2016: 146).

In Buber’s view, being the Other is an essential element of human condition, which he sees as fundamentally interpersonal: “Human beings are not isolated, free-ﬂoating objects, but subjects existing in perpetual, multiple, shifting relationships with other people, the world, and ultimately God” (Owen 2018: 2). Within human existence, there are two modes of mutual interactions, either based on what Buber terms I-It relation or rooted in the I-Thou affiliation. The I-It relation is functional and instrumental, and happens as an experience within a person rather than “between him [sic] and the world”

229

(Buber 1923/2016: 5): “It permits itself to be experienced, but has no concern in the matter” (ibid.). When the Other appears as “Thou” a mutual relation is established (ibid.: 6), and he/she becomes a fellow subject, fellow human being, and not an objectified, alien entity, defined by us as inferior or indifferent, passive. The I-Thou encounter does not involve defining the Other, but rather accepting their whole being, without filtering it through our “preconceptions and projections” (Owen 2018: 3).

In a similar vein, Gurevitch (1988; 1989a; 1989b), discusses meeting the Other as an effort to disengage from one’s presuppositions and stereotypes, engendering deep understanding, and meaningful and fruitful interpersonal communication. He refers to a process of “defamiliarization” which he calls “making the other strange” (Gurevitch 1988: 1184), or becoming aware of their strangeness, ultimately opening up space for dialogue:

[S]trangeness engenders otherness. The other person emerges, at a distance, as a separate self. The appearance of otherness throws into relief the element indispensable to any dialogue. It is not the exchange of goods, approval, or power per se, but rather a recognition of the “otherness” of “the other”. If all were the same, we would, in fact, be not much different from a throng of egos engaged only in the pursuit of food, mates, safety, and power but devoid of selves. The revelation of the otherness of the other gives rise to the awareness of being separate and different from and strange to one another. Every attempt to communicate entails acknowledgement (however implicit) of the other. The appearance of strangeness is considered […] as an exposure to real distance, which may be experienced either as a terrifying abyss or as a “dialogic span” that motivates the desire to know the other, as well as the self, and fosters movement and change. (1988: 1179-1180)

This process may initially result in feelings of distance, anger, and threat and as such, it is part of any social interaction or encounter (ibid.1184-1185). However, Gurevitch shows how the process of making the other strange ultimately leads to the exposure of “a web of taken-for-granted meanings” (ibid.: 1185), bringing “new understandings and recognitions” (ibid.) through “displacement of the familiar” (ibid.: 1190) and what he terms “reidentification” (ibid.: 1193). Reidentification involves rethinking of one’s “habitual context and placing it in a different context” (ibid.: 1193). In other words, reidentification means meeting and becoming aware of Otherness and redefining one’s

230 own perspective through that encounter. Although Otherness may invoke alienation and conflict, it can also be seen “as a creative challenge, a source of possibility and vitality” (Gurevitch 1989b:162).

Both approaches, Buber’s and Gurevitch’s, stress dialogue and see Otherness as stimulating positive transformation by subverting the existing ways of thinking about the Other and receiving him/her on an equal basis, free from prejudice and open to acceptance. Thinkers such as Bauman (1993) and Levinas (1969) further linked treatment of the Other and Otherness with ethics, pronouncing “that care for the Other in his [sic] Otherness is the essence of responsibility” (Mineva 2007: 33). Thus, encountering the Other becomes – or should become – a platform for (re)discovering common humanity and compassionate co-existence (ibid.: 36), rather than for rejection and exclusion.

This dialogic, transformative aspect of encounters with the Other and Otherness was to a certain extent evidenced in my data which showed its presence in some students’ experiences in the ABP (Chapter 5, Sections 5.4.3.4 and 5.4.2). Thus, for instance, it can be argued that Hamad’s overall experience was an example of such a positive encounter with Otherness on a personal, educational, and cultural level, since after his ABP education Hamad seemed to arrive at a new understanding of the world. In his own words, “it opened my eyes onto a new and different greater world than before”. He encountered and embraced the Otherness of Western education – co-education, studying in English, academic integrity, independent study, teacher feedback, American university admission – not only as a creative challenge and source of possibility, but also as a path towards reidentification or repositioning his pre-existing perspective, enriching it with new elements. Hamad successfully navigated and negotiated the Otherness he came into contact with in the ABP which could be claimed to have reinstated or strengthened his sense of ownership of and responsibility for the learning process, nullifying any sense of potential alienation (Mann 2001: 13).

231

Also, paradoxically, although Aisha’s experience in the ABP was overwhelmingly negative, she too can be seen as having experienced some, however minimal, positive encounter with Otherness through her recognition of the English language as a tool of knowing the world, and not merely an instrument of mundane basic communication for utilitarian purposes. Being able to use English for writing an essay or taking part in a discussion, instead of having the basic ability “to order a pizza”, as she put it, seemed to equip her with a degree of empowerment, a new way of learning about the world. That can also be considered an educational experience at least partially or fleetingly transformative.

Finally, in terms of teacher-student interactions, their positive, dialogic side was hinted at through students’ recognition of their teacher engagement and personal care, as discussed in Chapter 6, Section 6.7. That recognition was evident in students’ favourable view of their ABP teachers’ passion for teaching and responsibility for students’ and their learning (Chapter 5, Vignette 11). Abdulla’s statement regarding his teachers’ helpful attitude towards facilitating his adjustment to co-education seems to confirm that view. Similarly, Abdulla’s and Hamad’s comments that ABP teachers were helping them to learn by requiring original work and rejecting plagiarism also testify to the recognition of teachers’ concern to ensure their students’ academic achievement. Those mutually rewarding relationships were formed between many ABP teachers and students, illustrating Buber’s idea of education as an inclusive, dialogue based on trust, reciprocation, and friendship.

Such stories of academic success, personal growth and socio-cultural development, testify to a more positive or transformative side of Otherness seen as an inspiration rather than impediment. My research findings suggest that their ABP educational experiences contribute to students’ intellectual, social, cultural and personal development beyond the technical functionality of their English education. In other words, those experiences transcend the pragmatic framework of mere language training, necessary though it is to obtain a level of proficiency sufficient for entry into an English-medium university in Education City or in the UK/US. At least for some

232 students, their English education in the ABP can and does become a tool of knowing the world, even if initially experienced as alien, other. Despite her overall negativity, Aisha’s statement – “English in the ABP is something you learn from” – reveals the deeper intellectual, cultural, and social effect that English language education with its inherent Otherness can have on local students.

Thus, cultural Otherness in education can be celebrated and built upon, expanding one’s view of the world and forging new relations between people. As Buber (1947/2002) and Gurevitch (1979) suggested, Otherness can foster curiosity and increase motivation to find out about the Other. While presenting numerous challenges, the ABP environment offers hope that academic and cultural Otherness in education can result in dialogue, cooperation and even friendships between students themselves, and between local students and foreign teachers, leading to educational and personal transformation. The concept of transformative education offers a new understanding of that process.

7.5 Students’ experiences and educational transformation Based on the discussion of transformative education provided in Chapter 2, Section 2.7, I was interested to see if educational transformation was evidenced in some students’ experiences as they developed new perspectives, becoming critically aware of the dominant ones prescribed by their culture, and entering into new relations with individuals, institutions, and ideologies. Based on the data, it is possible to infer that some sort of educational as well as intellectual and personal transformation did take place in some cases, such as Hamad’s, even if it took only embryonic forms. The preceding discussion of encounters with Otherness and the Other bringing in positive change (Section 7.4) testifies to the potential transformative capacity of English language education as it introduces not just a new vocabulary and grammar structures, but offers students new cognitive tools by becoming their means of expanding knowledge. This was confirmed through the experiences of Hamad and Aisha. In her discussion of developing symbolic competence in Qatari medical students in EC, Golkowska concludes that internationalised education can open up doors to new affiliations and identity options (2018: 109). Wildavsky writes that in some countries, transnational education can gradually bring about a liberalising effect, even if such changes are usually “incremental and uneven” (2010: xi). It is true that any

233 conclusions would be premature since, to date, there is “no in-depth longitudinal study of the effectiveness of North-American pedagogies in Qatar or the socio-cultural impact of EC on the community” (Golkowska 2018: 109). Still, it is possible to infer that certain potentialities of transformation do exist, hidden in covert strands of subversiveness in internationalised educational narratives operating in EC. The last section of this chapter discusses them in the context of Qatar’s idealistic vision of knowledge-based society.

7.6 Potential implications for Qatar’s vision and beyond The last section of this chapter presents my final conclusions, inferred from my research augmented by my teaching experience, extensive, long-term knowledge of the Qatari context, and the relevant literature. I focus on ideological premises underlying the Education City project in Qatar, including the ABP, its university preparatory programme, and address the idealistic nature of the EC enterprise, while attempting to identify some potentially subversive cultural and intellectual forces embedded in foreign-run, internationalised English language education in Qatar.

7.6.1 Utopian search for perfect society Qatar developed an ambition to use the resources generated from exporting oil and gas to transform itself into a modern knowledge-based economy (GSDP 2008: Harding 2014: 513) and reach out to the world as a globally significant partner (Kerr 2010; Reed 2013). A critical part of that ambition was a desire to provide “world-class education for Qataris” (Fromherz 2012: 10), achieved through engagement with ‘prestigious’ Western academic entities. This was translated into a plan to build “an academic oasis” in Doha’s Education City, composed of American and other foreign branch campuses (Anderson 2015a). The ultimate purpose was to recast Qatar as a “leading center for science, research and development excellence (…) for the local, national, and international community”; able to “unlock human potential” and prepared to collaborate with “the greatest minds around the globe”, according to the official website of the Qatar Foundation52.

52 For more details, see: http://www.qf.org.qa/content/20th/developing-a-forward-thinking-society

234

Citing the same Qatar Foundation’s website, Harding provides the official narrative of QF’s inception, which explains how the idea was born after Sheikh Hamad took over power from his father, Sheikh Khalifa, in 1995. Soon after the peaceful palace coup, the new emir

shared a vision with Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser while sitting under a vision] for] ( تص ّور ) tent at Umm Qrayba farm. Together, they conceived a plan the future development of their country that would provide Qatari citizens with a greater choice in education, health and social progress than ever before. They then set about turning this dream into reality and, in August that year, founded Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development, right in the very heart of Qatar53. (ibid.)

The idealistic, or even utopian, character of the far-reaching educational vision first articulated by Sheikh Hamad and Sheikha Moza (Harding 2014: 513) may have stemmed from the desire to modernise the country after a Western fashion, adopting the best Western practices (Fromherz 2012: 22). Qatar Vision 2030 (2007) reverberates with parallel aims and aspirations, as it “envisages a vibrant and prosperous country in which there is economic and social justice for all, and in which nature and man are in harmony”. The document further states that the country needs “to galvanize [its] collective energies and direct them toward these aspirations” and stresses its adherence to Islam: “Strong Islamic and family values will provide our moral and ethical compass” (Qatar National Vision 2030: 3).

In the public discourse, the ruling couple’s grand desire took the form of a “societal narrative of transformation” (…) used “to make sense of the world and to explain, justify, and legitimise individual actions and the practices of institutions” (Harding 2014: 513). The narrative stresses the altruistic quality of the ruler’s vision (ibid.), its almost providential “inevitability or inescapability” (Baker 2006: 45, cited in Harding 2014: 514), and highlights the fairy-story-like rise of the country from rags to riches (Abbott 2007: 37, cited in Harding 2014: 514), which now strives to improve not just Qatar, but the entire world:

53 For more details, see: http://www.qf.org.qa/about

235

While Qatar may be a physically small country with a national (Qatari) population the size of a small town, the transformation narrative […] affects millions of people from all over the world who flow through the country, including through the doors of QF, working in research, education, science, technology, industry, medicine, public health, construction, engineering and the service industries including retail, tourism, hospitality and domestic services. (Harding 2014: 514)

This noble dream of a national transformation can be interpreted as a form of search for a perfect society living an ideal life supported by education and knowledge and implementing modernisation, all of which emanate from Education City, an embodiment of the search for perfection. Based on Aristotle’s definition, Tatarkiewicz describes perfection as having three shades of meaning: what is perfect is complete and includes all necessary parts; it is as good that it can be in its kind; and has fulfilled its goal (1976/1991: 15). Applying this definition, it can be said that EC university degree programmes were chosen to include the perceived necessary parts of future professional cadres of Qatar (doctors, engineers, designers, businessmen, computer specialists, scientists and international affairs experts). Furthermore, the branch campuses were hand-picked for their academic excellence (Rostron 2009: 226) in their respective majors: they were seen by the Qatari government as the best of their kind. Finally, the third aspect of perfection means that new Qatari graduates entering national workforce every year fulfil the goal of the project.

Education City, with its architectural style blending domestic and foreign aesthetic elements stands as a metaphor of this idealistic educational endeavour striving to combine diverse discourses of education and society, Western and Eastern:

Blending traditional Arabic and modern Western architectural styles, and regard for modern technology with penchant for age-old spatial metaphors, the visual layout of the campus functions as an embodiment of the narrative of ‘tradition meeting modernity’. As such it is not free of the tension inherent in QNV 2030. It is a space “specifically designed to encourage contemplation, creative thinking and concentration” (Ahmadi 2015, 11). One might add that it could also be a perfect place for interdisciplinary and intercultural dialogue. Questions such as how this construct is perceived by all the stakeholders, what type of identities it affords and what role it plays in relation to the community at large have not been explored yet. However, one can say that as a place

236

filled with disparate discourses and narratives EC presents as many challenges as opportunities. (Golkowska 2018: 100)

The LAS building, as well as the fence surrounding Education City’s vast campus, seem to bear witness to that understanding, while inviting some questions. As part of its campaign to promote this new national vision of education and knowledge-based ideal society, the advertising posted on the fence exhorts the public to think, wonder, and achieve (Image 17), setting those actions as elements of an educated, enlightened way of life. Leaving aside the argument of institutionalising thinking, a notion akin to institutionalising freedom (Foucault 1993: 165), it is worth remembering that thinking is not a value-free activity, since it can lead to constructive as well as destructive, or at least subversive, results. This is because thinking implies criticality, which means doubting and questioning of dogmas. In an environment deeply steeped in a religious interpretation of the world, including its intellectual, cultural, social and political dimensions, an attempt to think critically about the foundations of such an interpretation may be ill-advised for many reasons, since it might bring in intellectual, cultural, social, and political subversiveness with unpredictable consequences. Romanowski and Nasser describe this situation as a “contradictory relationship between the Qatari Regime of Truth and the development of students’ critical thinking skills” (2012a: 117).

In the context of Qatar Foundation’s exhortation to thinking and wondering, it is perhaps appropriate to bring up the issue of thinking resulting from an encounter with Western education embodied in the ABP. It can be argued that “thinking” could be understood as critical thinking, an element of the new educational dimensions characterising the ABP. New to the local culture and education (Romanowski and Nasser 2012a; 2012b), critical thinking, as a form of cultural Otherness, could potentially bring about a change of perspective, turning out to be a transformative, subversive force of unanticipated consequences, even if working in infinitesimal steps.

237

Image 17: Education City fence with the “Think” campaign slogans

7.4.2 Subversive strands of foreign education in Education City I acknowledge that the theme of subversiveness of internationalised English education of particular significance to me, as a Polish teacher of English, brought up and educated under the communist regime, where education was almost by definition subversive since it often undermined the official version of reality, or Regime of Truth, interpreted through a Marxist lens. Despite being infused with pro-regime ideological meanings, the official system of education could not ultimately prevent autonomous thinking, at least not in some schools and universities, where it was encouraged by more courageous teachers. Their students later turned their subversive thinking into practice, preparing and participating in the peaceful overthrow of communism in 1989. In this sense, my conclusions may be relevant to educators in many other settings and the theme of subversiveness of internationalised English education may resonate with other educators elsewhere. Drawing on abductive inferences from my research and background knowledge of Qatar, I have identified several potential interrelated strands

238 of subversiveness in the Education City context, with the ABP, a starting point of university education for many Qatari students.

7.4.2.1 Goals versus effects The first, overarching, strand of subversiveness concerns the stated goals versus effects of the EC project. In terms of large, ideological goals and purposes which constitute the rationale for QF’s existence as restated in Chapter 1 of QNV 203054, the fundamental objective of the QF is to transform the Qatari economy into a knowledge-based economy and Qatari society into a knowledge-based society. This goal rests on the premise that the current socio-political system will remain intact. In fact, the present system is the sole guarantor assuring smooth functioning of the organisation – its long- term fate would be unclear should the system collapse for whatever reason. The internal contradiction or opposition between this ontological conjecture and the reality of social and political change potentially inspired by the very education brought into Qatar (i.e. Western education with its liberal arts component) forms the most prominent strand of subversiveness that can be identified within the QF. My data suggested that local students exposed to internationalised English education, through the experience of cultural Otherness, begin to question their own social and cultural position within their society and with that may also, ultimately, challenge the political status quo, as shown in their various reactions and comments, for example demonstrated in Vignettes 2 and 3 in Chapter 5. Paradoxically, as Wasserman writes of the American branch campuses in EC, “if progressive ideas (e.g., public participation, universal suffrage, and freedom of speech) were implemented […], the foreign universities – which mainly served the privileged offspring of leadership groups – might find themselves unwelcome” (2017: 223.

54 For more details, see: file:///C:/Users/user/Downloads/Qatar_National_Vision_2030%20(1).pdf

239

7.4.2.2 Theory versus practice A related strand of subversiveness is the theory versus practice dichotomy, or the static image of an idealised educational system versus the dynamic and unpredictable results of real academic/intellectual development achieved through a potent thought process. This idealised view of education is an impression a reader may form while studying Qatar National Vision 2030 or browsing the QF’s website and publications (QF Telegraph). The thinking behind it seems to be the encompassing motif of the Qatari public narrative and can be summarised as a wish to create an ideal, just and enlightened, society. The country’s financial resources allow it to set itself such an ambitious goal, pursuing it through education. Hence, the government has endeavoured to secure deals with it considers the best academic institutions from abroad, especially the US (Anderson 2015a; 2015b; 2016a; 2016a). Although Europe, particularly Britain, used to be a preferred choice for university education for members of the Al-Thani family (Brawner Bevis 2016: 129), this has gradually changed, due to the growing recognition of the American tertiary system as the best in the world (Lewin 2007; Rostron 2009). The government selected and paid for specific schools/colleges/majors to be imported into Qatar (Lewin 2007; Wasserman 2017). They came hailed as centres of excellence in order to teach Qatari students, “unlocking their potential” through specific curricula and instruction with the goal of producing perfect graduates who would then become perfect members of the community, replete with wisdom and morals, fulfilled, satisfied and accomplished, working towards the ultimate goal of creating an ideal society where indigenous traditions and values are seamlessly blended with modernity, as evident in the QF narrative55. The ABP was created to prepare Qatari students for admission into EC universities.

However, as shown in my data, some ABP students develop a variety of unanticipated, subversive narratives within this context. Although many progress along the officially desired path of academic/social development, some are left doubting, questioning, wondering about ways to live a life different from the one sanctioned by their society,

55 For more details, see: http://www.qf.org.qa/about/about

240 such as some female students opening questioning the social constraints in class (e.g. Chapter 5, Vignette 3). The most drastic example of such questioning resulting from the subversive nature of internationalised education in Qatar involves a former ABP student who announced his loss of faith following his two semesters in the ABP and a university in EC. He could not discuss this with any member of his family, because he expected total rejection of his new ‘atheist’ identity: apostasy is a serious transgression according to Shari’a or Islamic law. Additionally, a Qatari person was “a Muslim by law”, he said, according to the country’s constitution. Therefore, he needed to remain a Muslim, at least on the surface, if he was to keep his nationality and citizenship. He planned to leave the Muslim/Arab world and live abroad.

The examples demonstrated through my study include students questioning their own upbringing, position of women, social mores, especially dress code (e.g. abayas and shaylas as required garments for women in the country) and gender mixing. In this sense, subversiveness can be seen as resulting from cultural Otherness understood as alienation from own background through foreign education.

7.4.2.3 Subversiveness and liberal education Subversiveness can be linked to liberal education, which is part of the EC academic offer (Rostron 2009: 219-229; Wasserman 2017: 214-232) and constitutes an element of ABP education with emphasis on analytical text reading, critical thinking, and independent study, particularly in literature and composition courses. EC universities bring it as an integral aspect of their curriculum, though they practise it in varying degrees depending on their academic specialism. In general, liberal education affords students a possibility to explore new topics such as literature, philosophy, history, or current affairs, subjects either non-existent (philosophy is not offered at QU) or restricted in the local curriculum (literature comes with censored choice of books for classroom use). Through debate and exposure to a diversity of views, it fosters independent thinking and encourages questioning received wisdom and dogmas, hitherto unquestioned. This can result in subversiveness potentially leading to some personal or cultural transformation (Chaudhuri 2008).

241

Some writers are cautiously hopeful yet simultaneously sceptical about the impact of liberal education on local students and wider community: Western “faculty arrived with the hope that this next generation would apply liberalism in a lifetime of benevolent relations with women, minorities and dissenters, not to mention with each other. Most of those teaching abroad hope that is what would result from their endeavors. Although not completely wrong, it was also not the whole story” (Wasserman 2017: 222). Having completed a foreign education, majority of students may return to “the enveloping ties of faith, family, and custom” (ibid.: 224), but for some individuals that education will have “facilitated [their] liberation from these traditional identities” (ibid.).

7.4.2.4 Social “deviants” It has been observed that social change and economic development happen when individuals undergo a “withdrawal of status respect, thus creating a rejected group whose members became deviants with innovative and creative personalities” (Hagen cited in Szyliowicz 1973: 10). Arguably, these new discourses of otherness might be significant in terms of their potentially transformative or even subversive impact on local society and culture, even if still uncertain and slow in coming (Golkowska 2017; 2018; Wildavsky 2010). Individuals such as the ones presented through my research – developing new ways of thinking and beginning to question their position and role in their own society and the society’s established order – although initially rejected, may at some point become agents of change beyond their personal transformation, “innovative deviants” remodelling their cultural and social environment. Perhaps the most subversive element in this discourse might turn out to be the newly empowered women, whose personal dialogue with the Otherness of Western education could just be the first step towards broader transformation, in Qatar and elsewhere.

Concluding remarks This chapter presented my conclusions based on the research I conducted in the Academic Bridge Program. It also offered a discussion of potential implications of my study findings considered in the context of Qatar’s vision of knowledge-based society educated to Western standards as declared in Qatar Vision 2030. The next, final chapter of this thesis focuses on the contributions my study makes and suggests areas for further research.

242

Chapter 8: Contributions and further research suggestions

Introduction In the final chapter of my thesis, I present my study’s contributions to wider scholarship and propose suggestions for further research. I start from summarising my research goals (8.1), discuss how my study adds to the literature of Othering in internationalised English language education (8.2), to educational ethnography (8.3), and brings pedagogical contributions (8.4). I then briefly describe how the study enriched me on a personal level (8.5) and suggest areas for potential future research (8.6).

8.1 Study goals My study aimed to learn about various forms of Othering present in students’ experiences of the key dimensions of the internationalised educational culture of the ABP: co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, independent learning and critical thinking, critical teacher feedback, as well as emphasis on studying in foreign universities. I wanted to find out what contributed to those forms of Othering and how they related to different educational processes occurring in this setting. Finally, I wanted to consider my research findings in the context of Qatar’s vision of knowledge-based society educated to Western standards as articulated in Qatar Vision 2030, with references to a broader framework of internationalised English language education in the Muslim Arab Gulf.

8.2 Contribution to the literature on Othering in internationalised English education The main contribution of my study lies in its original theoretical approach to exploring students’ experiences of Othering in an internationalised higher education context by linking Othering with the conceptualisation of small culture and host culture complex (Holliday 1994; 1999). The data collected and examined in the study demonstrates the multi-layered nature of Othering as experienced in a unique setting, which can be generalised to other parallel academic settings. Thus, my study contributes to the literature of Othering in the field of internationalised English education as it draws from and expands upon the existing body of scholarship. It adds to knowledge through an

243 exploration of a university preparatory programme in the Middle East, which is a setting that has not been largely under-explored. The study also examines specific educational practices (co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, independent learning and critical thinking, critical teacher feedback, as well as emphasis on studying in foreign universities) brought to the region through internationalised higher education, connecting them with the conceptualisation of Othering, drawing on the concepts of power and alienation. Through exploring local students’ encounters with those new educational dimensions, interpreted via the lens of Othering, the study provides an original contribution to the existing knowledge.

More specifically, with regard to the conceptualisation of Othering, the Other and Otherness, this study builds on and develops existing research on Othering, having drawn on the work of writers such as Al-Fassi 2011; Al-Qasimi 2010; Buber 1923/2016; 1947/2006; de Beauvoir 1949/2011; El-Saadawi 1990/2015; Eltahawy 2015; Gurevitch 1988; 1989a; 1989b; Holliday 2011; Jensen 2011; Mernissi 1987/2011; Lewis 2004; Said 1978/2003; 1993; Spivak 1985; 1988.

Since my research was focused on English language teaching in Qatar, it adds to wider narratives of transnational higher education in the Middle East and the Gulf, as well as in other parts of the world. It offers an interpretation of the complexities of local students’ experiences of Othering while studying English in a Western institution set up in their home country, with the dynamic educational scene set against the backdrop of local culture and society. Exploring that area, I took on board and attempted to advance other scholars’ ideas connected with the notions of the Other and Othering, alienation, identity, and power, in the context of internationalised English language education. Those scholars include, among others, Ahmadi 2015; Al-Misnad 1985; Burden-Leahy 2009; Findlow 2006; 2007; 2008; Holliday 1994; 1999; 2009a; 2011; 2013; Ideland and Malmberg 2014; Lausch, Temand and Terry 2017; Lee and Rice 2007; Linares 2016; Mensgtie 2011; Palfreyman 2005; Rich and Troudi 2006; Syed 2003; Wasserman 2017.

244

Finally, it focuses on a relatively new, but fast-developing, area of modern education in Qatar. Although in the past, scholarship on education in Qatar was scarce, in recent years, with the country’s school system undergoing modernisation and reform, many related publications have appeared, e.g. Asquith (2006); Al-Khawaga (2008); Brewer et al (2007); Chaudhuri (2008); Coker (2010); Gill (2010); Górak-Sosnowska and Czulda, eds. (2009); Lefebure (2009); Lewin (2008); Lindsey (2012; 2013a; 2013b); Moini et al. (2009); Stasz et al. (2007); Wheeler (2012). There is a growing body of expertise developed by Qatar and/or Education City-based researchers: Harding (2014); Paschyn (2013a; 2013b); Pessoa and Rajakumar (2011); Romanowski and Nasser (2012a; 2012b); Telafici, Martinez and Telafici (2014); Tellis (2014); Woodworth (2014), whose writings I consulted during the course of my research. Through my exploration of the ABP setting and students’ experiences, this study contributes to their work, broadening the existing understandings by adding new insights and interpretations, rooted in Holliday’s theory of small culture and host culture complex.

In particular, it does so through articulating issues involved in local students’ experiences of Othering while encountering the new educational culture of English language provision in an internationalised academic setting, practising co-education, instruction in English, academic integrity, independent learning and critical thinking, critical teacher feedback, as well as emphasis on studying in foreign universities. The data gathered through my research strongly indicate a multi-faceted, micro- and macro-character of local pre-university students’ experiences of Othering, taking place in an internationalised educational environment of an Arab Gulf country. This context and students’ encounters with various forms of Othering brought about by new educational dimensions are generalizable to other parallel transnational higher education settings in the region and beyond.

8.3 Contribution to educational ethnography As an ethnographic case study, my study is situated in the field of educational ethnography and contributes to the scholarship of other educational ethnographers, such as Herrera 1992; Jackson 2004; Ladd 1995; Lightfoot 1983; Palfreyman 2005.

245

Through exploring my own teaching environment, the study uncovers new aspects of the relationship between an embedded researcher and student informants. They include a collaborative approach based on reciprocal engagement, honesty, respect and trust; as well as enabling participants to actively shape some methodological tools while exploring the shared context together. An important element of my study is rooted in the embedded-researcher-and-background-knowledge dynamics. Hence, the study makes a contribution in terms of moving the thinking about the field of language education into a more reflective territory as it explores the methodological boundaries of an embedded researcher experience. In this, it adds to the knowledge of teacher/practice-led research in English teaching whose pertinence to professional development has been discussed in writings by Bauman and Duffy (2001); Dressman 2006; Johnson (2006); Nunan (1997); Queenan (1988), and others.

8.4 Pedagogical contribution Holliday’s desire to arrive at a more appropriate methodology of teaching English to foreign students in foreign settings found its expression through his advocacy of ethnographic action research (1994: 164). Although my study was not an example of educational ethnographic action research, it did reshape my own cognitions about English pedagogy and my own practice, making me more aware of students’ educational needs and cultural forces shaping their experiences in encounters with key aspects of the ABP environment. I learnt how to approach and recognise the changing dynamics of small culture settings such as my English classroom, without resorting to generalised cultural constructs. But I also learnt that students are active co-makers of the classroom reality and offering them opportunities for strong critical thinking, through exposing them to Otherness and questioning their accepted views in a responsive, empathetic but equitable environment may lead to a deeper understanding of the complexities of contemporary life and a dialogue rather than mutual rejection.

Thus, my doctoral work on the issue of Othering in an internationalised English teaching context, the multi-directional nature of the processes of Othering, and the changing frameworks of power underlying them has contributed to my own teaching

246 practice in Qatar. It has allowed me to move away from the simplistic conceptualisation of local students’ educational experiences based exclusively on ‘large’, essentialist cultural constructs. It has gradually led me to adopting a new pedagogical approach, based on dialogue and recognition of my students’ potent role in their own learning as engaged individuals and stakeholders in a broader collective cultural context. The liquid cultural alliances and hostilities that form in my classroom no longer impede the educational process, but can now be addressed more explicitly with the students themselves, enabling them to acknowledge and harness the various socio-cultural forces present in the classroom to benefit their academic development.

However, my research did not just enhance my own teacher awareness: its pedagogical contribution lies in its relevance to fellow practitioners through my publications and conference presentations, making my study a valuable overall contribution to the pedagogy of internationalised English education, with implications for teaching practice in Qatar (see: Appendix 10). For example, I have written on teacher identity and position in the Qatari setting, with focus on the status of the teaching profession in the country, a topic of interest to Qatar- and Gulf-based practitioners. I have also contributed to the critical thinking literature through a chapter on teaching critical thinking skills in Education City, another element of teaching practice relevant to professionals in Qatar and the region. Through formal and informal exchanges with academics working in Education City, at Qatar University, and in various schools in Doha, I have discovered that those and other elements of my doctoral research have informed other teachers’ thinking about their professional activities in the country, in terms of deepening their understanding of the complex cultural forces of Othering present in the internationalised educational setting in Qatar, manifested in the classroom. This new understanding of classroom dynamics has enabled them to adjust their teaching approaches, methods, and materials accordingly, while forging stronger, more meaningful, connections with local students.

A more practical, if circumscribed, aspect of the study’s pedagogical contribution concerns my local student informants. Their participation in my research enabled them

247 to verbalise and share views on their language education, helped them develop a self- reflective approach to their academic growth, and enhanced critical thinking about their learning and educational experiences vis-à-vis the socio-cultural landscape of Qatar. For example, we explored topics such as co-education or the position of English in relation to Arabic in Qatari education, thus raising their awareness of related social, cultural, and political issues in the country. Throughout the research process, I could see how my key informants felt gradually emboldened to express their opinions freely in a safe and confidential setting, as they expanded relevant English vocabulary and took ownership of the various ideological education-related discourses in the English-medium, public arena in Qatar.

8.5 Personal impact Inevitably, my research had an impact on me, the researcher. While it is hardly necessary to state that it significantly expanded my knowledge of my research subject, I feel it also compelled me to test at least some of my pre-existing cognitions acquired during the many years of living and working in Qatar. As I conducted my research, I had an opportunity to look at my work setting from a new perspective, re-examining my own cultural and professional expertise. Finally, the study allowed me to forge lasting connections with my participants, some of whom still visit me and enquire after the progress of my (seemingly never-ending) doctoral studies. Other researchers may find inspiration in this personalised approach to research, leading them to a deeper, closer, more meaningful engagement with their own work setting, which often can be – like mine – a meeting point of diverse of cultures, comparable to Al Ghazali’s dihliz or threshold (Moosa 2005: 29-30), a space of dialogue and transformation.

8.6 Potential areas for further research I do not claim to have utilised all of my data in an exhaustive way. In fact, there are areas uncovered or signalled through my study that I chose not to explore further, as I tried to remain focused on my research questions, without straying too far afield. But those areas could be investigated in future research because they have the potential to contribute to our understandings of the complex and dynamic educational scene in Qatar and the region. They include the impact of Western education on young Qatari

248 women’s experiences and narratives of personal, academic, and professional choices. A possibly longitudinal study related to the issue could involve researching EC university female students and graduates.

A research gap also appears to open in the area of reoriented power relationships in language education in Qatar, with foreign teachers and local students and their new positions in the internationalised environment of English teaching. Another research suggestion is to investigate local perceptions of the teaching profession’s status in Qatar with a view to offering long-term solutions to the complications surrounding the educational reforms in the country.

Finally, educational experiences of post-ABP students in various universities in Qatar and abroad might be worth researching to ascertain long-term merits of an English education provided via an internationalised university preparation programme such as the ABP.

Concluding remarks This final chapter summarized my contributions and suggested possible areas for future research. I hope my study can be used as a resource to deepen English language teachers and scholars’ understandings of the complexities involved in non-Western students’ experiences of Western-style education, with resulting processes of Othering.

249

References

Abdel-Jawad, H. and Abu Radwan, A. S. (2011). The status of English in institutions of higher education in Oman: Sultan Qaboos university as a model. In: Al-Issa, A. and Dahan, L.S. (Eds.), Global English and Arabic. Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang, 123- 151.

Abou El Fadl, K. (2005). The Great Theft: Wrestling Islam from the Extremists. San Francisco: Harper.

Abu Saud, A. (1984). Qatari Women. Past and Present. Harlow, UK: Longman Group Limited.

Ahmadi, Q. S. (2015). Othering in the EFL classroom: An action research study. International Journal of Humanities and Cultural Studies 1(4), 439-469.

Ahmed, L. (1993) Women and Gender in Islam: The Historical Roots of a Modern Debate (Yale University Press, 1993)

Ahmed, L. (2011) A Quiet Revolution: The Veil's Resurgence, from the Middle East to America (Yale University Press, 2011

Aid for Qatari Students in Private Schools (2012). The Peninsula 29 July 2012.

Al-Ali, S.M., Sellami, A.L., Elmaghraby, A.A., and Al-Qassass, H. B. (2018). Determinants of college and university choice for high-school students in Qatar. International Journal of Higher Education 7(3), 1-15.

Al-Attas, S. M. al N. (1979). (Ed.) Aims and Objectives of Islamic Education. Jeddah: Hodder and Stoughton.

Al-Fassi, H. (2011). Saudi women: Modernity and change. In: Seznec, J-F. and Kirk, M. (eds.). Industrialization in the Gulf: A Socioeconomic Revolution. London: Routledge. 157-170.

Al-Ghanim, K. (2009). Violence against women in Qatari society. Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies 5(1), 80-93.

Al-Hazmi, S. (2003). EFL teacher preparation programs in Saudi Arabia: trends and challenges. TESOL Quarterly 37(2), 341–344.

Al-Issa, A. and Dahan, L. S. (2011). Global English and endangered Arabic in the United Arab Emirates. In: Al-Issa, A. and Dahan, L. S. (Eds.), Global English and Arabic. Bern, Switzerland: Peter Lang, 1-22.

250

Al Khawaga, S. S. (2008). Qatar: conservative modernity. In: C. Henderson & M. Rajakumar (Eds.), Qatar Narratives. Doha: Waqif Art Center.

Al Kobaisi, A. J. (1979). The development of education in Qatar, 1950 – 1977, with an analysis of some educational problems. Durham Theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/1856/

Alkire, S. and Alkire A. (2007). Teaching literature in the Muslim world: a bicultural approach. TESL-EJ 10(4), 1-13.

Al Maleh, L. (2005). English literature and Arab students. Academic Exchange Quarterly 9(1), 269-274.

Al Misnad, S. (1985). The Development of Modern Education in the Gulf. London: Ithaca Press.

Al-Naimi, F. A., R. Cuttler, H. Arrock and H. Roberts. (2010). A possible Upper Palaeolithic and Early Holocene flint scatter at Raʾs ʿUshayriq, western Qatar. Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies, Vol. 40, Papers from the forty-third meeting of the Seminar for Arabian Studies held at the British Museum, London, 23- 25 July 2009 (2010), 35-39.

Alptekin, C. (2002). Towards intercultural communicative competence in ELT. English Language Teaching Journal 56(1), 57-64.

Al-Qasimi, N. (2010). Immodest modesty: Accommodating dissent and the ‘abaya-as- fashion in the Arab Gulf States. Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies 6(1), 46-74.

Al-Subaiey, M. (2010). Qatarization Policy – Implementation Challenges. Brookings Doha Center. Qatar.

Altbach, P.G. (2006). The foreign student dilemma. In: P.G. Altbach, Comparative Higher Education. Chestnut Hill, MA: Center for International Higher Education, Boston College, 225-48.

Althani, M.A.J. (2012a). Jassim the Leader, Founder of Qatar. London: Profile Books Ltd.

Althani, M.A.J. (2012b). The Arab Spring & the Gulf States: Time to Embrace Change. London: Profile Books Ltd.

Althani, T. and Romanowski, M. (2013). “Neoliberalism and Qatari preschools: A comparative study of England and Qatar.” Near and Middle Eastern Journal of Research in Education 13(2), n.p.

251

Anderson, N. (2015a). In Qatar’s Education City, U.S. colleges are building an academic oasis. The Washington Post. 6 Dec. 2015.

Anderson, N. (2015b). Northwestern professor raises questions about its branch in Qatar. The Washington Post. 17 Dec. 2015.

Anderson, N. (2016a). Qataris say Texas A&M pact for Doha branch should remain secret. The Washington Post. 6 Jan. 2016.

Anderson, N. (2016b). Texas university gets $76 million each year to operate in Qatar, contract says. The Washington Post. 8 March 2016.

Arab students in Qatar struggle to learn Arabic. (2012). Doha News. 11 June 2012.

Are Qatar’s independent schools broken? An in-depth report. (2013). Doha News. 22 March 2013.

Are they ready? The Peninsula, 21 April 2012.

Asquith, C. (2006). Accepted into Education City. Diverse: Issues in Higher Education 23(8), 22-26.

Atkinson, D. (1999). TESOL and culture. TESOL Quarterly 33(4), 625-654.

Bahgat, G. (1999). Education in the Gulf monarchies: retrospect and prospect. International Review of Education 45(2), 127-136.

Baker, A. (2013). Qatar’s leadership shake-up: powerful emir to step down for 33-year-old son. Time. 24 June, 2013.

Bakr, A. (2014). Qatar pares support for Islamists but careful to preserve ties. Reuters. World News. 2 Nov. 2014.

Bampton, R. and Cowton, C. J. (2002). The e-interview. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum: Qualitative Social Research [On-line Journal] 3(2), Art. 9. http://www.qualitative-research.net/fqs-texte/2-02/2-02bamptoncowton-e.htm

Barakat, H. (1993). The Arab World: Society, Culture, and State. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Bauman, Z. (1993). Postmodern Ethics. London: Blackwell, 343.

Bauman, Z. (2005). Płynne Życie. (Liquid Life). Kraków, Poland: Wydawnictwo Literackie.

252

Baumann, J. F. and Duffy, A. M. (2001). Teacher-researcher methodology: Themes, variations, and possibilities. The Reading Teacher 54(6), 608–615.

Belhiah, H. and Elhami, M. (2015). English as a medium of instruction in the Gulf: When students and teachers speak. Lang Policy (2015) 14, 3–23.

Bell, J. (2003). Doing Your Research Project. 3rd ed. Maidenhead, UK: OUP.

Bennett, Milton, J. (1998). Intercultural communication: A current perspective. In: Milton J. Bennett (Ed.), Basic Concepts of Intercultural Communication: Selected Readings. Yarmouth, ME: Intercultural Press.

Berhem, T. (1991). The internationalisation of higher education: The German perspective. Higher Education 21(3), 297-304

Beydoun N. M. and Baum, J. (2012). The Glass Palace. Illusions of Freedom and Democracy in Qatar. New York: Algora Publishing.

Bhandari, R. and El-Amine, A. (2011). Classifying higher education institutions in the Middle East and North Africa: a pilot study (Executive Summary). Institute of International Education. 30 Dec. 2011.

Bishai, W. B. (1960). Notes on the Coptic substratum in Egyptian Arabic. Journal of the American Oriental Society 80(3), 225-229.

Bogdan, R. (1973). Participant observation. Peabody Journal of Education 50(4), 302-308.

Borg, S. (2001). The research journal: A tool for promoting and understanding researcher development. Language Teaching Research 5(2), 156-177.

Borrero, N. E., Yeh, C. J., Cruz, C. I., and Suda, J. F. (2012). School as a context for "othering" youth and promoting cultural assets. Teachers College Record 114(2), 1-37. http://www.eric.ed.gov/contentdelivery/servlet/ERICServlet?accno=EJ912111

Bourdieu, P. (1991/2011). Language and Symbolic Power. Transl. Raymond G. and Adamson, M. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Brandenburg, T. (2012). Bridging the Knowledge Gap: Internationalization and Privatization of Higher Education in the State of Qatar and the Sultanate of Oman Doctoral dissertation. Mainz, Germany. http://ubm.opus.hbz-nrw.de/volltexte/2012/3210/pdf/doc.pdf

Brawner Bevis, T. (2016). Higher Education Exchange between America and the Middle East in the Twenty First Century. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

253

Brewer, D., C. H. Augustine, G. L. Zellman, G. Ryan, C. A. Goldman, C. Stasz, L. Constant. (2007). Education for a New Era: Design and Implementation of K-12 Education Reform in Qatar. Santa Monica: RAND Corporation.

Brinkman, W.P. (2009). Design of a questionnaire instrument. ResearchGate. file:///C:/Users/mr439/Downloads/Design_of_a_Questionnaire_Instrument.pdf

Brody, W.R. (2007). College goes global. Foreign Affairs. March /April 2007, 122-133.

Brons, L. (2015). Othering, an analysis. Transcience 6(1), 69-90.

Brown, L. (2009). “The Transformative Power of the International Sojourn: An Ethnographic Study of the International Student Experience.” Annals of Tourism Research, 65(3), 502-521.

Brown, L. C. and Itzkowitz, N. (Eds.). (1977). Psychological Dimensions in Near Eastern Studies. Princeton, NJ: The Darwin Press.

Buber, M. (1923/2016). I and Thou. Transl. Gregor-Smith, R. London: Continuum. http://www.maximusveritas.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/iandthou.pdf

Buber, M. (1947/2006). Between Man and Man. Transl. Gregor-Smith, R. London: Routledge.

Burden-Leahy, S. (2009). Globalisation and education in the postcolonial world: the conundrum of the higher education system of the United Arab Emirates. Comparative Education 45(4), 25-544.

Burgess, R. G. (1982). (Ed.) Field research: a sourcebook and field manual. Taylor & Francis E-Library 2005.

Case, J.M. (2008). Alienation and engagement: Development of an alternative theoretical framework for understanding student learning. Higher Education 55(3), 321-332.

Çelik, V. and Gömleksiz, M. N. (2000). A critical examination of globalization and its effects on education. Fırat University Journal of Social Science 10(2), 133-145.

Chalabi, M. (2013). Qatar's migrants: how have they changed the country? The Guardian. 23 Sep. 2013.

Chapelle, C. A. and Duff, P.A. (2003). Some guidelines for conducting quantitative and qualitative research in TESOL. TESOL Quarterly 37(1), 157-178.

Charrad. M. M. (2011). Gender in the Middle East: Islam, state, agency. Annual Review of Sociology 37(2011). 417-437.

254

Chaudhuri, A. (2008). Delivering American liberal arts education to Qatar. Proc. of the Conference on Liberal Arts. 10-13 May 2008, American University of Kuwait, Kuwait City, Kuwait. Unpublished.

Chen, T.-M. and Barnett, G. A. (2000). “Research on International Student Flows from a Macro Perspective: A Network Analysis of 1985, 1989 and 1995.” Higher Education, Vol. 39(4), Jun., 2000, 435-453.

Cherribi, S. (2017). Fridays of Rage: Al Jazeera, the Arab Spring, and Political Islam. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Clandinin, D. J. and Connelly, F. M. (2000). Narrative Inquiry. Experience and Story in Qualitative Research. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, Inc.

Clarke, M., Ramanathan, V. and Morgan, B. (2007). Language policy and language teacher education in the United Arab Emirates. TESOL Quarterly 41(3), 583-591.

Cohen, D. and Crabtree, B. (2006). Qualitative Research Guidelines Project. July 2006. http://www.qualres.org/HomeSemi-3629.html

Cohen, L., L. Manion, and K. Morrison. (2006). Research Methods in Education. 5th ed. London: RoutledgeFalmer.

Coker, M. (2010). Qatar rewrites ABCs of Mideast education. The Wall Street Journal. 18 May 2010.

Cole, D. P. (2003). Where have the Bedouin gone? Anthropological Quarterly 76(2), 235-267.

Collins, E. (1991). Qualitative research as art: toward a holistic process. Theory into Practice 31(2), 181-186.

Comparisons between Education City, Qatar University spark controversy. (2012). Doha News, 17 May 2012.

Connolly, W. E. (1996). The Ethos of Pluralisation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Country Studies: Country Profile – Qatar. (1993). U.S. Library of Congress. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/qatoc.html.

Creswell, J. W. and Miller, D. L. (2000). Determining validity in qualitative inquiry. Theory into Practice 39(3), 124-130.

255

Cultural Perspectives on Plagiarism. (2009). wsulibs.wsu.edu. Washington State University. http://www.wsulibs.wsu.edu/plagiarism/cultural-perspectives.

Culture, religion and history of Qatar. (2013). Geneva Healthcare. http://www.genevahealthmiddleeast.com/Qatar/About-Qatar/Culture-and-Religion

Cumming, A. et al. (1994). Alternatives in TESOL research: descriptive, interpretive and ideological orientations. TESOL Quarterly 28(4), 673-703.

Curtiss, R. H. (1996). For Qatari educators, women are both the problem and the solution. Washington Report on Middle East Affairs (Qatar: Special Section). May/June 1996, 84-87.

Curtiss, R. H. (1996). Qatar's new ruler breaks the GCC policy mold. Washington Report on Middle East Affairs (Qatar: Special Section). May/June 1996, 78-79.

Dalrymple, T. (2004). When Islam breaks down. City Journal. Spring 2004.

Dalrymple, T. (2015). David Cameron’s Muslim muddle. City Journal. 30 July 2015.

Dawson, J. (2012). Thick description. In: Mills, A.J., Durepos, G. and Wiebe, E. (eds.). Encyclopedia of Case Study Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications, Inc. http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781412957397 de Beauvoir, S. (1949/2011). The Second Sex. Transl. Borde C. and Malovany- Chevallier S. New York: Vintage.

Dedinsky, M. (2017). Journalism and scholarship: How one learns in Qatar. In: Higher Education Investment in the Arab States of the Gulf. Eickelman, D. F. and Abusharaf, R. M. (Eds). Gulf Research Book Series. Gerlach Press. 72-91.

Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. (1994). Introduction: Entering the field of qualitative research. In: Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y.S. (eds.), Handbook of Qualitative Research. London: Sage. 1-17. de Ridder-Symoens, H. (Ed.) (1992). A History of the University in Europe: Volume 1, Universities in the Middle Ages. Cambridge: CUP.

Doherty, R. (2012). Qatar's modern future rubs up against conservative traditions. Reuters (Business Travel). 27 Sep. 2012.

Doyle, S. (2007). Member checking with older women: A framework for negotiating meaning. Health Care for Women International 28 (10), 888-908.

256

Dressman, M. (2006) Teacher, teach thyself: teacher research as ethnographic practice. Ethnography, 7(3), pp. 329-356

Drum, Alice (1986). “Responding to Plagiarism.” Staffroom Interchange. College Composition and Communication. 37(2): 241-243.

Dubois, A. and Gadde, L.E. (2002). Systematic combining: an abductive approach to research. Journal of Business Research 55, 553-560.

East, J. (2006). “The problem of plagiarism in academic culture.” The International Journal for Educational Integrity 2(2), 16-28.

Edge, J. (1996). Cross-cultural paradoxes in a profession of values. TESOL Quarterly 30(1), 9-30.

Edge, J. (2003). Imperial troopers and servants of the Lord: a vision of TESOL for the 21st century. TESOL Quarterly 37(4), 701-709.

Edge, J. (2006). (Ed.) (Re-)Locating TESOL in an Age of Empire. Basingstoke: Palgrave.

Ehteshami, A. & Wright, S. (2007). Political change in the Arab oil monarchies: from liberalization to enfranchisement. International Affairs 83(5), 913-932.

El Aissati, A. (2001). Ethnic identity, language shift, and the Amazigh voice in Morocco and Algeria. Race, Gender & Class 8(3), Amazigh Voices: The Berber Question, 57- 69.

El Guindi, F. (2012). Milk and blood: kinship among Muslim Arabs in Qatar. Anthropos, Bd. 107, H. 2, 545-555.

Eliot, T.S. (1943). “Little Gidding”. In: Four Quartets. New York: Harcourt.

El Saadawi (1980/2015). The Hidden Face of Eve. Transl. Hetata, S. London: Zed Books.

Eltahawy, M. Headscarves and Hymens: Why the Middle East Needs a Sexual Revolution. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.

English versus Arabic: Qatar University decision continues to stir controversy. (2012). Doha News. 29 Jan. 2012.

Esposito, J.L., D. J. Fasching, T. Lewis (2006). World Religions Today. 2nd ed. Oxford: OUP.

Factbox: Gulf Arab countries' population, economy, military. (2012). Reuters. 14 May 2012.

257

Fahmy, H. (2016). Qatar’s Sheikha Moza: Arabs who lose their language lose their identity. Doha News. 21 Jan. 2016.

Fandy, M. (2007). (Un)civil War of Words: Media and Politics in the Arab World. London: Praeger Security International.

Fawley, N. E. (2012). Addressing academic integrity: Perspectives from Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar. In: Pamela A. Jackson; Patrick Sullivan, International Students and Academic Libraries: Initiatives for Success. Chicago, IL: ACRL. 172-186.

Figueroa, A. M. (2016). Ethnography and language education. In: King, K. at al (eds.). Research Methods in Language Education, Encyclopedia of Language and Education. Switzerland: Springer International Publishing.

Findlow, S. (2006). Higher education and linguistic dualism in the Arab Gulf. British Journal of Sociology of Education 27(1), 19-36.

Findlow, S. (2007). Women, higher education, and social transformation in the Arab Gulf. Aspects of Education in the Middle East and North Africa. (Jan. 2007), 57-76.

Findlow, S. (2008). Islam, modernity and education in the Arab States. Intercultural Education 19(4), 337-352.

Findlow, S. (2013). Higher education and feminism in the Arab Gulf. British Journal of Sociology of Education 34(1), 112-131.

Fisher-Yoshida, B., Geller, K.D., and Schapiro, S.A. (2009). Chapter 1: Introduction: New dimensions in transformative education. Counterpoints Vol. 341. Innovations in Transformative Learning: Space, Culture & the Arts, 1-19.

Flick, U., von Kardoff, E., and Steinke, I. (2004). A Companion to Qualitative Research. Transl. B. Jenner. London: SAGE Publications.

Forbes-Mewett, H. and Nyland, C. (2013). “Funding international student support services: tension and power in the university.” Higher Education, 65(2), Feb. 2013, 181-192.

Forest, J.J.F. (2002). Globalisation, universities and professors. Cambridge Review of International Affairs 15(3), 435-450.

Forsythe, J. (2011). Middle East: buffeted by the winds of change. The World Today 67(11), 17-19.

258

Foucault, M. (1983). The subject and power. In: Dreyfus H. and P. Rabinow. Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. 208- 226.

Foucault, M. (1993). Space, power and knowledge. In: During, S. (ed.) The Cultural Studies Reader. 3rd ed. New York: Routledge, 164-171.

Foucault, M. (1998). The History of Sexuality: The Will to Knowledge, London: Penguin.

Franz, K. (2011). The Bedouin in history or Bedouin history? Nomadic Peoples 15(1), 11–53.

Free degrees to fly. (2005). Economist (2005). 2 June 2005. Vol. 374/8415, 67-69.

Fromherz, A. J. (2012). Qatar: A Modern History. Washington DC: Georgetown University Press.

Garrison, D.R. (1992). Critical thinking and self-directed learning in adult education: An analysis of responsibility and control issues. Adult Education Quarterly 42, 136-148.

Gaventa, J. (2003). Power after Lukes: A Review of the Literature. Brighton: Institute of Development Studies.

Gecienë, I. (2002). The notion of power in the theories of Bourdieu, Foucault and Baudrillard. Sociologija 2002(2), 116-124.

Geertz, C. (1973). Thick description: toward an interpretive theory of culture. 1 May 2011. http://www.sociosite.net/topics/texts/Geertz_Thick_Description.php

General Secretariat for Development Planning. GSDP. (2008). Qatar National Vision 2030. https://www.mdps. gov.qa/en/qnv/Pages/QNVDocument,aspx

Gibran, K. (1923/1998). The Prophet. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

Gill, J. (2010). Gulf opens for UCL as Qatari campus aims to unearth past. Times Higher Education. 4 Nov. 2010.

Giddens, A. (1990). The Consequences of Modernity. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Giddens, A. (2004). Sociology. 4th ed. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Golafshani, N. (2003). Understanding reliability and validity in qualitative research. The Qualitative Report 8(4), 597-607.

259

Golkowska, K. (2017). Qatari women navigating gendered space. Social Sciences. 6(123), n.p.

Golkowska, K. (2018). Developing symbolic competence on a North-American branch campus in Qatar. Western Higher Education in Global Contexts. London: Lexington Books, 2018.

Golley, N. Al-Hassan. (2004). Is feminism relevant to Arab women? Third World Quarterly 25(3), 521-536.

Goodman, N.R. (1994). Intercultural education at the university level: Teacher-student interaction. In: Brislin, R.W. and T. Yoshida (Eds.), Improving Intercultural Interactions: Modules for Cross-Cultural Training. London: Sage. 129-147.

Government of Qatar Planning Council. (2007). Turning Qatar into a Competitive Knowledge Based Economy: Knowledge Economy Assessment of Qatar. Qatar Knowledge Economy Project. 21 May 2007.

Górak-Sosnowska, K. and Czulda R. (Eds). (2009) Państwo Katar. Gospodarka – Polityka –Kultura. Łódź: Ibidem.

Graves, M. (1995). U.S. universities in Japan: some painful lessons. Planning for Higher Education 24 (Fall 1995), 17-23.

Greenfield, B. (2012). The World's Richest Countries. Forbes (Lifestyle). 22 Feb. 2012.

Grimshaw, T. and Sears, C. (2008). ‘Where am I from? Where do I belong?’ The negotiation and maintenance of identity by international school students. Journal of Research in International Education 7(3), 259-278.

Guarino, C. M., and Tanner, J. C. (2012). Adequacy, accountability, autonomy and equity in a Middle Eastern school reform: The case of Qatar. International Review of Education 58(2), 221–245.

Guba, E.G. (1981). Criteria for assessing the trustworthiness of naturalistic inquiries, Educational Communication and Technology Journal 29 (1981), 75–91.

Gurevitch, Z. D. (1988). The other side of dialogue: on making the Other strange and the experience of otherness. American Journal of Sociology 93(5), 1179-1199.

Gurevitch, Z. D. (1989a). Distance and conversation. Symbolic Interaction 12(2) (Fall 1989), 251-263.

Gurevitch, Z. D. (1989b). The power of not understanding: the meeting of conflicting identities. Journal of Applied Behavioral Science 25(2), 161-173.

260

Gutek, G.L. (1995). A History of the Western Educational Experience. 2nd ed. Prospect Heights, Illinois: Waveland Press. Inc.

Guttenplan, D. D. (2012). Battling to preserve Arabic from English's onslaught. New York Times. 11 June 2012.

Hajar, R. (2011). My Life in Doha: Between Dream and Reality. Durham, Connecticut: Strategic Book Group.

Halepota, A.J. (1975). Islamic conception of knowledge. Islamic ytudies 14(1), 1-8.

Hall E. T. (1959/1990). The Silent Language. NewYork: Anchor Book Editions.

Hall, J. (2013). Emir of Qatar profile: Who is Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, how did he turn Qatar into the world’s richest nation and why has he decided to abdicate? The Independent. 25 June 2013.

Halliday, F. (1977). Labor Migration in the Middle East. MERIP Reports No 59, 3-17.

Halpern, D. F. (2003). Thought and Knowledge. An Introduction to Critical Thinking. 4th ed. London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Halstead, J.M. (2004). An Islamic concept of education. Comparative Education (40(4), 517-529.

Hamady, S. (1960). Temperament and Character of the Arabs. New York: Twayne Publishers.

Hancock, S. (2011). Qatar raises public sector salaries by 60%. BBC. 26 Nov. 2011.

Hammond, A. (2014). Qatar’s leadership transition: like father, like son. Policy Brief. European Council on Foreign Relations. ecfr.eu. Feb. 2014.

Harding, S. (2014). ‘But we don't read, Professor!’ Translation, Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation Publishing, and building a ‘vibrant literary culture’. Perspectives: Studies in Translatology 22(4), 511-533.

Harvey, L. T. (2014). Language Learning Motivation as Ideological Becoming: Dialogues with Six English-Language Learners. Doctoral thesis. The University of Manchester. Unpublished.

Hatem, M. (1985). Conservative Patriarchal Modernization in the Arabian Gulf. Contemporary Marxism 11(Fall 1985), 96-109.

Hatina, M. (2006). In search of authenticity: a Coptic perception. Middle Eastern Studies 42(1), 49-65.

261

Hawkins, D. F. (1987). Primitive rock carvings in Qatar. Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies, Vol. 17, Proceedings of the Twentieth Seminar for Arabian Studies, London, UK. 1-4 July 1986 (1987), 53-6.

Hayes, N. and Introna, L. D. (2005). Cultural values, plagiarism and fairness: When plagiarism gets in the way of learning. Ethics and Behaviour 15(3), 213-231. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Heard-Bey, F. (2006) Conflict resolution and regional co-operation: the role of the Gulf Co-operation Council 1970- 2002. Middle Eastern Studies 42(2), 199-222.

Heath, S.B. (1983). Ways with Words: Language, Life, and Work in Communities and Classrooms. Cambridge” Cambridge University Press.

Henzell-Thomas, Jeremy. (2005). Excellence in Islamic education: key issues for the present time. IslamOnline. 22 Nov. 2005.

Henderson, C. and Rajakumar, M. (Eds.). (2008). Qatar Narratives. Doha, Qatar: Waqif Art Center.

Herrera, L. (1992). Scenes of schooling: inside a girls’ school in Cairo. Cairo Papers in Social Science 15, Monograph 1. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press.

Herrera, L. (2004). Education, Islam, and modernity: Beyond Westernization and centralization. Comparative Education Review 48(3), 318-326.

Herrera, L. (2010). Education and ethnography. Insiders, outsiders, and gatekeepers. In: Mazawi, A. E. And Sultana R. G. (Eds). World Yearbook of Education 2010. Education and the Arab “World”: Political Projects, Struggles, and Geometries of Power. Abingdon: Routledge.

Hirsi Ali, A. (2007). Infidel. London: Pocket Books.

Hirsi Ali, A. (2015). Heretic. London: HaperCollins.

Hodges, N. J. (2012). “Integrating writing with contemporary mathematics to develop critical thinking skills.” American Society for Engineering Education: 2012, https://www.asee.org/public/conferences/8/papers/3246/view

Hoffman, E. (1998). Lost in Translation. London: Vintage Books.

Hofstede, G. (1991/2003). Cultures and Organisations: Software of the Mind. London: Profile Books Ltd.

Holley, K. A. and J. Colyar. (2009). Rethinking texts: narrative and the construction of qualitative research. Educational Researcher 38(9), 680-686.

262

Holliday, A. (1994). Appropriate Methodology and Social Context. Cambridge: CUP.

Holliday, A.R. (1996). Developing a sociological imagination: expanding ethnography in international English language education. Applied Linguistics 17(2), 234-255.

Holliday, A.R. (1999). Small cultures. Applied Linguistics 20(2), 237-264.

Holliday, A. (2004a). Issues of validity in progressive paradigms of qualitative research. TESOL Quarterly 38(4), 731-734.

Holliday, A. (2004b). The value of reconstruction in revealing hidden or counter cultures, Journal of Applied Linguistics 1(3), 275-294.

Holliday, A. (2005). How is it possible to write? Journal of Language, Identity & Education 4(4), 304-309.

Holliday, A. (2008). Doing and Writing Qualitative Research. 2nd ed. London: Sage Publications.

Holliday, A. (2009a). The Struggle to Teach English as an International Language. Oxford: OUP.

Holliday, A. (2009b). English as a Lingua Franca, “non-native speakers” and cosmopolitan realities. In Sharifian, F. (Ed.), English as an International Language: Perspectives and Pedagogical Issues. Bristol, UK: Multilingual Matters. 21-34

Holliday, A. (2011). Intercultural Communication and Ideology. London: Sage.

Holliday, A. (2013). Understanding Intercultural Communication: Negotiating a Grammar of Culture. London: Routledge.

Holliday, A., Hyde, M. and Kullman, J. (2004). Intercultural Communication: An Advanced Resource Book. London: Routledge.

Hopkyns, S. (2014). The effects of global English on culture and identity in the UAE: a double-edged sword. Learning and Teaching in Higher Education: Gulf Perspectives, 11(2), 1-20.

Hornberger, N. H. (1994). Ethnography. In: A. Cumming et al. Alternatives in TESOL research: descriptive, interpretative and ideological orientations. TESOL Quarterly 28(4). 673-703.

Hourani, A. (2005). A History of the Arab Peoples. London: Faber and Faber Limited.

263

Howard, Rebecca Moore. (2001, Sep 16). “Forget about Policing Plagiarism. Just Teach.” The Chronicle of Higher Education http://abacus.bates.edu/cbb/events/docs/Howard_ForgeT.pdf

Huntington, S. P. (1996/2002). The Clash of Civilizations. London: Simon and Schuster.

Ibnouf, A., Dou, L. and Knight, J. (2013). The evolution of Qatar as an education hub: moving to a knowledge-based economy. In: International Education Hubs: Student, Talent, Knowledge-Innovation Models. London: Springer. 43-61.

Ideland, M. and Malmberg, C. (2014). ‘Our common world’ belongs to ‘Us’: constructions of otherness in education for sustainable development. Critical Studies for Education. 55(3), 369-386.

Illustrated Dictionary of the Muslim World. (2011). Marshall Cavendish Reference. New York: Marshall Cavendish Reference

Independent schools to have new curriculum in 2016-17. (2014). The Peninsula 27 June 2014.

Jackson, J. (2004). Language and cultural immersion: An ethnographic case study. RELC Journal: A Journal of Language Teaching and Research 35(3), 261-279.

Jandt, F.E. (2006). An Introduction to Intercultural Communication. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications, Inc. 211-229.

Jensen, S.Q. (2011). Othering, identity formation and agency. Qualitative Studies 2(2), 63-78.

Johnson, K. 2006. The sociocultural turn and its challenges for second language teacher education. TESOL Quarterly 40(1), 235-257.

Johnston, B. (1997). Do EFL Teachers Have Careers? TESOL Quarterly, 31(4), 681-712.

Johnston, B. (1999). The Expatriate Teacher as Post-Modern Paladin. Research in the Teaching of English, 34(2), 255-280.

Jonsen, K. and Jehn, K.A. (2009). Using triangulation to validate themes in qualitative studies. Qualitative Research in Organizations and Management: An International Journal 4(2), 123-150.

Josselson, R. 1987. Pathways to identity development in women. San Francisco: Jossey- Bass Publishers.

264

Jung, Y. (2014). Ethnographic case study in place-based research: Planning to be comfortable with uncertain moments and unexpected encounters. SAGE Research Methods Cases. London: Sage Publications, Ltd.

Kabbani, R. (1986). Europe’s Myths of the Orient. London: The Macmillan Press Ltd.

Kabel, A. (2005). The discourse of appropriation: A response to Karmani (2005). Applied Linguistics 28(1), 136-142.

Kahlouche, R. (2001). Socio-historical determinations of loan words from Arabic to Kabyle (Berber). Race, Gender & Class 8(3), Amazigh Voices: The Berber Question, 25- 32.

Kamrava, M. (2005). The Modern Middle East. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Kamrava, M. (2009). Royal Factionalism and Political Liberalization in Qatar. The Middle East Journal 63(3), 401-420.

Kamrava, M. (2013). Qatar: Small State, Big Politics. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press.

Kapiszewski, A. (2007). De-Arabization in the Gulf: foreign labor and the struggle for local culture. Georgetown Journal of International Affairs 8(2), 81- 88.

Karkouti, I. M. (2016). Qatar’s educational system in the technology-driven era: Long story short. International Journal of Higher Education 5(3). 182-189.

Karmani, S. (2005). TESOL in a time of terror: toward an Islamic perspective on applied linguistics. TESOL Quarterly 39(4), 738-744.

Kassir, S. (2004). Being Arab. Transl. W. Hobson. London: Verso.

Kawulich, B. (2005). Participant observation as a data collection method. Forum: Qualitative Social Research. 6(2). N.p.

Kay, S. (1978). The Bedouin. New York: Crane, Russak & Company Inc.

Kazemi, F. (2000). Gender, Islam, and Politics. Social Research 67(2), 453-474.

Kéchichian, J. A. (2007). Can Conservative Arab Gulf Monarchies Endure a Fourth War in the Persian Gulf? Middle East Journal 61(2), 283-306.

Kerr, S. (2010). Gulf state sets itself a goal beyond gas. Financial Times. 22 Nov 2010.

Kesten, C. (1987) Independent learning: a common essential learning. Study completed for the Saskatchewan Department of Education Core Curriculum Investigation Project,

265

Saskatchewan Department of Education: University of Regina. In: Broad, J. Interpretations of independent learning in further education. Journal of Further and Higher Education 30(2) May.

Khatib, L. (2013). Qatar’s foreign policy: the limits of pragmatism. International Affairs 89(2), 417–431.

Khatri, S. (2013a). Qatar’s education system grapples with language challenges. Doha News. 26 Oct 2013.

Khatri, S. (2013b). Qatar students rank near bottom of education index again, but gains made. Doha News. 6 Dec 2013

Khawaja, I. and Mørck L.L. (2009). Researcher positioning: Muslim “otherness” and beyond. Qualitative Research in Psychology 6(1-2), 28-45.

Kilbourn, B. (1999). Fictional theses. Educational Researcher 28(9), 27-32.

King, K.P. (2011). Teaching in an age of transformation: Understanding unique instructional technology choices which transformative learning affords. Educational Technology 51(2), 4-10.

Kirkpatrick, D.D. (2014). Qatar’s support for Islamists alienates allies near and far. The New York Times. 7 Sep. 2014.

Knight, J. (2003). Updated internationalization definition. International Higher Education 33(3), 2-3.

Knight, J. (2004). Internationalization remodeled: Definition, approaches, and rationales. Journal of Studies in International Education 8(1), 5-31.

Knight, J. (2010). Regional education hubs – rhetoric or reality. International Higher Education 59, 20-21.

Knight, J. (2011). Education hubs: A fad, a brand, an innovation? Journal of Studies in International Education 15(3), 221-240.

Knight, J. (2015). Investing in education hubs: local support is key. University World News 352, 30 Jan. 2015.

Knowles, M. (1975). Self-directed Learning: A Guide for Learners and Teachers. Parsippany, NJ: Pearson Learning Group.

Kolich, A. M. (1983). Plagiarism: The worm of reason. College English 45(2), 141-148.

Kottak, C. P. (2004). Cultural Anthropology. London: McGraw-Hill.

266

Kovessy, P. (2014). Qatar’s knowledge economy efforts struggle amid construction boom. Doha News. 26 June 2014.

Kramsch, C. (1998). Language and Culture. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Kubota, R. (1999). Japanese culture constructed by discourses: Implications for applied linguistics research and ELT. TESOL Quarterly 33(1), 9-35.

Kubota, R. (2001). Discursive Construction of the Images of U.S. Classrooms. TESOL Quarterly 35(1), 9-38.

Kubota, R. (2002). The author responds: (Un)raveling racism in a nice field like TESOL. TESOL Quarterly 36(1), 84-92.

Kumi-Yebaoh, A. (2014) Transformative Learning Experiences of International Graduate Students from Asian Countries. Journal of Transformative Education 12(1), 25-53.

Ladd, J. (1995). The journey: An ethnographic case study of multicultural education in a predominately white, rural, public elementary school. Doctoral Dissertations 1896 – February 2014. 2260. http://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1/2260

Ladika, S. (2009). Women’s work. International Educator. Sep./Oct. 2009, 31-37.

Larkin, C. (2007). An Academic Debate. Letters to Editor. Foreign Affairs. 86(4), 171- 172.

Latest Qatar University criticism highlights community divide. (2012). Doha News. 25 May 2012.

Lau, J. (2007). Muslims and the decadent West. Eurozine. 23 Nov. 2007. https://www.eurozine.com/muslims-and-the-decadent-west/

Lausch, D., Teman, E. and Perry, C. (2017). Scholastics, pabulum, clans, transformation: A journey into otherness. Journal of International Students 7(3). 893-917.

Lazaraton, A. (1995). Qualitative research in applied linguistics: A progress report. TESOL Quarterly 29, 455-472.

LeCompte, M. D. (2000). Analyzing Qualitative Data. Theory into Practice, Vol. 39(3), 146-154.

Lee, J. J. and Rice, C. (2007). Welcome to America? International student perceptions of discrimination. Higher Education, Vol. 53(3), Mar., 2007, 381-409.

Lefebure, L. 2009. Stosunki międzyreligijne w Katarze (Interreligious relations in Qatar. Transl. M. Rostron). In Katarzyna Górak-Sosnowska and Robert Czulda (Eds.).

267

Państwo Katar: Gospodarka, Polityka, Kultura (The State of Qatar: Economy, Politics, Culture). Łódź, Poland: Ibidem.165-166.

Leki, I. (1992). Understanding ESL writers: A guide for teachers. Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook.

Lett, J. (1990). Emics and etics: Notes on the epistemology of anthropology. In T.N. Headland, K.L. Pike, & M. Harris (Eds.). Emics and etics: The insider/outsider debate. Frontiers of anthropology, V. 7. Newbury Park, Calif: Sage Publications.

Lewin, T. (2008). In Oil Rich Middle East, Shades of the Ivy League. New York Times 11 Feb. 2008.

Lewis, B. (1975). The Arabs in History. London: Hutchins & Co (Publishers) Ltd.

Lewis, B. (1990). The roots of Muslim rage. The Atlantic. Sep. 1990.

Lewis, B. (2001). A Middle East Mosaic: Fragments of Life, Letters and History. New York: The Modern Library.

Lewis, B. (2003). What Went Wrong? London: Phoenix.

Lewis, B. (2004). The Crisis of Islam. London: Phoenix.

Lightfoot, S. L. (1983). The Good High School: Portraits of Character and Culture. New York: Basic Books.

Lightfoot, S. L. and J. Hoffmann Davis. (1997). The Art and Science of Portraiture. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Linares, M. S. (2016). Othering: Towards a critical cultural awareness in the language classroom. HOW 23(1), 129-146.

Lincoln, Y. S. and Guba, E. G. (1985). Naturalistic Inquiry. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

Lindsey, U. (2012). Debate arises at Qatar U. over decision to teach mainly in Arabic. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 7 Feb 2012.

Lindsey, U. (2013a). Qatar Sets Its Own Terms for U.S. Universities. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 18 Nov. 2012.

Lindsey, U. (2013b). The Arab world’s tangled linguistic landscape. Al Fanar, 19 April 2013.

Little, D. (1990). Autonomy in language learning: some theoretical and practical considerations. In: Gathercole, I. (ed.). Learning Foreign Languages from Authentic

268

Texts. Dublin: Authentik, in association with CiLT, London, 7-15.

Loboda, L. (2004). The thought of Sayyid Qutb. Ashbrook Statesmanship Thesis Recipient of the 2004 Charles E. Parton Award. http://www.ashbrook.org/wp- content/uploads/2012/06/2004-Loboda-The-Thought-of-Sayyid-Qutb-PDF.pdf

Lorenzini, D. (2015). What is a 'Regime of Truth'? In: Le foucaldien, 1/1.

Lucas, R. L. (2013). The Persian Gulf Monarchies and the Arab Spring Russell. In: The Evolving Ruling Bargain in the Middle East. (2013). Summary Report CIRS. Georgetown University, SFS-Q, Doha, Qatar.

Lvovich, N. (1997). The Multi Lingual Self: An Inquiry into Language Learning. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Mace, J. (1999/2003). Teach Yourself Beginner’s Arabic Script. London: Hodder & Stoughton.

Madill, A., A. Jordan and C. Shirley. (2000). Objectivity and reliability in qualitative analysis: realist, contextualist and radical constructionist epistemologies. British Journal of Psychology 91, 1-20.

Magrath, C.P. (2000). Globalization and its effects on higher education beyond the nation-state.” Higher Education in Europe. XXV(2), 251-258.

Mann, S.J. (2001). Alternative perspectives on the student experience: Alienation and engagement. Studies in Higher Education 26(1), 7-19.

Marmolejo, F. (2011). The future of higher-education internationalization. The Chronicle of Higher Education. 30 Aug. 2011.

Mason, J. (2002). Qualitative Researching. London: SAGE.

Mason, J. (2010). Creative interviewing. Seminar. The University of Manchester, 18 Nov. 2010. http://www.methods.manchester.ac.uk/methods/creativeinterviewing/

Matthews, D. (2013a). Qatar strives to weave its Western branches into one. Times Higher Education. 28 Feb. 2013.

Matthews, D. (2013b). Branches unshaken by Qatar's change at the top. Times Higher Education. 11 July 2013.

Matthiesen, T. 2013. The sectarian Gulf vs. the Arab Spring. Foreign Policy (The Middle East Channel). 8 Oct. 2013.

Mauthner, N.S. and A. Doucet (2003). Reflexive accounts and accounts of reflexivity in

269

qualitative data analysis. Sociology 37(3), 423-32.

McAuley, A. (2015). Qatari trade surplus falls in July due to oil and gas price volatility. The National (Business). 30 Aug. 2015.

McDonough, J. and S. McDonough. (1997). Research Methods for English Teachers. London: Hodder Education.

McGinity, R. and Salokangas, J. (2014). Introduction: ‘embedded research’ as an approach into academia for emerging researchers. Management in Education 28(1), 3-5.

McHarg, M. (2013). Celebrate citation: Flipping the pedagogy of plagiarism in Qatar. Journal of Pedagogic Development. 3(2). 38-39.

McWhorter, K. (2010). Successful College Writing. 4th ed. Boston: Bedford St. Martin’s.

Melamid, A. (1987). Qatar. Geographical Review 77(1), 103–105.

Media has anti-Muslim bias, claims report. (2005). The Guardian. 14 Nov. 2005.

Mengstie, S. (2011). Constructions of “otherness” and the role of education: The case of Ethiopia. Journal of Education Culture and Society 2(2011), 7-15.

Mernissi, F. (1987/ 2011). Beyond the Veil: Male-Female Dynamic in Modern Muslim Society. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.

Mezirow, J. (1978). Perspective transformation. Adult Education XXVIII(2), 100-110.

Meyer, W. R. (2010). Independent learning: a literature review and a new project. Education-line. Paper presented at the British Educational Research Association Annual Conference, University of Warwick, Warwick. UK. 1-4 Sep. 2010.

Miles, M. B. and Huberman, A. M. (1994). Qualitative Data Analysis. An Expanded Sourcebook. London: SAGE Publications.

Miller-Idriss, C., and Hanauer, E. (2011). Transnational higher education: offshore campuses in the Middle East. Comparative Education 47(2), 181–207.

Mineva, S. (2007). Identity, otherness and their postmodern ethical discourse. European Journal of Science and Theology 3(2), 31-39.

Mir, S. and Paschyn, C. (2018). Qatar’s hidden women: symbolic annihilation and documentary media practice. Visual Communication Quarterly 25(2), 93-105.

270

Mitchell, G. (Ed.) (1991). Architecture of the Islamic World: Its History and Social Meaning. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd.

Moini, J. S., T. K. Bikson, C. R. Neu, L. DeSisto. (2009). The Reform of Qatar University. Santa Monica: RAND Corporation.

Moosa, E. (2005). Ghazali and the Poetics of Imagination. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina.

Muslim World: Modern Muslim Societies. (2011). Marshall Cavendish Reference. New York: Marshall Cavendish Reference

Nakosteen, M. (1964). History of Islamic Origins of Western Education. Boulder, Co: University of Colorado Press.

Nasser, R. (2017) Qatar’s educational reform past and future: challenges in teacher development. Open Review of Educational Research 4(1), 1-19.

Nayyar, D. (2007). Globalization: what does it mean for higher education? Economic and Political Weekly, 42(50), 30-35.

Norton B. and Early, M. (2011). Researcher identity, narrative study, and language teaching research. TESOL Quarterly 45(3), 415- 439.

Nydell, M. (1988/2006). Understanding Arabs. Yarmouth, ME, Intercultural Press.

Ochsenwald W. and Fisher, S. N. (2004). The Middle East: A History. 6th ed. Boston: McGraw–Hill.

Odin K.J. and Manicas, P.T. (Eds.). (2004). Globalization and Higher Education. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press.

O’Doherty, M. (2006). Definitions of independent learning. Learn Higher. The University of Manchester. http://archive.learnhigher.ac.uk/resources/files/Independant%20Learning/IndependentL earning%5B1%5D.pdf

Owen, M. M. (2018). I and thou. Aeon. 7 March 2018.

Owolabi Kolawole A. (2001). Globalization, Americanization and Western imperialism. Journal of Social Development in Africa Vol 16(2). July 2001.

Oyserman, D., Elmore, K. and Smith, G. (2012). Self, self-concept, and identity. In: Leary, M.R. and Tangney, J.P. (eds.) Handbook of Self and Identity. 2nd ed. London: The Guilford Press.

271

Paavola, S. (2006). On the origin of ideas: an abductive approach to discovery. Philosophical Studies from the University of Helsinki. University of Helsinki: Department of Philosophy.

Palfreyman, D. (2005). Othering in an English language program. TESOL Quarterly 39(2). 211-233.

Parry, S. (1998). Disciplinary discourse in doctoral theses. Higher Education 36(3), 273- 299.

Partrick, N. (2009). Nationalism in the Gulf States. Kuwait Programme on Development, Governance and Globalisation in the Gulf States. The Center for the Study of Global Governance. Oct. 2009 (5).

Paschyn, C. M. (2013a). Gulf students say their education needs improvement. Al- Fanar Media. 16 Oct. 2013.

Paschyn, C. M. (2013b). Zig-zagging education policies leave Qatari students behind. Al-Fanar Media. 25 Oct. 2013.

Patai, R. (1976/2002). The Arab Mind, New York: Hatherleigh Press.

Peirce, C. S. (1934/1960). Collected Papers of Charles Sanders Peirce. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Pennycook, A. (1994). The Cultural Politics of English as an International Language. London: Longman.

Pennycook, A. (1996). “Borrowing others’ words: Text, ownership, memory and plagiarism.” TESOL Quarterly, 30(2), 210-230.

Pennycook, A. (1998). English and the Discourses of Colonialism. London: Routledge.

Pennycook, A. (1999). Introduction: Critical Approaches to TESOL. TESOL Quarterly 33(3), 329-348.

Pennycook, A. (2005). Performing the personal. Journal of Language, Identity, and Education 4, 297-304.

Pessoa, S. and M. Rajakumar. (2011). The impact of English-medium higher education: the case of Qatar. In: A. Al Issa and E.L. Dahan (eds). Global English and Arabic Issues of Language, Culture and Identity. Vol 31, 153-178.

Phillipson, R. (1992). Linguistic Imperialism. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

Pilch, T. i Bauman, T. (2001). Zasady badań pedagogicznych. Strategie ilościowe i

272

jakościowe. arszawa, Poland: Wydawnictwo Akademickie „Żak”.

Pipes, D. (2003). Militant Islam Reaches America. New York: W.W. Norton.

Ponterotto, J.G. (2006). Brief note on the origins, evolution, and meaning of the qualitative research concept “thick description”. The Qualitative Report 11(3), 538- 549.

Potter, L. (2009). The Persian Gulf in History. New York: Palgrave Macmillan US.

Potter, L. (Ed.). (2014). The Persian Gulf in Modern Times: People, Ports, and History. New York: Palgrave Macmillan US.

Pryce-Jones, D. (1990). The Closed Circle. London: Paladin.

Pusch, M.D., ed. (2000). Multicultural Education: A Cross-Cultural Training Approach. Maine: Intercultural Press.

Qatar and its Emir; he’ll do it his way. (2010). The Economist. 27 May 2010.

Qatar Education Study 2012: Curriculum Report (2014). Social & Economic Survey Research Institute (SESRI). Qatar University Doha, Qatar May 2014.

Qatar economy. (2010). Economy Watch. 29 June 2010.

Qatar focusing on knowledge-based society: Attiyah, Gulf Times. 29 Oct. 2014.

Qatari backing for extremist preachers and anti-Semitic incitement. ADL. 10 April, 2018 https://www.adl.org/blog/qatari-backing-for-extremist-preachers-and-anti-semitic- incitement

Qatar’s identity crisis: Choosing prosperity over culture. (2011). Doha News. 3 July 2011.

Qatar’s Sheikha Moza: Arabs who lose their language lose their identity. (2016). Doha News. 21 Jan. 2016.

“Qatar”. The American Foreign Policy Council’s World Almanac of Islamism. (2017)

Queenan, M. (1988). Questions about teacher research: a review. The English Journal. 77(2), 41-46.

Qureshi, Y. (1982). Gulf Cooperation Council. Pakistan Horizon 35(4), The Middle East (Fourth Quarter 1982), 82-94.

Qutb, S. (1964/2000). Milestones. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform.

273

https://www.amazon.com/Milestones-Sayed-Qutb/dp/817231244X

Raddawi, R. and D. Meslem. (2015). Loss of Arabic in the UAE: Is Bilingual Education the Solution? International Journal of Bilingual & Multilingual Teachers of English. 3(2), 85-94.

Ramazani, N. (1985). Arab women in the Gulf. Middle East Journal 39(2), 258-276.

Reichertz, J. (2014). Induction, Deduction, Abduction. In: Flick, U. The Sage Handbook of Qualitative Data Analysis. http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781446282243.n9

Reed, S. (2013). Qatar pushes for a larger role on the global stage. The New York Times. 6 Jan. 2013.

Report: hold the oil, pass the books. Doha News. 18 March 2012.

Rich, S. and Troudi, S. (2006). Hard times: Arab TESOL Students’ Experiences of Racialization and Othering in the United Kingdom. TESOL Quarterly 40(3), 615- 627.

Richards, K. (2003). Qualitative Enquiry in TESOL. Basingstoke: Palgrave.

Richards, J. & Farrell, T. (2005). Professional Development for Language Teachers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Ritz, A. (2010). International Students and Transformative Learning in a Multicultural Formal Educational Context. The Educational Forum 74(2), 158-166.

Rodinson, M. (1979). The Arabs. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

Romani, V. (2009). “The Politics of Higher Education in the Middle East: Problems and Prospects.” Middle East Brief. Crown Center for Middle East Studies. Brandeis University. Massachusetts. 15 Dec 2011.

Romanowski, M. H. and Nasser, R. (2012a). Critical thinking and Qatar’s Education for a New Era: negotiating possibilities. International Journal of Critical Pedagogy 4(1), 118-134.

Romanowski, M. H. and Nasser, R. (2012b). How critical thinking is taught in Qatari independent schools’ social studies classrooms: teachers’ perspectives. International Journal of Education 4(1), 68-92.

Rossman, G.B. and Rallis, S.F. (2003). Learning in the Field: An Introduction to the Field of Qualitative Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

Rostron, M. and Evans, C. (2007). Optimising student development through co- curricular activities in a post-secondary academic setting in Qatar. Proc. of the 2007

274

Gulf Conference, University of Exeter, UK, 4-7 July 2007. Unpublished.

Rostron, M. (2009a). Liberal Arts education in Qatar: intercultural perspectives. Intercultural Education 20(3). 219–229.

Rostron, M. (2009b). Pilot study: students’ reading experiences in the English Literature course in the ABP. DRC course paper. The University of Manchester. Unpublished.

Rostron, M. (2009c). Qatar Foundation: działalność i modele edukacji. In: Katarzyna Górak-Sosnowska and Robert Czulda (Eds.). Państwo Katar: Gospodarka, Polityka, Kultura (The State of Qatar: Economy, Politics, Culture). Łódź, Poland: Ibidem. 155- 164.

Rostron, M. (2010). Small cultures, big issues: classroom cultures in the ABP English Academic Composition course. ISS course paper, The University of Manchester. Unpublished.

Rostron, M. (2011). Reading Kafka in Qatar. Proc. of the Qatar-TESOL Conference, April 8-9, 2011, Doha, Qatar. Unpublished.

Rostron, M. (2014). Exploring identity of non-native teachers of English through narratives of their experience. In: Paul Breen (Ed.). Cases on Teacher Identity, Diversity, and Cognition in Higher Education. London: IGI Global. 140-170.

Rostron, M. (2016). A cultural Other in transnational education: impact of globalization on student and teacher identities. In: Leslie Seawright and Amy Hodges (Eds). Learning Across Borders: Perspectives On International And Transnational Higher Education. 1st ed. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. 193-215.

Rostron, R. J. (2012). Internationalism on the Evolution of the Vernacular. Manchester School of Architecture. BA Dissertation. Unpublished.

Rugh, W.A. (2004). Arab Mass Media: Newspapers, Radio, and Television in Arab Politics. 1st ed. Praeger 61, 72.

Said, E. (1978/2003). Orientalism. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Said, E. (1993). Culture and Imperialism. London: Chatto and Windus.

Schiellerup, P. (2008). Stop Making Sense: The Trials and Tribulations of Qualitative Data Analysis. Area, Vol. 40(2), 163-171.

Seeman, M. (1975). Annual Review of Sociology 1(1975), 91-123.

Seidman, R. (2006). Interviewing as Qualitative Research. New York: Teachers College Press.

275

Shadid, W. and van Koningsveld, P.S. (Eds.). (2002). Religious Freedom and the Neutrality of the State: The Position of Islam in the European Union. Leuven: Peeters, 174-196.

Shaw, J. J. (2008). Emmanuel Levinas on the Priority of Ethics: Putting Ethics First, Cambria Press.

Shayegan, D. (1992). Cultural Schizophrenia. Islamic Societies Confronting the West. Transl. J. Howe. London: Saki Books.

Shenoda, M. M. (2007). Displacing Dhimmī, maintaining hope: unthinkable Coptic representations of Fatimid Egypt. International Journal of Middle East Studies 39(4), 587-606.

Shenton, A. K. (2004). Strategies for ensuring trustworthiness in qualitative research projects. Education for Information 22 (2004), 63–75.

Sherry, M., Thomas, P. and Chui, W. H. (2010). “International Students: A Vulnerable Student Population.” Higher Education. 60(1), 33-46.

Siegel, R. (2013). Instead of sending students abroad, Qatar imports U.S. colleges. NPR. National Public Radio, Inc. https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2013/12/24/256874173/instead-of-sending- students-abroad-qatar-imports-u-s-colleges

Smart, J. and Altorfer, F. (1999). Gulf Arabic. Abingdon, Oxon, UK: Teach Yourself Books.

Smith, K. (2009). Transnational teaching experiences: an under-explored territory for transformative professional development. International Journal for Academic Development, 14(2), 111-122.

Snoj, J. (2013). Population of Qatar by nationality. BQ Magazine. Business in Qatar and beyond. 18 Dec. 2013.

Sobh, R., Belk, R., and Gressell, J. (2010). The scented winds of change: Conflicting notions of modesty and vanity among young Qatari and Emirati women. Advances in Consumer Research 37. Association for Consumer Research, 905-907.

Sonbol, A. El-Azhary. (ed.). (2012) Gulf Women. Doha, Qatar: Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation Publishing.

Sowden, C. (2005). Plagiarism and the culture of multilingual students in higher education abroad. ELT Journal 59(3): 226-233.

Sparking debate, SEC to offer vouchers to Qataris who wish to attend private schools.

276

(2012). Doha News. 29 July 2012.

Spivak G. C. (1985). The Rani of Sirmur: An essay in reading the archives. History and Theory 24(3), 247-272.

Spivak, G. C. (1988). Can the subaltern speak? In: Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture. Nelson, C. and Grossberg, L. (eds.) Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press, 271-315.

Spradley, J. and McCurdy, D. (1972). The Cultural Experience: Ethnography in a Complex Society. Chicago: Science Research Associates.

Stake, R. (2005). Qualitative case studies. In: Denzin, N.K. and Lincoln, Y. S. (eds.). The Sage Handbook of Qualitative Research. 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, Ca: Sage, 1-35.

Stake, R. E. (2010). Qualitative Research: Studying How Things Work. New York, NY: The Guilford Press.

Stanfield, D. A. (2014). International Branch Campuses: Motivation, Strategy, and Structure. Dissertation. Boston College Lynch School of Education. http://hdl.handle.net/2345/bc-ir:103560

Stasz, C., E. R. Eide, F. Martorell. (2007). Post-Secondary Education in Qatar: Employer Demand, Student Choice and Options for Policy. Santa Monica: RAND Corporation.

Staszak, J-F. (2008). Other/otherness. International Encyclopedia of Human Geography. Elsevier.

Staat, W. (1993). On abduction, deduction, induction, and the categories. Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society 29, 225-237.

Stenbacka, C. (2001). Qualitative research requires quality concepts of its own. Management Decision 39(7), 551-555.

Stephens, M. (2015a). Is Qatar becoming the new Dubai? Open Democracy. opendemocracy.net. 6 April 2015.

Stephens, M. (2015b). Migrant crisis: Why the Gulf states are not letting Syrians in. BBC Middle East. 7 Sep. 2015.

Sunnis and Shia in the Middle East. (2013). BBC. 19 Dec. 2013.

Survey: western education erodes Qatari culture. (2011). The Peninsula. 15 May 2011.

Syed, Z. (2003). The sociocultural context of English language teaching in the Gulf. TESOL Quarterly 37(2), 337-341.

277

Szyliowicz, J. S. (1973). Education and modernization in the Middle East. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press.

Taida-Drózd, I. (2004). Życie codzienne w Abu Zabi (Daily Life in Abu Dhabi). Warszawa, Poland: Wydawnictwo Akademickie DIALOG.

Tasch, B. (2015). The 23 richest countries in the world. Business Insider. 13 July 2015.

Tatarkiewicz, W. (1976/1991). O Doskonałości (About Perfection). Warszawa, Poland: PWN.

Taylor, C. (1994). Interpretations and the sciences of man. In: Martin, M. and L. C. McIntyre (Eds.). Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science. Cambridge, Mass. US: MIT Press 183.

Teichler, U. (2004). The Changing Debate on Internationalization of Higher Education. Higher Education. 48(1), 5-26.

Telafici, M., M. Martinez and M. Telafici (2014). East of West: rearguing the value and goals of education in the Gulf. The Journal of General Education 63(2-3), 184-197.

Tellis, A. (2014). Some thoughts on Education for Leadership and Innovation. The Journal of General Education, 63(2-3), 152-160.

The Oxford Dictionary of Islam. (2003). Ed. J. L. Esposito. Oxford: OUP.

The other Wahhabi state. The Economist. 2 June 2016

The Evolving Ruling Bargain in the Middle East. (2013). Summary Report CIRS. Georgetown University, SFS-Q.

Thesiger, W. (1990). Oxford: OUP. Arabian Sands. London: Collins. In: Hanbury- Tenison, R. (2005). The Oxford Book of Exploration Oxford: OUP.

Tibawi, A.L. (1964). English-speaking Orientalists: A critique of their approach to Islam and Arab nationalism. Islamic Quarterly 8 (1964), 25-45.

Tibawi, A.L. (1972). Islamic Education: Its Traditions and Modernisation into the Arab National Systems. London: Luzac & Company Ltd.

Top ten oldest universities in the world: ancient colleges. (2009). collegestats.org. Dec. 2012.

Toohey, K. (2008). Ethnography and language education. In: King, K.A. and Hornberger, N. H. (eds.). Encyclopedia of Language and Education, 2nd ed. Volume

278

10: Research Methods in Language and Education, 177-187.

Toumi, H. (2010). Qatar women work to change tradition. Gulf News (Qatar). 23 Dec. 2010.

Toumi, H. (2011). Public sector in Qatar to get 60 per cent pay rise. Gulf News (Qatar). 7 Sep. 2011.

Travis, R. (1986). On powerlessness and meaninglessness. The British Journal of Sociology 37(1), 61-73.

Triandis, H.C. (2002). Odysseus wandered for 10, I wondered for 50 years. In: W. J. Lonner, D. L. Dinnel, S. A. Hayes, & D. N. Sattler (Eds.). Online Readings in Psychology and Culture. Unit 2, Chapter 1, Center for Cross-Cultural Research, Western Washington University, Bellingham, Washington, USA.

UAE, Qatar have highest expat ratio in GCC: Saudi Arabia has lowest expat ratio. Emirates News 24/7. 11 Sep. 2013.

Upton, A. (2018). The Othering of Muslim Women by Western and Eastern Societies. Honors Thesis. University of Colorado, Boulder. Spring 2018.

Use of Arabic in schools in Qatar deemed inadequate. (2012). The Peninsula. 29 April 2012.

Van der Vliet, J. (2009). The Copts: 'Modern Sons of the Pharaohs'? Church History and Religious Culture 89(1/3). Religious Origins of Nations? The Christian Communities of the Middle East, 279-290.

Varisco, D. M. (2008). Reading Orinetalism: Said and the Unsaid. Seattle and London: University of Washington Press.

Versi, M. (2015). It’s time the media treated Muslims fairly. The Guardian. 23 Sep. 2015.

Walker, L. (2014). Qatar Foundation reminds staff to dress respectfully. Doha News. 27 May 2014.

Walker, L. (2015). Report: Qatar ranks in bottom 10 of education index, but shows potential. Doha News. 14 May 2015.

Walker, L. (2016). Qatar cabinet gives nod to new Arabic language law. Doha News. 11 Feb. 2016.

Walker, L. and Sheble, R. (2016). Qatar University mandates Arabic for staff meetings and emails. Doha News. 6 Nov. 2016.

279

Wals, A.E.J. and Jickling, B. (2002), Sustainability in higher education. International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education 3(3), 221 – 232.

Warraq Ibn (2007). Defending the West: A Critique of Edward Said’s Orientalism. Amherst, New York: Prometheus Books.

Wasserman, G. (2017). The Doha Experiment: Arab Kingdom, Catholic College, Jewish Professor. New York: Skyhorse Publishing.

Watson-Gegeo, K.A. (1988). Ethnography in ESL: Defining the Essentials. TESOL Quarterly 22(4), 575-592.

Weber, A. (2011a). Politics of English in the Arabian Gulf. First International Conference on Foreign Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics. May 5-7, Sarajevo, 60-66.

Weber, A. (2011b). The role of education in knowledge economies in developing countries. Procedia Social and Behavioral Sciences. 15 (2011), 2589–2594

Weber, M. (1978). Class, status, party. In: Roth, G. (ed.) Economy and Society, University of California Press.

Westernisation biggest threat. The Peninsula. 7 Oct. 2006.

Wheeler, D. (2012). American Academics Need Cultural Humility. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 22 May 2012.

White, J., Drew, S. and Hay, T. (2009). Ethnography versus case study. Qualitative Research Journal 9(1), 18-27.

Whitaker, B. (2010). Persian Gulf? Arabian Gulf? One Big Gulf in Understanding. The Guardian. 27 Oct. 2010.

Whitehead, T. L. (2005). Basic classical ethnographic research methods: secondary data analysis, fieldwork, observation/participant observation, and informal and semi‑structured interviewing. Ethnographically Informed Community and Cultural Assessment Research Systems (EICCARS) Working Papers Series. CEHC: Cultural Ecology of Health and Change. 17 July 2005.

Widavsky, B. (2010). The Great Brain Race. How Global Universities are Reshaping the World. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Wickens, G.M. (1980). Arabic Grammar: A First Workbook. Cambridge: CUP.

Wilkins, S. and Huisman, J. (2012). “The International Branch Campus as

280

Transnational Strategy in Higher Education.” High Education 64, 627-645.

Williams, L. (2014). Inside Doha, at the heart of a GCC dispute. The National. 19 March 2014.

Winslow, L. A. & Winslow, K. S. (2014). Ezra's holy seed: Marriage and othering in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. Journal of Communication and Religion 37(3), 44 – 62.

Woodworth, A. (2014). Exporting acting curricula from the Midwest to the Mideast: Seriously? The Journal of General Education. 63(2-3), 138-151.

Wright, C. (2013). Mapping Qatar’s Many State-Owned Funds. Sovereign Wealth Center. Sovereign Investor Institute. 6 June 2013.

Yang, R. (2003). Globalization and Higher Education Development: A Critical Analysis. International Review of Education 49(3/4), 269-291.

Yin, R. (1994). Case Study Research. Design and Methods. Thousand Oaks: Ca: Sage Publications.

Zaky, A. (2012). Is Bedouin heritage still engraved in Qatari Badu? Qatar Culture Club. http://qatarcultureclub.blogspot.qa/2012/10/is-bedouin-heritage-still-engraved-in.html

Zarnett, D. (2008). Review: Defending the West: A Critique of Edward Said’s Orientalism, by Ibn Warraq. Demokratiya. (Spring 2008), 50-61.

Zevallos, Z. (2011). What is Otherness? The Other Sociologist, 14 Oct. 2011.

281

Appendices

Appendix 1: ABP entry requirements

282

Appendix 2: Sample syllabus (Academic English: Composition)56

Academic Composition 1 Fall Syllabus 2012 - 2013

Course Number: 211 Name: Mrs Magda Rostron Course Credit: 3 Email: [email protected] Classroom Number: B012 Office: B129 Class Time: S, T, Th 1,2, 4 Telephone: 44542159

Course Description and Goals: This class is an introduction to freshman composition and rhetoric with added emphasis on editing and error correction. Selected essays will be assigned as readings and will serve as models and as idea generators. Writing assignments will focus on several rhetorical modes. Students will be guided to experience writing as a process while working to improve their composition and editing skills. The main purpose of this course is to transition students away from viewing writing in English as a discrete skill. Instead students are guided towards producing writing that is carefully edited, thoughtful, and content rich.

Course Objectives:

 Introduce students to a variety of rhetorical modes  Allow students to strengthen their grammar and sentence structure usage by focusing on proofreading and editing skills  Provide readings to be used as idea generators and as potential written sources

Learning Outcomes:

By the end of the semester students will be able to:  Locate and correct many of their own grammar-based errors  Write cohesive and coherent academic essays that are organized according to relevant essay formats such as comparison/contrast, definition, argument, etc.  By the end of the semester, produce well-developed essays of at least 1000 words  Paraphrase, summarize, and quote from sources using MLA citation style  Revise using multiple drafts  Produce well-supported paragraphs by including specific details  Meet expectations of due dates, manage multiple assignments, take responsibility for own learning

56 Including teacher’s Special Policies (sample)

283

Materials: McWhorter, Kathleen. Successful College Writing 4th Ed. Boston: Bedford St. Martin’s, 2010. Hacker, Diana, Rules for Writers 6th ed. Boston: Bedford St. Martin’s, 2008. Means of Assessment: Students will receive three grade reports during the semester, each one at the end of a five week teaching block. The three grades are not cumulative; each one is a separate grade awarded for work done in that particular 5 week block. The following grading system is used to calculate the grade. . Participation ...... 20% . Class assignments ...... 20% . Essays ...... 40% . Journal ...... 40% . Total ...... 100% The percentage achieved is used to calculate a grade at the end of each of the 5 weeks. Each of these three grades contributes 28% to the overall final semester grade, with the final examination in worth 16%. The final semester grade is an average of the three grades plus the final examination grade.

Marking Periods:

First grading 5 Weeks—August 12- 28% period September 20

Second grading 5 Weeks—September 23- 28% period October 25

Third grading 5 Weeks—November 4 – 28% period December 6

Final Exam December 9 - 12 16%

Total 100%

Assessment and Evaluation:

Students are assessed by a variety of instruments, procedures, and methods such as:  Informal teacher observation  Teacher-generated quizzes and tests  Student-written responses/essays  In-class performance assessment  Student self-assessment such as drafting, error correction, peer review

284

Special Policies for Teaching and Learning:

. You are expected to come to class on time. Repeated tardiness may negatively affect the final grade. Any work or quizzes missed due to lateness will result in a zero grade and cannot be made up. . If you miss 25% or more of the classes for this course, you risk failing the course. Attendance in all classes is essential for satisfactory completion of the course. PLEASE, NOTE THE FOLLOWING:

1. Absence does not justify coming to your next class unprepared.

2. If you are absent – even if your absence is excused – it is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY to find out what was done in the class you missed and what homework and/or preparation is expected for the next class.

3. Thus, failure to collect and complete handouts/worksheets, etc., done during the class you missed, BEFORE your next class, will affect your grade. It may result in a “0” (zero) for the assignment.

. Late delivery of course assignments will NOT BE ACCEPTED. Deadlines for assignments are non-negotiable. Written assignments (except for writing done in class) should be typed, printed out, and brought in to class when they are due (not emailed). All written assignments have to be correctly formatted (MLA). Unless otherwise requested, incorrectly formatted or handwritten assignments will not be accepted. You will be required to present at least 20 pages (double-spaced, Times New Roman 12) of writing this semester and no fewer than 4 major essays.

. Participation means attending regularly, coming to class on time and prepared, with the required materials and completed homework and other assignments, taking part in class discussions and other activities and exercises.

. You are reminded of the academic integrity policy of the ABP expressed and confirmed through the honour pledge. All coursework submitted during the semester should reflect your own work. If you consult outside sources for additional information, you MUST cite these sources according to the MLA style. In case of questions or queries regarding academic integrity issues, be sure to ask your professor for guidance.

. Mobile phones are to be switched off or put on “silent” in class.

285

Appendix 3: ABP consent to my research

286

Appendix 4: Participant Information Sheet and Participant Consent Form for Initial Questionnaire (Q1)

Experiencing education as a cultural other: Qatari students on an English preparatory course for US/UK universities

Participant Information Sheet (for Student Participants)

You are being invited to take part in a research study as part of my PhD. Before you decide it is important for you to understand why the research is being done and what it will involve. Please take time to read the following information carefully and discuss it with others if you wish. Please ask if there is anything that is not clear or if you would like more information. Take time to decide whether or not you wish to take part. Thank you for reading this.

Who will conduct the research?

Magdalena Rostron

 School of Education, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL, UK  English Faculty, Academic Bridge Program, PO Box 24404, Education City, Doha, Qatar.

Title of the Research

Experiencing education as a cultural other: Qatari students on an English preparatory course for US/UK universities

What is the aim of the research?

My aim is to explore Qatari students’ educational experiences on an English course in the ABP as they prepare to enter American or British universities in Qatar or abroad. I want to find out what they think and how they feel about those experiences.

Why have I been chosen?

I wish to conduct the research with male and female Qatari students who attended local independent schools before coming to the ABP.

What would I be asked to do if I took part?

You will be asked to answer an initial questionnaire with factual questions regarding your educational background (e.g. nationality, gender, type of school attended, experience of English-language education). It will take approximately 15-20 minutes to complete.

287

If you agree to take part in further research activities over the course of one academic year, there may be 1 or 2 additional questionnaires with open-ended questions concerning your educational experiences in the ABP, taking about 20-30 minutes each to complete. Also, I will ask you to agree to participate in 2-4 short scheduled observations of your English class conducted by me at pre-arranged times, 20-25 minutes each.

Finally, you may also be asked if you would be willing to take part in one or two individual semi-structured interviews exploring further selected points from the questionnaires. Each interview may last from 30 to 45 minutes, but participation would be entirely voluntary. If you agree to be interviewed, I may ask you questions about your experience of learning English in your previous school, about (on a recorder or in writing) your experiences in the ABP, and about your academic aspirations and plans for the future. You can decline to answer any question. With your permission, I will record and transcribe all or parts of the interview, and ask you to read the transcript and/or my notes to check if you agree with my account of what you said. If you do not agree, you may change or delete anything you wish, without giving a reason. The focus group meetings and interviews will be arranged in a way that is convenient for each participant and can be rescheduled if necessary. You will not be asked to discuss any topic or answer any question you do not want to. You may also stop the interview or leave the focus group discussion at any time, without giving a reason.

What happens to the data collected?

The data will be uploaded to and stored on my encrypted personal computer at my home in anonymised form. No-one has access to it except for me. An anonymised transcript will be printed and used for analysis, which will be carried out at my home. When I am not working on them, all documents relating to the study will be stored in a locked cabinet.

How is confidentiality maintained?

No-one will have access to the data except for me and my PhD supervisors (in anonymous form), and you, if you request it. To preserve anonymity, names will be changed where data are quoted directly in the text of my dissertation. Any audio recordings and/or interview notes will be destroyed after my dissertation is finished.

What happens if I do not want to take part or if I change my mind?

It is up to you to decide whether or not to take part in each research activity as they will be conducted separately. If you do decide to take part you will be given this information sheet to keep and be asked to sign a consent form. If you decide to take part in future research activities related to my study (as described above) you are still free to withdraw at any time without giving a reason and without detriment to yourself (in other words, it will have no bearing on course assessment).

What is the duration of the research?

If you agree to participate in the initial activity (Questionnaire 1), your part will include answering several simple questions about your previous educational experiences at school, which will take approximately 15-20 minutes.

288

If you agree to take part in further research activities, 1 or 2 more questionnaires will be conducted (20-30 minutes each). Then, if you are willing to continue with more activities, 2-4 pre-arranged classroom observations of 20-25 minutes each, and one or two interviews of 30-45 minutes each. All this will take place during the academic year when you study in the ABP. A separate Participant Information Sheet and Participant Consent Form will be provided with each activity.

Where will the research be conducted?

The initial questionnaire will be conducted in your classroom.

The rest of the study will be conducted in the classrooms, in the LAS building, and the surrounding environment. Interviews will take place in my office, B129, LAS building, during breaks or after classes.

Will the outcomes of the research be published?

Parts of this study may be published in academic books or journals and the study will also be publicly available in The University of Manchester library, but all data provided will be used anonymously. You can contact me at the Academic Bridge Program, LAS Building, Education City, Doha, office number B129, office telephone: 44542159, or at [email protected]

Contact for further information

Please contact me at the Academic Bridge Program, LAS Building, Education City, Doha, office number B129, office telephone: 44542159, or at [email protected]

If you want to make a formal complaint about the conduct of the study please contact the Head of the Research Office, Christie Building, University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester, M13 9PL.

What if something goes wrong?

Please contact me at the Academic Bridge Program, LAS Building, Education City, Doha, office number B129, office telephone: 44542159, or at [email protected].

Also, I would like to encourage you to discuss any concerns related to my research and your role in it with your ABP academic advisor, the ABP counsellor, one of the English Department supervisors, and/or the ABP Academic Director.

If there are any issues regarding this research that you would prefer not to discuss with the researcher, please contact the Research Practice and Governance Co-ordinator by either writing to 'The Research Practice and Governance Co-ordinator, Research Office, Christie Building, The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL', by emailing: [email protected], or by telephoning 0161 275 7583 or 275 8093.

289

Experiencing education as a cultural other: Qatari students on an English preparatory course for US/UK universities

CONSENT FORM

If you are happy to participate please complete and sign the consent form below.

Please, initial the box.

1. I confirm that I have read the attached information sheet on the above study and have had the opportunity to consider the information and ask questions and had these answered satisfactorily.

2. I understand that my participation in the study is voluntary and that I am free to withdraw at any time without giving a reason.

3. I understand that the interviews may be audio-recorded.

4. I agree to the use of anonymous quotes from my comments made in questionnaires, focus group’s discussions and scheduled interviews and observations, in the thesis resulting from this research.

5. I agree that any data collected may be published in anonymous form in academic books or journals.

I agree to take part in the above project.

Name of Date Signature participant Name of Date Signature person taking consent

290

Appendix 5: Questionnaire Q1 (ABP student background information) # Question Answer

1 Nationality a 1 Gender Male Female b 1 School you went to School Language c (name and national affiliation, e.g. Qatari, American, British, Lebanese, etc.) and language of instruction (English or Arabic)

1 Type of school you went Co-educational = Segregated = only d to: co-educational or boys and girls boys or only girls segregated together

1 Level in the ABP (circle F1 F2 Acade e the right answer) mic

1 Planned major/university f

2 What does “independent I don’t know. study” mean?

3 What does “plagiarism” I don’t know. mean?

4 In your English classes at school, did you have to Yes / No / I don’t know use and cite sources for writing? Circle one answer.

5 What kinds of English writing: exercises; paragraphs; essays homework and class reading: short texts in textbooks; articles; stories; assignments did you novels; poems have at school? Circle all doing individual or group research projects answers that apply. class presentations

other: ......

291

6 Did you get feedback on your homework and class assignments from your teachers? If so, what kind of feedback was it? 7 Comment on your English a) reading skills (are you good at reading in English; do you like it; do you need to improve your reading skills; etc.) b) writing skills (are you good at writing in English; do you like it; do you need to improve your writing skills; etc.) c) speaking skills (are you good at speaking in English; do you like it; do you need to improve your speaking skills; etc.) 8 Are you happy about having to study in English? Why? Why not?

9 Are you comfortable about having to study in a co-educational environment, with male and female students together?

1 Why did you decide to 0 study in the ABP? What do you want to achieve here?

Any other comments:

292

Appendix 6: Questionnaire 2 (for student informants)

Question Answer #

1 In your view, what are some positive aspects (good sides) of studying English in the ABP as compared to your previous school?

2 In your view, what are some negative aspects (bad sides) of studying English in the ABP as compared to your previous school?

3 Comment on how you are adjusting to co-education.

4 Comment on how you are adjusting to the academic integrity rules.

5 Comment on how you are adjusting to having to study independently.

6 What is your overall experience of studying English in the ABP so far?

Additional comments regarding your educational experience in the ABP:

293

Appendix 7: Teacher/administrator interview questions Teachers: In general terms, what are your perceptions of your students’ experiences on your English course/s (behaviour in class, interactions with other students and yourself as their teacher, participation in class, responses to academic tasks, problems/successes studying in English, future university plans)?

Supporting questions:

1. How do your students seem to cope with the co-educational environment of the ABP? 2. How have they adjusted to academic integrity? 3. Do they successfully manage independent study? Why/why not? 4. How do they respond to teacher feedback? 5. How do you see their English skills? What do you consider to be their major successes/problems or strengths/weaknesses in your English course? What aspects of the ABP/your course/your classroom/ your teaching do they seem to respond to positively/negatively? 6. What are their motivations and plans for university?

Administrators: In general terms, what are your perceptions of this year’s students’ experiences in the ABP (behaviour, interactions with other students and other ABP staff, participation in activities, academic progress, problems/successes studying in English, future university plans)?

Supporting questions: 1. How do students seem to cope with the co-educational environment of the ABP? 2. How have they adjusted to academic integrity? 3. Do they successfully manage independent study? Why/why not? 4. How do they respond to teacher feedback? 5. What do you consider to be their major successes/problems or strengths/weaknesses in the ABP? What aspects of the ABP environment do they seem to respond to positively/negatively? 6. What are their motivations and plans for university?

294

Appendix 8: My notes from purposeful conversation with ABP administrators “Alia” and written answers from “Fatma” (her own writing)

Alia’s comments on independent schools (Dec 2012), as noted by me

Situation of independent school teachers: apparent lack of engagement with students: inadequate training or no training; overworked; they mostly did not have time or inclination to engage with students on an individual level; no time for thorough preparation for lessons

She said: “there are no textbooks, so teachers are required to produce their own materials for each class” (usually downloading them from the Internet)

Very often no coordination between materials teachers were using (the same materials used several times, inappropriately, inaccurately, for example, for teaching at different levels). Alia: “it happened to me when another teacher used the same materials for a higher grade class” as what I used for the level below”

Also: weak or non-existent opportunities for professional development, esp. with teaching in English (many teachers not fluent)

Pressure to deliver exam results: “national benchmarks”; rushing to complete curriculum; overloaded teaching schedules

Another problem: students copying and pasting from the Internet, if homework done, then it gets full marks, nobody checks for plagiarism

Alia: “shoddy teaching, lack of materials and low discipline and motivation among students” – main difficulties, plus parents critical, want schools to have full responsibility for kids’ education, don’t want too much homework, family always a priority

In the ABP: absence of major discipline issues with students, BUT: “low student motivation was a common problem also in the ABP”. Still, situation in independent schools: “based on [her] experience, much worse” and affecting teacher motivation and job satisfaction.

Alia: “Why do you think so many teachers in Qatar leave this profession?” Alia, now in ABP – she herself became “desperate to work somewhere else”, was fed up with her school, that’s why she applied to the ABP (Director’s Special Assistant).

Doubts about the continuing school reform: good in essence, but not carried out effectively enough to improve education here, students pay the price for the state of education: disenchanted, demotivated (with poor education and low academic skills, esp. English)

295

Image 18: Sample page from Fatma’s written comments, with my analytical notes

296

Appendix 9: Email responses from two English teachers, Sara and Chris

Sara What are your perceptions of your students’ experience on your English course/s (in general terms: behaviour, attitude, skills, participation, background knowledge, academic self-awareness, responses to readings and other tasks

I'm going to respond in reference to my academic students only. The students are predominately female, which I think is fantastic for such a patriarchal society. The students behaviors, skills, knowledge, etc. vary dramatically. I have students with perfect attendance, and others who literally sit at Starbucks instead of attending class. I find few students have great self-confidence within the classroom, though they may appear incredibly confident and assured outside of the classroom. I think academic composition scares them a bit. Many have only ever written at the most 2 paragraphs in English, prior to entering ABP. Suddenly they are faced with having to write a proper essay. Likewise many have only ever copied information or summarized; few have ever had to write about themselves or share their opinions. Overall I find their written expression to be quite poor in terms of grammar with sentences that drag on and on. Also few are able to express themselves with precise and concise thoughts. In terms of participation, few of the females are comfortable with completing a task in front of classmates. Poor attendance was noted on the day students were required to complete an oral presentation in front of the class. Very few hands are raised when trying to elicit classroom conversation. However, each student is quite eager for one on one help, whether that is in my office, the English room, at the computers, or during independent work time during class. They seem to really desire that individual attention from the teacher. I can teach a concept to the class, such as how to draft a thesis statement, and some are actively engaged, others not so much. So when it comes time to write a thesis statement, not all are capable of applying what was just taught to their individual work. Yet they all want me to help them individually and "hold their hand" as they struggle to write. In terms of background knowledge, I find that students don't seem that knowledgeable about the world at large. For instance I was using a written piece by Muhammed Yunus as a focal point one day, and only 2 students (both male) had heard of him. I started explaining the concept of microloans and there was no recognition of this concept from the other students. If I contrast this with students at several of the previous schools where I have worked, they would not have necessarily known the name Yunus, but they certainly would have acknowledged what I was talking about as I mentioned phrases such as Grameen Bank, microfinancing, etc. as many of them ran community service organizations based on the very principle.

297

What do you think are their main academic strengths and weaknesses? Which ones may possibly be the result of previous schooling, family background, culture, other factors?

Academic strengths are certainly not in math. When I use a rubric and they ask how much it is out of, I suggest they do the math...5 criteria multiplied by 8 possible points...and they have no idea. Additionally, when I return an assignment with a score of 19/20, they don't understand why the percentage is not 99, because they only missed one point. I'm flabbergasted by their poor sense of all things mathematical. Additionally, I don't find their academic preparedness to be stellar. By that I mean that my students often come to class with a Blackberry and a pen. Nothing else. Well, perhaps a coffee from Starbucks. This contrasts greatly with former students I have taught who arrive with backpacks full of laptops, texts, folders, papers, water bottles, etc. Now in terms of strengths, I find some students to be quite committed to improvement in that they might turn in 5 drafts before they are satisfied with their score. Is that work and effort for a sense of personal satisfaction, or just for an improved number grade...I don't know.

How do your students seem to cope with the co-educational environment of the ABP?

What are your perceptions of your students’ approach to the issue of academic integrity?

Many have no idea that my definition and expectations of academic integrity exist. It is quite an eye opener when discussed at the beginning of the semester.

Do you find that your students successfully manage independent study

No. That's my short answer. One of the biggest struggles my students have faced is time management. They repeatedly find themselves in situations where they cannot manage all that is required of them by several subjects at once. In response, many give up, others just cry and cry, and others respond by working to succeed in only one or two classes and give up on the demands from the others. This is when I often find students skipping my class to prepare for a math test or a group project or something they did not take care of until the last minute. I suppose I should be thankful that they are honest enough with me to tell me the truth?

298

What are their major problems/successes in your course?

Their major success is that they now have self-confidence in their writing. They feel that they can write 3-4 page essays without the same level of fear and numbness as they felt at the beginning of the semester. That is not to say that their writing is "perfect", but at least they are putting words to the paper now, compared to months ago, when they would barely write a one paragraph response. The major problem they face is that I fear some of their errors are now fossilized and I cannot help them change their habits. This is particularly in response to grammar issues. Even though we have focused on specific grammar issues over and over, the errors continue.

What aspects of the ABP/your course/your classroom/ your teaching do they seem to respond to positively/negatively?

They certainly respond well to individual feedback. When I first used a rubric to grade their written work, they were appalled that I hadn't 'graded' their work. "But, Miss, there are no marks on my paper. How do I know what is wrong?". I had to explain how the rubric worked moving from basic to advanced in categories such as thesis/lead in, sentence fluency, grammar and mechanics, etc. I had to explain that if a score was low in the conclusion column, then the conclusion is what they needed to work on to improve. That was a foreign concept to them in terms of teacher feedback, yet they eventually seemed to grasp onto the concept.

What English skills do you think they have improved in your course?

Some students seem more comfortable using a broader range of vocabulary. Others are working on organizing their thoughts at the paragraph level. Initially, one paragraph could cover 5 different topics, and now they seem to understand patterns of organization in order to express those 5 ideas.

What English skills do you think they still need to improve most?

Students still need to improve on basic grammar and eliminating comma splices, for example. They don't seem to be so fearful of reading an article, for example, but I wouldn't say that active or strategic reading is something they enjoy or are even comfortable with.

299

Chris

1. What are your perceptions of your students’ experience on your English course/s (in general terms: behaviour, attitude, skills, participation, background knowledge, academic self- awareness, responses to readings and other tasks)?

In general, I have been pleased with my students at the ABP. They are very kind and respectful. Any behavioural problems are usually minor, such as talking/texting on their mobiles. My students usually participate in class and stay on task. Academically, the students are weak. They are seriously lacking critical thinking skills, and they have very poor reading and writing ability. They were not brought up in a reading culture, so academic work is very challenging for them. Additionally, the students can be lazy. They want everything handed to them and they are not independent learners. Lack of motivation is an issue that we constantly deal with. Unfortunately, due to the above factors, academic honesty is a common problem at the ABP.

Please, comment on all or any one of the questions below as you feel appropriate or relevant.

2. What do you think are their main academic strengths and weaknesses? Which ones may possibly be the result of previous schooling, family background, culture, other factors?

See response to #1.

3. How do your students seem to cope with the co-educational environment of the ABP?

4. What are your perceptions of your students’ approach to the issue of academic integrity?

Many students don’t take academic integrity seriously. Part of the problem is not understanding how serious it is, but some just don’t care. As mentioned above, if the students are always looking for the easiest way to get something done, academic dishonesty is appealing to them.

5. Do you find that your students successfully manage independent study?

Absolutely not. The students must be constantly guided and managed by the teacher. They frequently wait until right before the class to study or complete an assignment. Due to their lack of motivation, any type of learning on their own that goes beyond the lesson is very unusual.

300

6. What are their major problems/successes in your course?

I teach grammar courses and the students generally do well if they come to class and do the work. The major problem is that many times they aren’t able to apply what they learn in their other courses or in real life. They have many fossilized errors due to growing up in this culture, and it’s difficult for them to change.

7. What aspects of the ABP/your course/your classroom/ your teaching do they seem to respond to positively/negatively?

I think most students like studying at the ABP. They have a sense of freedom that they didn’t have in high school. Many students have told me that it was the best year of their lives. I think the social possibilities at the ABP have a lot to do with it. In my class they do not respond positively to the aspects of western education that they aren’t used, e.g. not being allowed to make up work without an excuse, higher expectations, etc. They do respond positively to my energy and enthusiasm. They also know that I genuinely care about them, and that makes them willing to participate in the class.

8. What English skills do you think they have improved in your course?

As it is a grammar class, I hope that their writing has improved. As we don’t teach integrated skills classes, it’s difficult to be sure. Overall, I would say that they have improved, but not to the extent that I would like.

9. What English skills do you think they still need to improve most?

Reading, writing, and critical thinking.

301

Appendix 10: List of selected presentations, papers and publications

Presentations and papers:  “Critical Thinking Skills” – panel presentation at the IAFOR Conference, Dubai, UAE, February 2017  “A Cultural Other in Transnational Education: Impact of Globalisation on Student/Teacher Identities”– panel presentation at the Liberal Arts International Conference, Texas A&M University, Doha, Qatar, February 2015  “An Experiential Approach to Teaching Academic Writing”– panel presentation at the MENAWCA Conference, College of the North Atlantic, Doha, Qatar, November 2012  “Arabic versus English: Language, Culture and Education in Qatari Students’ Learning Experiences” – paper presented at the Georgetown University Culture and Politics seminar, GU-Q, Doha, Qatar, September 2011  “Reading Kafka in Qatar” – paper presented at the LTE Researcher Conference, “From Here to There and Back Again”, Manchester Institute of Education, The University of Manchester, UK, June 2011  Academic Writing: Challenge, Inspiration, Engagement – poster presentation at the ETE-Q Conference, Carnegie Mellon University, Doha, Qatar, October 2010  Liberal Arts Education in Qatar – paper at the Intercultural Education Conference, Warsaw University, Warsaw, July 2008  Optimizing Arab Students’ Performance through Debating and MUN – co-authored paper at The Gulf 2007 Conference, the University of Exeter, Exeter, UK, July 2007  Culture and Academic Integrity – presentation at a series of working lunches on Cultural Perceptions of Plagiarism, Virginia Commonwealth University, Doha, Qatar, April 2007

302

Publications:  “Rethinking Critical Thinking in a Non-Western Educational Context.” In: Western Higher Education in Global Contexts. London: Lexington Books, 2018.  “A Cultural Other in Transnational Education: Impact of Globalization on Student and Teacher Identities.” In: Learning Across Borders. Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2015.  “Exploring identity of non-native teachers of English through narratives of their experience.” In: Cases on Teacher Identity, Diversity, and Cognition in Higher Education. London: IGI Global, 2014.  “Liberal Arts Education in Qatar: Intercultural Perspective”. Intercultural Education 20 (June 2009): 219-229.  “Qatar Foundation: działalność i modele edukacji.” In: Państwo Katar: Gospodarka, Polityka, Kultura (The State of Qatar: Economy, Politics, Culture), ed. K. Górak- Sosnowska and R. Czulda, Łódź: Ibidem, 2009.

303