Hazem Ghorab - Studying The Origins Of Our Issues In Order To Wipe Away Our Foot Prints

Poet Wendell Berry gave a speech where he talks about how we should resolve the ecological imprint caused by mankind. He speaks on how we should erase our ‘footprints’ by following these seven points:

·      . We should not work or think on a heroic scale, instead work on a scale that is limited to our capabilities.

·      . Damages done by industrialization cannot be fixed by more industrialization.

·      . We must move on, meaning that instead of just lingering on one issue that cannot be solved, we must move on and find other issues to solve.

·      . We must give up the notion that we are too good to do our own work. This statement is related to slavery and the abuse of workers. We shouldn’t let other humans do jobs that could also be done by us.

·      . Make locally adopted economies that are based on our local nature.

·      . Learn the sources that have caused these issues and learn how to solve and avoid them in the future.

·      . We must also understand that these measures are radical.

The main point that got my attention in this speech was the point about how we must give up the notion that we are too good to do our own work. The first thing that comes to mind is how workers are treated in the UAE. These workers are hired on low incomes and are forced to work extra hours just to get the job done; but the interesting thing about this is that these workers are not locals, instead they’re mostly Pakistani workers that have traveled from their original country with the notion that they will be making more money. After the hard work that these men do, it is very normal for the people to not like the outcome of their work without considering the hard work and extra-unpaid hours that has been contributed. The bottom line is that if we are not satisfied with a certain job that has been done, maybe we should be doing it ourselves since we seem to know more about it instead of throwing the blame on innocent hard workers who only follow the rules they’ve been given.

Furthermore, Wendell Berry talks about how we should learn the sources that have caused the issues. What I have noticed is that people usually linger around the issue thinking about how they should solve it for too long until the issue gets even worse. What people should do is just what Wendell Berry said, which is to study how this issue started so that in the future we can prevent it from happening again. A saying comes to mind that goes like “it’s too late to cry over spilled milk”, which was the case of the BP oil spill incident, the managers of BP wasted their time trying to get apologize to get the public’s approval when instead they could have found a solution for the problem they have caused and studied how they should prevent another spill.

Hazem Ghorab - Virtual Against Reality

In order for us to be distinguish between the virtual and the real communities we must first look at the factors that separate and connect them together. For instance, as a mean of communication, the virtual community lacks the communication attributes that are present in real communities like eye contact, body language, listening, etc., it depends more on the writing style in order to show the tone that the writer is intending to present.  

Also in virtual communities, the presence of the receiver is not necessary since time synchronization is not important (ex: emails, SMS, etc.). 

Physicality and space in real communities are essential, which gives it more authority where the communication can be more controlled. 

When it comes to Identity, real community is much more trust worthy because the receiver/sender is physically in front of you; but in the virtual community, identities can never be certain since the receiver on the other side does not have to show their true identity.

In today’s world, whether we like it or not, we are a part of two communities, a virtual and a real one. I for one am trying my best to keep a balance in both worlds in order to be part of the social agenda. But if I had to choose, I would stick with the virtual community, even though people will argue that it’s harder to communicate. That maybe so but what I have realized in virtual communities is that because of it’s unrestricted time and space, it has made staying in touch with people so much easier. I can easily communicate with a person on the other side of the world where the timing would be completely different and I don’t have to wear socially accepted attire for me to converse with that person.

Hazem Ghorab - Diaspora: A Journey To A Better Life Or A Fake One?

Diaspora is a term that is usually related to the migration of the Israelis to countries outside of Palestine. But what I’m referring to is the general concept of a group of people, that aren’t necessarily Israelis, leaving their countries to settle in a different place making them expats instead of locals. This migration could result from different reasons, whether it’s for better security, better labor, better lifestyle, or even just for the sake of leaving their own countries. The main reason why my family decided to leave their homeland (Egypt) and settle in the UAE was because they had this idea that raising their children in Egypt would not be safe and would not offer them the best education and lifestyle. This rationalization convinced my relatives to do the same thing, so my father’s brother and his wife and my mother’s sister and her husband decided to follow them. Today, I am sad to say that this was a failed diaspora; none of their intended goals were achieved, at least not the way my parents expected it to be. 

Through out my education years, my family and I have come to realize that there really isn’t anything special about the education in the UAE; sure they might have fancy names and are mostly American public schools, but the bottom line is their not that good. It turns out that education in Egypt is actually considered to be better and much more accredited than here. I’ve noticed that my cousins in Egypt that are of the same age as I am, are actually much more knowledgeable than me in mostly everything.  

As for my lifestyle, I’m close to loosing my Egyptian culture due to the diversity of the cultures around me. One would think that the United Arab Emirates has an Arabic culture; on the contrary, it’s actually as westernized as any other western country. So now I’m not just losing my Egyptian culture, but I’m also losing my Arabic culture, instead, I lean towards being an American than being an Arab.

These websites are related to my diaspora because of the following:

·      http://saraghorab.wordpress.com

I was glad to find a website that is created by a stranger that is in the same family tree as I am. Sara Ghorab is a Poet and a Philosopher, and in her website she talks about all the living issues of Egypt and the Egyptian people.

·      http://www.masrawy.com

A perfect website to stay in touch with my Egyptian side. It a website designed in a teenage friendly way by young adults. It talks about everything that is related to Egypt, whether its news, sports, films, books, etc., all in Arabic. When I visit this website, I feel like I’m an Egyptian again.

·      http://www.internations.org

An online community made for expats all around the world. It doesn’t matter whether the user is an Egyptian expat, Indian expat, Filipino expat, etc. the number one purpose for this website to connect all expats together around the world. 

Hanan Ahmed Ali - Egyptians in Saudi Arabia

What is Diaspora? Diaspora comes originally from the word disperse which means scattered. Diaspora is the scattering of people who come from the same country in another country. So I will be talking about the Egyptians dispersed or scattered in Saudi Arabia. Egypt is a poor country and the rates of the unemployment is high, so people choose to travel abroad to earn their living. In one of the articles I read that the top destinations for Egyptians are Saudi Arabia, compared to the rest of the Arabian Peninsula. Whenever I go for Umra I find a lot of Egyptians in Saudi Arabia more than any other country I’ve been to and this is why I chose Saudi Arabia to talk about. Talking about the strong relations between the two countries, in 1939, Egypt signed a construction agreement in Riyadh which Egypt implemented some construction projects in Saudi, which needed Egyptians to go and work for those companies. Geographically, it takes one hour to travel by plane from Egypt to Saudi Arabia. Egypt and Saudi share identical policies, which makes it easier for Egyptian expatriates to live there. When I thought about this topic, I asked my friend who lived and worked in Saudi for three years and she said that despite the strict rules and regulations they have in Saudi, she still felt herself at home, as there is a majority of Egyptians living in Saudi. In one of the articles it said that the last twenty years witnessed the exchange of numerous visits between the two countries, on all levels and it also said that the volume of Egyptian-Saudi inter-trade was estimated at $7.4 billion in 2008. This is the Egyptian Diaspora information I found interesting to share and would like to hear comments and would be grateful if anybody would like to share their experiences.

Refrences

http://www.npr.org/2011/01/31/133365410/Egyptians-Elsewhere-In-The-Middle-East

http://www.sis.gov.eg/en/LastPage.aspx?Category_ID=59

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Diaspora
http://www.masrawy.com/

Maha K. ElSalhy - Egyptian Diaspora

Diaspora, when I was asked to look for the meaning of this word it amazed me that the definition that kept appearing was always related to Jews. After research a bit more I gladly discovered that it is linked to Jews because they are almost the first Diaspora that still exists till this day. If you are still wondering what it means I will spare you the search just keep reading.

Now the direct meaning of the word Diasporas is a group of people that are living in a different country away from their homeland. LIKE ME! But this still doesn’t explain why it is always related to Jews in every dictionary that you cross by.

You know how those internet dictionaries capitalize your first letter when typing the word. That was the reason behind  the Jews reference, if you capitalize Diaspora then you are referring to Jews that were scattered after the destruction of their temple thousands of years ago and still are scattered all over the world trying to unite in the modern Israeli state. On the other hand if you don’t capitalize the first letter then you are talking about anyone who lives in a country that is not their homeland.

There are no synonyms for the word and if you ever type it in small letters dictionaries and websites do not identify it as a real word.

So for this research I was looking for three websites that are concerned with Egyptian Diaspora in U.A.E. amazingly while in the process I realized that there are almost 3.9 million Egyptians living abroad and this was in 2006. A huge number when you think about it. This is more than the population of Dubai. I am one of those 3.9 million. We used to leave our country simply because life there was extremely hard. Most of the people that leave their country do so to work. In my case it is slightly different my parents refuse to go back to Egypt simply because it is an unsafe, corrupted country that doesn’t feel like home. Same reasons the younger generations started a revolution. So a very good way to stay in touch with more Egyptians and feel like you are at home is through the internet.

First website that is mainly directed to the Egyptian Diaspora:

http://www.el-shella.com/

this is my favorite of all. Needs a new graphic designer to create a better layout to the website but other than that the content is great.

Second website:

http://myegy.com/

A very popular website among Egyptian. You can rarely pump into an Egyptian that has not come across this website

And finally my third website:

http://a7a.me/

a 7 a is interestingly a common expression used among the young generation to express their objection on a certain topic. This website shares the experiences of various Egyptians through posts ended with an a7a

Pavan Premaney__Imprinted

Before we explore the realms of mankind’s impression on the environment, we must first understand the meaning of Ecology. Ecology is the technical and scientific side of ‘environment’. It includes physiology, evolutionary biology and genetics.

What Berry pleads is that mankind’s activities takes an enormous toll on the ecology and most the times, it is not reversible. Mankind’s activities and lifestyle is severely destructive to the ecology and we need to make a change.

Berry sets an agenda to solve this crisis, an agenda which several people around the globe, adhere to.

 The 7-step agenda states,

1.     Start with the bare minimum. Don’t try to influence the world on the global scale.

2.     Correct the common error in thought, which states that industrialization, can be solved by industrialization.

3.     Learn the sources of our economic lives.

4.     We must learn the sources and costs of our own economic lives.

5.     We must learn that we need to clean up our own messes.

6.     Support local produces.

7.     This is a global issue and cannot be performed by any expert or politician alone.

He explains the fundamental steps to conserving our society and how simple it is to start going about it, if we just put in a small effort for the greater good. In this case, the rewards exceed the costs.

While all the steps in the agenda are important, one supersedes the rest. Step number 5, which explains our that we need to do our own work, I feel, is the most important. We need to focus on the fact that this ecological change is not concentrated on a handful of people in the society who are intellectually and financially strong, but instead, it is a societal effort. It will take a behavioural change in the mass of the people to achieve this. As Berry states, “ We must give up the notion that we are too good to do our own work, or clean up our own messes”.

In the end, it boils down to all the steps a regular household can take to make a small difference. And when these seeming small differences are clumped together, it can make a massive ecological impact for the better. 

below are some key points on how to make a small change: -

i)              Switching from incandescent light bulbs to florescent lights is an easy change, and very cost effective, as florescent bulbs require only a small fraction of how much a regular light bulb requires.

ii)             Turning up an Air Conditioner by just 3 degrees can save 1050 pounds of Carbon Dioxide from entering the atmosphere.

iii)           Travelling by just 18 km lesser per week in a car can prevent up to 900 pounds of Carbon Dioxide from entering the atmosphere. Other healthier options include walking or cycling.

iv)           Recycling just half of the aluminium, glass and paper waste of a household in a year can save 2,400 pounds of waste per year.

v)             A slightly more drastic change can be driving a hybrid car. It can save up to 5,600 pounds of Carbon Dioxide per year.

These are some of the most basic ways to make an impact. First, the general populous of the globe needs to adhere to this, then if they can, make more of an effort to making the environment and the ecology as a whole a safer haven for the future generations.

In an effort for extra research, I went looking for videos to better understand, and I stumbled upon this one, which is truly eye opening.

 Citation:

Mankind’s Ecological Imprint. By Wendell Berry. Ukiah Online Blog. 2011. Web. 5 May 2011. <http://ukiahcommunityblog.wordpress.com/2011/05/05/wendell-berry-on-mankinds-ecological-imprint/>

Asma Hinawi _ Syrian Diaspora

Syrian Diaspora

What is Diaspora: 

The term “Diaspora” is used to refer to the dispersion of religious or ethnic groups from their homelands, either forced or voluntary. The word is also used to refer to those people as a collective group and community” (Smith). What am going to take bout under the title of the term Diaspora is Syria Diaspora which means the Syrian communities out of their original country. 

Three website about Syrian Diaspora:

http://www.syria-news.com 

Syrianews is a mean of media that is related to Dash dot. This website launched in the begging of 2005. The main station of this website is in Damascus. This website is mainly about Syrian news and it publishes a lot of issues about Syrian population around the world.

http://www.family-help.com

This website is talking about the sex education. It also provides useful information about sexual relationship. Moreover, it affords tips of how we practice healthy sexual relations. Besides that, it has medical information that helps us to protect ourselves from harmful and unhealthy sexual relationships. I was really impressed by such a web site because we have very close mentality about such subject in Syria. Also, people do not take such information serious enough to make them an educational topic. What I liked the most about this website that it is supported by the ministry of health in Syria which make the information that the website provide very valid and trustful. 

http://www.souria.com/ar/about.asp

This website is about a huge Syrian community in the internet. It has members from all over the world. The main objectives for the website are:

To define the history of Syria 

To cover the Syrian social events

To provide maps for Syrian cities

This website also provides the historical and modern places in Syria and it considers one of the biggest travelling guide for Syria. Moreover, it represents the natural site   in Syria. In addition, it has its own magazine that discuses Syrian issue which also the members can purplish in it. 

Work cited

Smith, S.E. “What is a Diaspora.” Wise GEEK clear answers for common questions, wiseGEEK, 2003-2011. Web. 3rd june, 2011 &lt; www.wisegeek.com &gt;.

Pavan Premaney__FaceBook and Twitter Versus Coffee shops and Malls, The Real and Virtual Community disparity explored

The instances of Real versus Virtual are endless. But I don’t understand why so many people criticize the virtual community. The way I see it, if a person has the resources, the person has the best of both worlds.

The possibilities are practically limitless. You can get in touch with anyone in the world with just a click of a mouse. It is so simple and yet so complex. A virtual community lets you communicate with people around the world without the barrier of space or time. Technology has advanced so much, that now; you don’t even need to speak the same language. With the help of translation websites, that obstacle is as benign as the one of desktop computers. Perhaps the best part of being online is, you can access information from anywhere. And that is not an exaggeration. It’s a fact. With the use of Facebook and Twitter, you can speak with anyone, anytime, anywhere. And the best part is, it does not limit you to the people you know. You can follow, like and even contact influential people such as politicians, corporations and celebrities.

I honestly prefer Facebook and Twitter or coffee shops and malls. It’s perhaps the best way to socialize and get to know all you need to know about what’s happening right this very second. And that’s not all the Internet limits us to. Many websites have forums and Chat rooms too, so you can start up a conversation with someone who shares the same interests as you, and challenge them intellectually. In a situation, where you feel you need to mass communicate a certain message, an advertisement or even propagate a message, the internet is the best way to contact more people, than hitting the streets with a speakerphone and a cardboard sign. It is without a doubt, the better alternative.

Like I said before, the possibilities are truly limitless.

Asma Hinawi_ Human's Ecological footprint

How Can I save my Earth?

·         Summary for Wendell Berry's speech

According to Washington post national, a speech made by Wendell Berry “mankind’s ecological imprint”. Berry discussed in his speech about human footprint on earth and environment. Also, he stated that the effect of industrialization on not just the environment but also the ecology. 

Berry gave seven steps that people all over the world must follow; in order to, clean their foot prints up of the environment. These steps will help people on earth to fix the damages that been made by the industrialization. Berry in his speech was calling people to wake up and observe the effect of their squander of the environmental resources, and the result of their extreme usage of nature. Moreover, these seven steps that Berry confirmed in his speech are consider as a guide and start to clean the world from the remnants of industrialization.

·         Wendell Berry’s Agenda:

   First, we must not work or think on a heroic scale. In our age of global industrialism, heroes too lightly risk the lives of people, places and things they do not see. We must work on a scale proper to our limited abilities. We must not break things we cannot fix. There is no justification, ever, for permanent ecological damage. If this imposes the verdict of guilt upon us all, so be it.

Second, we must abandon the homeopathic delusion that the damages done by industrialization can be corrected by more industrialization. we must quit solving our problems by “moving on.” We must try to stay put and to learn where we are geographically, historically and ecologically. Fourth, we must learn, if we can, the sources and costs of our own economic lives.

   Fifth, we must give up the notion that we are too good to do our own work and clean up our own messes. It is not acceptable for this work to be done for us by wage slavery or by enslaving nature.

 Sixth, by way of correction, we must make local, locally adapted economies, based on local nature, local sunlight, local intelligence and local work.

  Seventh, we must understand that these measures are radical. They go to the root of our problem. They cannot be performed for us by any expert, political leader or corporation.

       My critique:

The ecological foot print is a measure of human demand on earth. Moreover, it is a standard measurement of a unit’s influence on its habitat based on consumption and pollution.Wendell Berry explained the slow crisis that is increasing each day. Based on people aggressive reaction toward natural resources, nature started to shrink and disappear while industrialization is taking its space. The first step on Berry agenda was “we must not think on a heroic scale” (mankind’s). If each person stared to improve their habits that might pollute the earth like smoking, and be responsible for his\her own mess our world will be cleaner. For example, people cannot just blame industry for producing unrecyclable plastic bag; in the other hand, they should blame themselves for buying the unrecyclable plastic bag. In his third point Berry stated, “solving our problems by “moving on.” We must try to stay put and to learn where we are geographically, historically and ecologically”. What Berry was referring to in the previous step is to start working on the solutions we put for the foot print problem instated of keeping these solutions on the paper, and that when he said “Moving on” (mankind’s). Moreover, Berry mentioned that “we must learn the cost of our own economic live”. People must not massively use the source, or use harmful component that pollute the environment. For example, “carbon emissions and rising concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere unless major changes are made in the way we produce and use energy” (Brown). As a result, “Many scientists agree that a doubling of atmospheric [CO.sub.2]*

 concentrations could have a variety of serious environmental consequences, including rising sea levels, more-turbulent weather, and an increased incidence of drought” (Brown). 

Berry confirming that people should use the amount they need from these harmful chemical components because the extraordinary usage of these components can result huge and serious polluting issues.

 Berry affirmed that people should start to think locally as he said “locally adapted economies, based on local nature, local sunlight, local intelligence and local work”. Locally adapted economic will help each nation and country to focus on what they have from natural resources and invest them, so each country will be able to be self-sufficient. In sequence, countries will no more need to import and export. As a result, people will not waste energy and fuel resources to ship goods from country to county. Moreover, people will not waste fuel resources for transportation. In addition, the risk of transportation means accident will decrease, so the pollution that arises from transportation accident will decrease as well.

Rina Al Mughni_Mankind's Ecological Imprint



Source: Google images,, The concept of ecological footprint   

 

             Wendell Berry is an academic, cultural and economic critic. Hence, listening to Wendell Berry's speech about "Mankind   Ecological Imprint" cannot help but make us think about several aspects that are related to ecology. These aspects might not concern people nowadays. Therefore, Berry strengthens his speech by using words to draw peoples' attention to environment and more particularly to ecology. According to the biology book" Natural Science for Today", ecology means" the branch of biology that studies the relationship between organisms and their environment" (Henry, p.56). In my opinion, ecology also means a combination of various systems that when put together to form a single complex structure creates the world. These systems consist of biotic and a-biotic elements. Moving on, focusing on Berry's speech about ecological imprint, we can deduce that his concern about ecology and how people have been causing it nothing but harm. As a result, he provides ways to stop that harm.  

             Berry starts his speech by mentioning the word ecology and how people must cooperate to adapt their environment and save it for a better future. For example, Berry said that" local adaptation does not work for a few financiers, and a few intellectual and political hotshots. This is work for everyone, requiring everybody’s intelligence" (Berry, 2011). Therefore, in order for people to live in a healthy ecology, they must all cooperate and share their intelligence and efforts without any exception. Accordingly, Berry provides people with several important ways that awake them from this distortedness, and encourage them to look after their environment. One of these aspects is to avoid thinking and behaving as heroes because they often risk people's lives by acting unconsciously. For instance, heroes often act as if they are the only ones alive. This is because they just want to satisfy themselves no matt what the consequences are. Even if it means that this hero is hurting the abilities of others and peoples' lives. Berry does not provide any justifications for peoples' damages, since they have the ability to think and choose how to behave. People should be more aware about ecology. This can be done by understanding the relationship between the people and their environment. Thus, once they know their risky effects on ecology, this opportunity can be taken advantage of in order to work to protect the environment from serious damages. For example, if people became aware about damages being done by their daily activities such as industrial, economical and other environmental activities, they will take into consideration the damages as serious problems that have to eventually be solved. Indeed, people must be aware that" damages being done by industrialization cannot be corrected by more industrialization"; however, by working to diminish the use of industrialization (Berry, 2011). This can be done if people study their geographic area, their history and their ecology. Having known these three aspects, people will become aware about damages they cause to ecology by comparing the current geographic area with the historical previous one. Therefore, they will detect the amount of damage that they have been adding to their valuable environment.

              Being aware about ecology and how much we have been affecting it negatively will make us feel guilty. Thus we should start changing our behaviors and attitudes that harm our innocent environment. People will think about environmental recourse they need and use them wisely without any action that could affect ecology. Also, people will become more aware about the importance of adapting their local economies and making a positive use of its factors which are local nature, local sunlight and local work.

                 In my opinion, Berry's speech about mankind's ecological imprint is such an important one because it provides us with awareness about ecology, which has been affected by humans since the beginning of industrial innovation. His speech calls for peoples’ attention to several aspects that help to save the ecology and create a better future.
Work Sited                                                                 
       Henry, Criss. "Definition of biology." Natural Science for Today. 7th ed. New

     York: n.p., 2010. 56. Print.       

                                    Mankind's Ecological Imprint. Berry, Wendell. The Washington Post, 5 May 2011. Web. 12 May 2011

   



Pavan Premaney__India-spora

NRI Stands for Non-Residential Indians. Breaking apart from the vast population of India, which exceeds 1.1 billion people, there are a millions more living abroad. Every 5^th person on earth an Indian. And many of them actually don’t reside in their homeland.

To recognize more about the Indian Diaspora, we need to first understand the real meaning of Diaspora. A Diaspora can be defined as a community of people in another country, with origins elsewhere. An example of the first Diaspora is of the Jewish. A root of a person’s heritage comes from dispersion of the people to an adopted country.

A few diverse sites I think would explain the Indian Diaspora more clearly are listed below.

• http://www.theindiansabroad.com/

            This website is a concise and informative website which establishes the role of the Indian community in foreign countries. The website serves as an online society for all the NRI’s who have a piece of their homeland in their hearts. Indians abroad speaks about social awareness, personal development, jobs and occupations abroad and in general about the Indian entertainment industry. Having read through the main aim of the editor and a few of the articles on the website, it is a great source of knowledge, tips on how to live abroad and how to keep in touch with your roots.

• http://republicofbrown.com/about/

            Being a media student, discussing the Indian entertainment and media industry is crucial and imperative. The Republic of Brown is a great source of information on how the Indian entertainment industry is affecting the western and even global entertainment industries. The editor explains,” Indians have taken things up a notch in the entertainment and lifestyle scene creating hip fashion, cutting-edge music, entertaining films, powerful literature and so much more. The world has taken notice. And this is only the beginning”. Indeed it is.

• http://www.garamchai.com/sitemap.htm

This is a website which provides all the information an NRI needs to know about living abroad. It is complete with a full section on international worship spots, business and occupational help and forums for the NRI’s. It is not a very well constructed website, but the information they provide is valuable.

My personal experience with my Diaspora in Dubai is a very pleasant one. We have a rather large Indian Diaspora in Dubai and it gives me a sense of compassion and community. The best part about it is that it is big enough to make me feel secure in Dubai, and smaller societies make it small enough to know almost everyone. 

Rina Al Mughni_My Experience in Virtual and Real Community

Sourse: Google image

                  

           

The structure, operation and composition of virtual communities defer, in a certain way, from real (physical) communities. There are several characteristics of virtual communities that do not exist in the realm of the physical world. Virtual communities are often not circumscribed by the territorial and geographical limit of the physical interaction. For example, I can communicate easily with people all over the world by using the internet. I can chat, share information and exchange various files all in the same time over certain networks such as hotmail, face book, and twitter. Additionally, virtual community is not limited by time except in the chat room; therefore, I can communicate with my friends and other people for 24 hours. I do not have to worry about particular time to access and contact. For example, I might be able to send emails to my friends in the midnight, but I cannot go to their home at that time to give or share information. Also, virtual community is normally based on text and corporeal; therefore, there is no mean for the stigma. For instance, whenever I feel uncomfortable to meet and talk to particular people face-to-face, I send them an email and tell them whatever I feel without feeling embarrassed or irritated by having to meet with them. In contrast to these advantages of the virtual community, disadvantages also have a place in this community. People in this community have a tendency to be on basis of the text. Only what is written is exchanged; there is an absence of no-verbal clues like gestures, the way we dress up, the posture, and the facial expressions. Also, members of virtual community cannot be identified nor held responsible for their actions and words. Due to previous characteristics, the virtual communities are more anonymous than real. For example, I once added a friend on Facebook that I did not personally know. I thought I can make friends through this website. However, after sometime when we became really close I discovered that she is not who she claims to be. This incidence showed me that the virtual world cannot be trusted and is deceiving at a lot of times.

                                    The real physical community is not purely real and physical especially with the emergence of new technologies. I have many doubts if this type of reality still exists, since the technology and its constant innovations are present in our days, present in all the societies. In some peoples’ point of view, real community is not flexible, waste of time and limited to a number of people. However, the real community still has its advantages that the virtual community lakes. For example, in this community I can meet people face-to-face and talk to them through non-verbal communication means. For instance, in this community I can share my feeling with my friends which are impossible to be expressed in the virtual community. Also, I can talk about sensitive problems which often cannot be solved in the virtual community. Additionally, in the real community people can show their confidence, appearance and personality to the other people they meet. For instance, whenever I have a meeting with authoritarian people in my life, I can dress up well, talk with confidence and use verbal expressions. These aspects all come together to create a good image about me. Due to previous characteristics, virtual community is the realistic community that we can trust and build strong relationships through.          

Rina Al Mughni_Paletinian Diaspora in the Arab Gulf Region

Diaspora: Is the dispersion or spreading of something that was originally localized (as a people or language or culture). Focusing on peoples' Diaspora, it means the movement, migration, or scattering of people away from an established or ancestral homeland or people dispersed by whatever cause to more than one location, or people settled far from their ancestral homelands.

Focusing on the Palestinian Diaspora in the Arab Gulf, we can find out websites several important facts about them from the following websites.

   http://www.palestine-pmc.com/details.asp?cat=3&id=1228

This website has many important facts about the Palestinian community and their Diaspora that reached up to 5.2 million from the whole Palestinian population which is around 10.1 million. It also provides information about the reasons that forced huge numbers of Palestinians to flee away from their own homeland. One of the main reasons is the establishment of Israel and the Palestinian Nakba (catastrophe) in 1948. Additionally, this website discussed clearly several other aspects such as waves of Palestinian displacement, and characteristics of the Palestinian Diaspora. This website also includes a lot of caricature and cartoons about the Palestinian cause and especially the issue of Palestinian refugees living all over the middle-east. The sarcasm in these cartoons helps communicate a lot of sensitive issues and ideas that couldn’t have been expressed by words and articles and would’ve been censored.

www.al-awda.org

This website is devoted to a project run by Palestinian and American activists in California. This project is called “Al Awda” in Arabic; which means the return in English. It is about the Palestinian cause and specifically the Palestinians living outside Palestine that constitute the Palestinian Diaspora. It includes a lot of facts about Palestine’s history and the evidence of the Palestinians right in their land whether those who were forced to leave in 1948or in 1967. There is also a link that directs you on how you can donate for the cause and help the organization pursue their goals. It includes audios and videos about Palestine and the Palestinian refugees, and how they live in camps and what their conditions are. 

www.farfesh.com

This website is an entertaining Palestinian website. It includes a lot of fun activities and links. There are several sections in the website: Music, movies, jokes, celebrity pictures, TV series, news local and international, etc. There is also a section for chatting in which Palestinians living all over the world can chat and exchange ideas and get to know each other. 

http://books.google.ae/books?id=WyX5XowgxzsC&pg=PA64&lpg=PA64&dq=palestinian+diaspora+in+Gulf+region&source=bl&ots=u4PMslcLTF&sig=anNYKk-yN3J1JmIJkzMyQGcCvzA&hl=ar&ei=xdDYTamoI8f3rQeFxLj9BQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=palestinian%20diaspora%20in%20Gulf%20region&f=false

Whenever you click on this link, it will take you to particular page on a website. This page is actually from an online book. It talks about the Palestinian Diaspora in Arab Gulf region from 1990 until 1995, and how they have been suffering since 30 years ago. Most of the pedestrian who left to the Gulf countries were professionals, physicians, engineers and teachers who become urban lower class after their immigrant. This is because of the lower class jobs they acquired in the Gulf region such as build port, rail and residential facilities. However, with the existence of the oil in the Gulf countries, Palestinian citizens became much better and they established themselves by creating their own business.

http://www.jstor.org/pss/2536751

This website carries an important topic about Palestinians and their rights to be treated and recognized as a part of the community they live in because they have been suffering because of the Israeli occupation. This occupation which forced them to flee from their own beloved country, Palestine.

 

 
           Waiting for your comments :)

Regards,

Rina