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The Middle East Studies Student Initiative is a board of students dedicated towards the development of an inter-disciplinary Middle East Studies Program at the University of California, Irvine. With the support of our faculty, administration, and students we hope to develop a comprehensive curriculum and academic forum in order to engage in dialogue regarding the political, economic and social issues of the region.


A MIDDLE EAST STUDIES PROGRAM AT UC IRVINE WILL:
Foster an environment conducive to the production of constructive dialogue on the Middle East;

Provide a forum whereby scholars and prominent members of the community collaborate in promoting an academic understanding of the Middle East;r>
Enhance awareness of and respect for diversity within the community;

Facilitate broader cultural understanding among students and community members with distinctive backgrounds from the Middle East and between those and others without generational connections to the region;

Provide a strong educational foundation for future generations within the community to engage in in-depth academic understanding of the region;

Provide an academic understanding of the dynamic processes in which religion plays in shaping politics, society and culture.


MISSION STATEMENT
We the students of the University of California, Irvine believe that our esteemed university desperately needs a curriculum and programs devoted specifically to the study of the Middle East and North Africa.

In the hope of finding an immediate remedy for this situation, we the students of the University of California, Irvine respectfully request the development of a program that will incorporate not only the history and languages of the region, but also its politics, sociology, and culture.

We want the opportunity, and we want future generations of UCI students to have the opportunity, to learn more about a region which is and will likely remain critical to world peace and America’s national interests.

We want the opportunity to eventually major in Middle East and North African Studies. We appreciate that the development of a major is necessarily a lengthy and detailed process. More immediately, we wish to see the enhancement of a curriculum devoted to Middle East and North African Studies, leading to the opportunity for students to minor in this field from various extant majors.

We speak on behalf of both Middle Eastern and non-Middle Eastern students at UCI who realize, as most Americans already do, that the geo-political conditions in the Middle East and North Africa unwittingly, but dramatically affect our lives today as they will the lives of our children.

For a number of specific reasons, UCI and the Orange County community at large, need to support the development of such a program.


A MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA STUDIES PROGRAM WILL
  1.  Enhance an awareness of and respect for diversity on the UCI campus
  2. Foster an environment conducive to the production of constructive dialogue about the Middle East;
  3.  Recognize and implement a serious course of academic study for interested students;
  4. Help prepare students to meet the rising demand of private and public sector employment opportunities which require training in Middle East Studies;
  5.  Facilitate broader cultural understanding among students with distinctive backgrounds from the Middle East and between those students and others without generational connections to the region
  6.  Provide an academic understanding of the dynamic processes which religion plays in shaping politics, society, and culture.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT
Dr. Lina Kreidie
University of California, Irvine
3151 Social Science Plaza A
Irvine, CA 92697-5100		 Email M.E.S.S.I. at
ucimessi@gmail.com
 

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