Department: Arab & Islamic Studies

Professor: Dr. Dina Amin, Ph.D.

Dr. Amin has a joint appointment as assistant professor of Arabic Literature and Culture and assistant professor of Theatre Arts at in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Villanova. Having completed her undergraduate and graduate work at American University in Cairo, Dr. Amin received an ITT Scholarship from the Fulbright Commission to pursue her theatre studies at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburg, Pa. Dr. Amin holds an MFA in Stage Directing from Carnegie Mellon and a Ph.D. in Arabic literature from The University of Pennsylvania.

Dr. Amin is also a director, working in both Egypt and the United States and directing plays in both Arabic and English. She has won many awards for her work, including an award for excellence at the Amman festival for free theatre for her direction of Al-Meshwar al-Akhir. Dr. Amin has also published in many prominent academic journals.

Course Description:

“Difference is always scary, and this is what cultural studies is about, how do we treat that difference?” Dr. Amin said to her students. Her new class entitled, “Women and Gender in the Arab World,” provides students the opportunity to cross cultural boundaries so that they can better understand their Arab counterparts.

Through the reading of Eastern feminist writings, such as short stories, memoirs, feminist manifestos, and lectures, and watching feature and documentary films relating to Arab women, Dr. Amin works to inform her students about the role Arab women play in Eastern society. Beginning with the women’s movement in Egypt in the late 19th century and continuing throughout the 20th century to the present time, this class explores all aspects of Arab feminism. Dr. Amin provides her students with the history of Arabic culture and tradition in order to promote an understanding of the gender roles in the Arab world.

Stereotypes, the veil, Islam, the role of the media and other topics relevant to the perceived gender gap in the Eastern world are discussed and debated. Class time is devoted to open discussion, and questions are posed by students that are not always easy to answer. “Nuns choose to veil; why is it not in the news all the time?” Dr. Amin asks her students in the midst of their discussion reflecting on the veiling of Arab women and the media’s influence on stereotypes.

Shortly later in the conversation, she poses a different question: “How can we stop stereotyping each other?” Questions like these, which force students to think about issues on a deeper level and seek answers to cultural differences, are prominent in every conversation held in Dr. Amin’s classroom.

Today, struggles between the Eastern and Western world continue. As Dr. Amin points out to her class, in the 21st century, “Women become important where oil is.” In order to become successful leaders in our world, students need to be educated about the different cultures prominent in our everyday lives. Dr. Amin’s class strives to break the stereotypes set by Western culture and opens the eyes of Western students to the multiple facets of Arab culture.

Ultimately, the class is a success when a student comments that “they’re really not that different from us,” and unsurprisingly, this happens constantly in her classroom.