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Viewpoint - September 23, 2010
How the Arab Civilization Has Changed Your Life
by Sherri Muzher
These have been tough times, and our media deserves kudos
in recent weeks for bringing Arab-Americans and Muslim-
Americans forward to humanize their respective communities,
and to demonstrate that they are not the same as the
alleged terrorists.
And while Arab-Americans are being singled out in this
fight against terror, it might be interesting for people
to note that the overwhelming majority of Arab-Americans
are law-abiding and concentrate on achieving the 'American
Dream.'
People might even be surprised to learn that there are
Arabs and Arab-Americans among their heroes. For the
sports fan, there's NBA star Rony Seikaly and NFL star
Doug Flutie. If you like comedy, you may be familiar with
the late Danny Thomas, Jamie Farr, and Tony Shalhoub. Maybe
you like drama...there's Salma Hayek and Omar Sharif. Maybe
you're into politics, and so you might be familiar with
Republican John Sununu, Green Party founder Ralph Nader,
and Democrat Nick Rahall ? related to race car driver,
Bobby Rahall. Do you like Latin pop? There's Shakira.
When you write a check or count your dollars, you are using
Arabic numerals. Are you putting away money so that your
kids can go to a university when they grow up? The Arabs
founded great universities, in particular the ones at
Cairo, Bagdad, and Cordova. These schools preserved and
taught Greco-Roman culture. Classical learning provided a
foundation for further advances by Arab scholars, who were
permitted to write with considerable freedom. History tends
to jump from the Greco-Roman period and right into the
Renaissance period. The period between them is known as
the Dark Ages. But if these were Dark Ages, the Arabs were
wearing sunglasses. It was during the so-called Dark Ages
that Arabs made great contributions to science and math-
ematics.
They furthered the studies of algebra, geometry, and
trigonometry. They prepared chemical compounds such as
sulfuric acid and alcohol; improved metal refining and
cloth dying; and gained new knowledge about the relation-
ship between light and vision. In terms of medicine, they
used anesthetics; performed difficult surgery, particularly
progressing in eye operations; and compiled medical text-
books.
The famous scientist-philosopher known in Europe as
Avicenna was Ibn Sina, an Arab. He was the greatest writer
of medicine in the Middle Ages, and his Canon was required
reading throughout Europe until the seventeenth century.
Have you been seeing a counselor or therapist? Avicenna
did pioneer work in mental health, and was a forerunner of
today's psychotherapists. He believed that some illnesses
were psychosomatic, and he sometimes led patients back to
a recollection of an incident buried in the subconscious
in order to explain the present ailment.
Did you grow up on a farm? The Arabs improved farming by
methods of rotating crops and using fertilizer. The next
time you celebrate with a glass of wine, consider this:
Arabs were able to graft a single vine so that it would
bear grapes in different colors, and their vineyards were
responsible for the future of wine industries of Europe.
From India, they introduced the cultivation of sugar, and
from Egypt they brought cotton to European markets. Peach,
apricot, and loquat trees were transplanted in southern
Europe by Arab soldiers. The hardy olive was encouraged
to grow in the sandy soil of Greece, Spain, and Sicily.
There was a time that people around the world thought the
earth was flat. The Arabs believed the earth was round and
it's been said that Christopher Columbus's navigator was
Arab. The Arabs used the Mariner's compass to determine
direction at sea.
The Arab World gave the world its third monotheistic
religion -- Islam, which means "submission." This peaceful
religion, considered to be the fastest growing in modern
times, was spread to lands more distant than North Africa
and the Fertile Crescent, but it was in this area that a
common Arab culture emerged. Being Arab means that one
speaks Arabic and shares a world of common traditions,
customs and values. The US is a melting pot of different
ethnicities and religions, and so, too, is the Arab civil-
ization, which brought together Muslims, Christians and
Jews. It unified Arabians, Africans, Berbers, Egyptians,
and the descendants of the Phoenicians (modern day
Lebanese), Canaanites (modern day Palestinians), and many
other peoples.
From tanning leather to the famous British bagpipes to
literature to philosophers who worked closely with Plato
and Aristotle, the Arabs have contributed in many ways
to modern civilization. For so many unfortunate years,
our fellow Americans have been subjected to stereotypes
and misinformation about the Arab community, probably
never realizing the true impact of Arab civilization in
everyday life.
--------------------
Sherri Muzher is a Palestinian-American activist, lawyer,
and freelance journalist.
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