On my first day in Amman, Jordan, I awoke to what I had come to the Middle East to hear—the ethereal sounds of the Muslim call to prayer. Broadcast five times a day from mosques around the world, the call to prayer has both a practical and spiritual purpose. It not only reminds Muslims when it is time to pray, it also offers insight into the devotion and sense of community that are among the hallmarks of Islam.
A desire to gain a firsthand understanding of this culture drew me to Amman. With the support of Faculty Dean Maureen Franklin, I applied for and was accepted to the “Teaching About Islam and Middle Eastern Culture Seminar,”
sponsored by the Council of Independent Colleges (CIC), the U.S. Department of State, Council of American Overseas Research Centers (CAORC), and the American Center of Oriental Research (ACOR).
Since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, faculty at small liberal arts colleges who, like myself, are not Islamic specialists, have been teaching courses about Islam and the Middle East. The three-week seminar between December 2006 and January 2007 was designed to introduce humanities and social science faculty to Jordan and the Middle East through a series of lectures and tours. Twelve faculty members from across the country participated in the seminar.
Most of my time in Amman was spent at ACOR. Founded in 1968, it is a private, non-profit institution that conducts and offers research and publication opportunities for scholars in the fields of archeology, art and history, among others. The seminar’s activities, which were arranged by Barbara A. Porter, Director of ACOR, explored a wide range of topics that covered Middle East history from prehistory to the present. The seminar lectures focused on Islamic religious practice (accompanied by visits to the King Hussein and King Abdullah mosques in Amman), Islam and women’s rights, and Islamic art and architecture. In addition, discussions addressed contemporary issues: Arab-American relations, the Arab-Israeli Conflict, and urban planning in Amman. 
The speakers—including U.S. Ambassador David Hale, H.R.H. Prince El Hassan bin Talal, and H.E. Leila Sharaf, a member of Jordan’s Senate—offered a variety of perspectives and answered the group’s questions.
The seminar tours took us all over Jordan. In addition to a visit to King’s Academy in Madaba (featured in the Sept. 4, 2006 issue of The New Yorker) and several art museums in Amman, we visited various historical sites. These included the spectacular remains of the Nabatean civilization at Petra, the Roman ruins at Jerash, and the incredible desert landscapes at Wadi Rum. Other tours took us to palaces built by the Umayyads—who ruled the Islamic empire in the seventh and 
eighth centuries—to the Dead Sea, to Mount Nebo, and to Umm Qeis, which overlooks the Sea of Galilee and the Golan Heights. We also toured the Jabal El-Hussein Refugee Camp in Amman, established for Palestinian refugees in 1952 by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). A visit to the home of ethnographer Widad Kiwar gave me the opportunity to wear an antique embroidered costume made by a woman from Nablus and a chance to sample Turkish coffee and Arabic sweets. Throughout the trip, the ACOR staff offered insights into the archeological framework of Jordan’s history and our tour guide, Nasser Abu Al Khair, spoke to us about Islam and Jordan’s history and customs.
While in Jordan, I discovered that the world is very small indeed. A few months before the seminar, I received an e-mail from Porter,
who told me that she had a connection to Doane College. The Dwight E. Porter Professor of Teacher Education Endowed Chair, currently held by Dr. Marilyn Johnson-Farr, was established in 1989 by Doane Trustee Duane H. Hillmer, in honor of Porter’s grandfather, who had been Mr. Hillmer’s teacher and mentor.
In addition to getting to know Porter, I had the pleasure of spending an afternoon with a recent Doane graduate, Kamleh Shaban, who is in Amman for the year as part of the Fulbright Islamic Civilization Initiative program. While in Jordan, Shaban is learning Arabic and observing Islamic medical practices and the Jordanian health care system. The experience has been a productive one for her.
My visit to Jordan was transformative, on both a scholarly and personal level. I left Amman with a deeper understanding and appreciation of Islam and Middle Eastern history and culture, which I will integrate into future courses that I teach at Doane. I also have memories of the kindness and generosity of Jordanians and of the ACOR staff, as well as of the unique natural, architectural, and historical beauties of Jordan itself. I hope to return soon, to hear the call to prayer again.