- Home
- Search Results
Search Results
Filter :
FILTER BY author:
FILTER BY language:
FILTER BY content type:
FILTER BY publication:
FILTER BY affiliation:
- 1Assistant Professor in Residence, Northwestern University in Qatar [1]
- 2Lecturer in Residence, Northwestern University in Qatar [1]
- 3Assistant Professor, Virginia Commonwealth University in Qatar [1]
- 4Assistant Professor in Residence, Northwestern University in Qatar [1]
- 5Adjunct Lecturer, Northwestern University in Qatar [1]
- Qatar University, Doha, Qatar. *Email: [email protected] [1]
- VCUQatar, QA [1]
- [+] More [-] Less
FILTER BY article type:
FILTER BY access type:
Measuring Qatari Women's Social Progress through Marriage Contracts
Contemporary Qatari women's social progress can in part be measured through an analysis of current marriage practices. The Islamic marriage contract is a legal and religious document wherein Muslim brides indicate their expectations for post-marital life and an essential step in the marriage negotiation process. The conditions they stipulate in their marriage contracts are symbolic of the degree to which they exercise agency in their personal and professional lives as wives. As part of a larger study on marriage practices in Qatar we collected and analyzed marriage contracts from a broad range of Qatari families. We treated these documents as archival evidence reflecting changing bridal expectations from 1975–2013. A content analysis of contracts in our sample demonstrated an increase in the age at marriage for both Qatari men and women. The contracts also show the major areas in which brides negotiated the terms of their married lives including educational professional and household expectations. We read these stipulating conditions as moves to guarantee autonomy as wives.
Teaching Medical Humanities in a Middle Eastern International Medical School: Frameworks and structure
Several reports over the last two decades have indicated the importance and success of incorporating medical humanities courses and modules in medical schools. While this inclusion is well established in the Euro-American contexts it is still underrepresented and understudied in Eastern contexts. In this presentation we aim to describe building an elective course titled “Medicine and the Arts” for second and third-year medical students of different nationalities at the College of Medicine in Qatar University. In offering this elective we aimed to establish an understanding of the linkages between humanities medicine and art and to strengthen concepts and practices of culture competence among the students.
Little has been written on designing medical humanities courses in non-Western contexts. In structuring and building the content of the course in a Middle Eastern context we faced several challenges. The discipline privileges the Western scene and discourse in art and humanities means that resources tend to be mainly Euro-American in their framing of medical concepts such as doctor-patient relationship patient-centred approach illness narratives. Whereas the students enrolled in the college come from non-Western contexts which are largely ignored in the majority of the available current reports.
To equivocate these challenges we used the Cultural Competence Model of Purnell; adopted an interdisciplinary approach and employed the concept of intersectionality to structure and deliver a culturally competent course that explores the nexus of medicine humanities and art. Students were encouraged to link topics discussed in the course to their own experiences and cultures as a way to create relevance and meaning. Lastly we made a concerted effort to curate art work reflecting the students’ rich cultural heritage.
The course comprises five themes taught in two-week blocks:
– Medicine history and painting
– Medicine anthropology and photography/documentary
– Medicine sociology and music
– Medicine literature and philosophy
– Medicine psychology and cinema
The remaining sessions include physician-artists guest speakers and visits to relevant art exhibitions to explore art in medical contexts.
Adopting a culturally competent approach to medical humanities helps to broaden the scope and make the course relevant to a culturally diverse student population. This approach harnesses the students’ own cultural backgrounds and works of art to explore the nexus between humanities social sciences and medical care from around the world.