Courses
The MESP integrates the study of culture, history, religion, politics, and language. Three seminar courses and an Arabic course continue throughout the semester.  

Introduction to Arabic Language (4 credits)
This course, taught by Egyptian instructors affiliated with the American University in Cairo, aims to help students acquire basic skills in Egyptian Arabic, a dialect widely understood in the Arab world.  The course emphasizes the practical use of the language, encouraging interaction with the locals through the use of "language lab Cairo" assignments or during visits to service projects. Small classes four days a week offer a solid introduction to the colloquial grammar and a substantial vocabulary as students take more than 50 hours of instruction. Once completed, the course should bring students to the intermediate level of Egyptian colloquial Arabic. 
[Possible credit: language/cross-cultural] 

Islamic Thought and Practice (4 credits) 
This course examines many dimensions of Islamic faith-historical, legal, doctrinal, popular, and behavioral-from early times to the present. While emphasis is on the early period and its influence on latter events and people, it also attempts to relate these early developments to contemporary issues in the Middle East like the impact of colonialism, gender equality, modernization, development, and democracy. Students are encouraged to begin thinking about relevant similarities and differences between themselves and Muslim peoples around the world. The course also makes use of the "Cairo Lab" in order to showcase some of the most historically influential institutions and architecture in the Arab world. Occasionally, students encounter important personalities associated with institutions like Al Azhar, Cairo University, the Egyptian Government, or the Arab League.  Dr. Holt may teach all or some of this course as well as the seminars that follow, but he frequently makes use of local scholars affiliated with American University in Cairo and Cairo University, and guest lecturers with particular expertise of relevance to the subject at hand. 
[Possible credit: history/religion] 

Conflict and Change in the Middle East (4 credits)
This course examines the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, or what many scholars now call "the 100 years war." Beginning with the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the course traces the origin of the conflict from the early encounters between Arab and Jew in Palestine to the contemporary struggle to achieve a final status agreement between Israelis and Palestinians today. Students learn about the complexity and difficulty of reaching peace in an otherwise tiny space shared by two peoples with competing civilizational visions. While current conflict between the two peoples may prohibit travel to Israel/Palestine, the course usually includes a ten day on-site component in Israel/Palestine in order to give students first-hand experience seeing and hearing the important people and places that make this conflict so difficult. This component is subject to change based on safety considerations.  Finally, another important part of the course includes an intense negotiation simulation in Cairo, where students take on role characters, Israeli and Palestinian respectively, and actively engage their counterparts across the table in final status talks related to Jerusalem, borders and security, refugees, water, and settlements. 
[Possible credit: political science/history]

Peoples and Cultures of the Middle East (4 credits)
With an emphasis on anthropological approaches to the region, this course examines the variety of peoples and cultures in the Middle East in societies like Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Israel/Palestine, Turkey, or perhaps other countries as well. MESP for example, has recently added Tunisia and Morocco for the first time to its possible travel options. While the selection of travel locations will depend upon safety conditions and budgetary constraints prevailing at the time of travel, the course nonetheless seeks to introduce students to patterns of thought and behavior which characterize the region generally without losing sight of important differences across countries. The Middle East is a multiethnic, multi-confessional region, and student travel allows them to observe and study a great variety of social, religious, and political groups. In addition, students learn about pressing issues, from gender to war to economic development, that currently animate the many religious and political communities they visit. 

As part of our culture component of the program, we arrange weeklong home-stays with mainly Muslim families. Each family has a contact person who is the same gender and is an English speaker so students have a way to communicate their needs, ideas, and feelings. It is a positive as well as necessary experience in order for students to appreciate the genuine nature of life in Egypt. While most students stay individually with a family, some MESP students may do their home-stays together with another MESP student. 
[Possible credit: sociology/anthropology]