Composition and Rhetoric - Essay Example

On the other hand, when I speak from the United States, I am essentially a citizen of UAE. ‘I’, My Multiple Identities and Difference At present, as the democratic revolutions spread cross the Arab world, which is initiated and led by youngsters like me, it is easy to identify myself as an Arab. It is important to think identity as something not given or stable. Identity is closely related to your imagination and the consequent identification with places and social groups. Therefore, when the whole world was concentrated in Egypt’s Tahrir Square, I found myself belonging to Tahrir Square than anywhere else.

Although I am a citizen of United Arab Emirates, I imagine myself as a citizen of the increasingly globalizing world. As Benedict Anderson argues, it is your particular imagination defines you as part of certain communities. Still, it does not negate my identity of being an Arab. One’s identity in the modern world is predominantly defined by the nationality. It is not to say that national identity blurs all other identities. On the other hand, the identity of a person could be immensely influenced by his/her country of origin.

I do have many commonalities with my fellow people in the United Arab Emirates and in the Arab world. As an Arab, I am proud of the great civilizations emerged from the Arab world. But, I am equally disgusted with the current affairs at my part of the world same as many of my fellow beings do. I believe, as like many other people in my country, that our civilization is decadent and decaying. But, still, we are proud of our glorious past. Having said that ‘we’ are proud of our past, it is necessary for me to emphasize that I am not proud of ‘our past’ in the same way as my fellow country men do.

I am least proud of the history of Ottoman Empire or the great crusades. On the other hand, I have a lot be proud of being the successors of a great people who traveled all around the world, established strong trade links with China, India and the Europe from sixteenth century onwards. It makes me delighted to claim that my ancestors spread the wisdom of mathematics and medicine to the rest of the world. If we had not preserved the intellectual and cultural products of the great Greek civilization, humanity would have lost it forever.

Moreover, I am happy to be proud of what is really great in our historical past. But, many in my country do not see things related to the past in the same way. They proud of the fact that once we built big empires and took our religion even to the distant corners of the earth. And, they are so detached from the present, they still imagine the Arab world as the center of the world. Still, they imagine through their illusions that the Islamic civilization is far more superior than any other. However, in reality, after the great medieval scientists from the Arab world who contributed immensely to the development of modern mathematics, medicine and astronomy, no great scientist or philosopher of stature has emerged from our part of the world.

A civilization triumphs only when it has a lot give and share with other civilization. Unfortunately, we have nothing more at the present to contribute to the humanity than the mystic tales of our glorious past. In brief, in medieval times, if we had lived in and for the future, at present, we die in and for the past. In terms of religion and spirituality, I identify myself as a Muslim like many in my country