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Middle Eastern Culture Essay

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The region of the Middle East and its inhabitants have always been a wonder to the Europeans, dating back to the years before the advent of Islam and the years following the Arab conquest. Today, the Islamic world spreads from the corners of the Philippines to the far edges of Spain and Central Africa. Various cultures have adopted the Islamic faith, and this blending of many different cultures has strengthened the universal Islamic culture. The religion of Islam has provided a new meaning to the lives of many people around the world. In the Islamic world, the religion defines and enriches culture and as a result the culture gives meaning to the individual. Islam is not only a religion, it is in its own way a culture. It may be this very …show more content…

Thus, the extended family becomes unified functional unit which contributes to the much larger community. The tribal villages settled in Iraq still rely on these traditional concepts for a living. The family structure in Syria is quite different from that in the tribal villages in Iraq. There are two major reasons for this difference. First of all, most of the settled tribes belong to the Shiite sect of Islam. The Shiite believe themselves to be pure Muslims and therefore are very conservative towards religious obligations. Secondly, if we look back at the Arab conquest, The Arab army itself never introduced a new culture in the region, it was actually the fusion of the religion (Islam) and the local cultures of the conquered people which in the time developed into a universal Islamic culture. So, it is understandable that now all the Muslim countries will have the exact same way of life, yet their fundamental family beliefs will , no doubt, stem from the sources of the Islamic law. The conservative outlook of the Shiite is somewhat misleading, for it may seem that family life is very monotonous, but on the contrary it is rather very complex. Women in this society are rarely seen in the public, but it does not mean they don’t have a public life. For them, the private life, in the sanctuary of their houses, is their public life. It is there that a woman can do anything she pleases. If she does decide to come out into the public she

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