Jenny Salan: A Rich Experience

Growing up in the small town of Iowa Park, Texas, I wanted more than anything else to be a lawyer.  After graduating from high school, I enrolled at Midwestern Texas State University in Wichita Falls, Texas.  In summer school, between my freshman and sophomore year, I took a course in international relations from Dr. David Martin and Dr. Michael Preda.

Both teachers were alumni of the National Council on US-Arab Relations Malone Faculty Fellow Program in Arab and Islamic Studies.  They were substituting for Dr. Kenneth Hendrickson, a Malone Fellow, who, like Dr. Martin had participated in the Council’s study visit to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.  Dr. Preda had participated in the Council’s summer 1990 study visit to Iraq that had concluded only days prior to Iraq’s invasion and occupation of Kuwait.

Not long into the course, I realized I had trouble explaining the reasons for my flawed understanding of the Arab world.  What so impressed me about Profs. Martin and Preda was the depth of their knowledge and convictions based both on serious research and personal connections.

When it became apparent that I was enthused about the subject matter and anxious to learn more Drs. Martin and Preda said, “If you like this subject and want to study it further, you might want to participate in the Model Arab League.”  At their suggestion, I decided I would.  I volunteered to be a member of the delegation that would represent Palestine.

The first Model I participated in as a delegate was held at the University of Texas in Austin.  I remember having butterflies in my stomach thinking that I would have to stand up and speak in front of all those people.  I felt awful, knowing that I was in way over my head.  But I soon met a lot of friends and found others, like me, were also unsure of themselves and wondering whether they, too, had done the right thing.

I also realized something else: I was not alone in my newfound interest in the Middle East.

The next year, I was chosen to attend the National University Model Arab League in Washington DC as a member of a delegation formed by university’s department of history.  Again, I represented Palestine.  This was held in April 1992, and I was a delegate to the Social Affairs Committee.  In 1993, I represented Syria at the National Model Arab League.  I remember our delegation going to the Embassy of Syria.  This fantastic Syrian diplomat, who was in charge of the embassy’s information office, briefed us.  She was so charismatic and articulate.  To me, she was a living example of everything that was the opposite of the stereotypical Middle Eastern woman.

I was selected to participate in the National Council’s Kuwait Studies Program.  Even though it was not a convenient time for me to travel, I decided to go as I knew that I might not have such an opportunity again.  We spent ten days in Kuwait and the experience had a remarkable impact on my life.  The Kuwait that I saw in 1993 was one that had largely been rebuilt following Iraqi aggression.  I saw the love that many Kuwaitis felt for the American people.  But what made such a powerful and lasting impression upon me was not just seeing the country, but the additional experience of living in the dorm with Arab women students who were enrolled at the university.

In the late evenings after we had returned to the dorms at the end of a day filled with meetings and visits to sites of historical and cultural interest, we were amazed at how much the Kuwaiti and other Arab girls were dedicated to their studies.  Night after night, they stayed up studying until three o’clock or later after having the books hard all day.

We would sit with them and talk about our respective dreams.  Some of the girls were Kuwaitis, but others were Bahrainis, Egyptians, and Palestinians, making every conversation a rich experience.  As I look back on it now, that experience gave me an immensely important grounding that I could not have gotten in any other way.

As a result of all that I learned, I decided to forego a career in law.  I realized that I was determined instead to pursue a career in Middle Eastern affairs.  To this end, I applied for and won a Rotary Club Scholarship to a Masters Program at the University of Exeter in Devon, the United Kingdom.  My advisers were the late Nazih Ayyubi and Mick Dumfer, a British scholar on Jerusalem.

After graduation from Exeter, I returned to Texas and went on to work for a research organization that produced an encyclopedia and a monthly publication for schools.  Before I knew it, I was working on issues related to the Middle East.   That was when I learned of an opening at the Arab American Institute in Washington DC.  I applied, was accepted, and the rest is history.

Since taking her position as Research Assistant, Jenny Salan has risen to become Media Director for the Arab-American Institute.  To learn more about the Kuwait Studies Program, click here.

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