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invasion of privacy

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invasion of privacy
al-ajnabia
04/04/04 at 20:25:30
[slm]
I don't know if anyone has ever been in this kind of a situation but I thought I would put this out here incase people had ideas.
I've mentioned that I am a student of arabic and that the teachers have been problematic to me.  I want to know though is there any spacific way to deal with hmmm
When I first started studying almost four years ago imediately there began to be inuendos about inapropraite relations between me and a married instuctor.  
Things got to where none of the instructors were willing to take me seriously because they beleived I was having arelationship witht his other instructor.
Because I thought this was no body's businsess I refused to talk about it, but later I began to believe that he believed I wanted a relationship with him and was saying to people that this was hapening between us.
Now Im in my thirties and I have not lived under a rock.  I know that teacher crushes happen and that they dont mean anything in the real world.  But also I pass for 19, and I dont always wear a sign around my neck anouncing my age.
For a long time I thought he had feelings for me, and not being a nincompoop
I knew the repercussions of this, I knew that my grade could be in jeapordy.
so whenever he seemed distracted and unfocused in theaching me I would remind him that I am a chaste muslim woman, and that I would never wish to be acountable for any kind of behavior that is forbidden, that I would never be able to deal with it and for me this kind of thing on his mind could only hapen in a mariage.
But he persisted and made it clear that my future in arabic was contingent on me aproaching him sexually and I reminded him again that I would only aproach my husband.
He carried out his threat, he even acused me of stalking him, when I asked him to treat me honorably and quit telling people to harrass me.
My Arabic teachers since this time have refused to teach when I am in class and if I miss class for any reason I find out that they covered all the material that they refused to cover while I was in class and that there will be quized over this material. Also last semester they had another married male instructor teach on fridays and they began to make the same inuendos. So I informed him of it and when the previous instructor began to try to sit with me I informed to police about it and somethings he has done that I havent mentioned in this post and sent the report that I sent the police to the vice president of administration here and now I am waiting.
I realize I probably should have quit arabic way back when but I couldnt bring myslef to give up.  I kept hoping for either the best or a resolution to these issues.
And now I need to finish this semester to cover my language requirement for my MA.
I always hope that my troubles are somehow the thread that will unravel somehting evil.  That may have some pathology to it, but its something to cling to when it just seems so nasty.
I dunno, so I've told the police and the administration.  I origially went to the chair of the NELC department about this but he decided the solution to this problem was to make the ofending teacher teach me privately, so I doubt he would be any help.  I try to explain to the other "muslims" here but they are no help either, I think they know the truth but they dont care. They are the greatest mystery to me, they are what I shake my head the most over. Ive tried to explainto my other arabic teachers but they sympathise with him.
So I pray over it, I really try not to make waves if I can avoid it, but it is so sad that I came here with such high hopes.
I wanted to learn arabic for several reasons. The first was to read the reaveald book of Allah in the language that He revealed it in.  The second was to combat misperceptions of islam from an authoritative positin even if this required extensive post graduate study, The third reason was that I entertained the hope of having the optionto study in arabic, the fourth is that I would like to write in arabic, mostly novels but with a cultural and religious signifigance, and also I would like to write stories about american life in Arabic that are different than the ones Arabs are most likely to hear.  The fifth is an intrest in the arabic media such as in movies and television programing. I know that is a lot, but I wanted to learn arabic so that I could introduce myself in Arabic with the same eloquency that I attempt to introduce myself in english, I wanted to transplant my life into arabic, Iwas even willing to forget speaking english like I have forgotten other languages.
And the biggest reason I wanted to learn Arabic is because people talk about how hard it is and I wanted to try my hand at making it easier since whin I try my hand at teaching or training anyone or anything whatsoever Ifind I am very good at it and this seemed to be the best thing I could apply my talent for teaching in.
unfortunately I toldt this to my instructors.
I dont think anyone ever thought Iwas sexy, they just knew this would mess me up and it did.
Well thats that, and now back to it.
Salaam,

Re: invasion of privacy
Nadeem
04/06/04 at 06:00:15
[slm]

Sister, I was troubled to read your post and about the difficulties you are facing.  However, sorry, I am a little confused as to certain parts of your post.  I hope you wont mind if I ask you a few questions relating to this just to clarify:

1. You received private one-to-one tuition from your Arabic instructor?  Perhaps this is where the problem started.  Since there is no concept of man-woman one-on-one relationship outside family.  Are there no female teachers that you get private tuition from?

2. Are you saying that your Arabic instructor implied that in order to get ahead in your class you would have to provide some sort of inappropriate service to him? I am appalled!  Or are you saying you developed feelings for him but you remained firm by telling him that you werent interested in any kind of "relationship" outside teacher-student?  I got confused at this point.

3. When you spurred his advances, he then tried to ruin your reputation by spreading rumours about you?

4. Because of this the other teachers are deliberately trying to sabotage your studies and chances of getting through the class?

5. Other muslims on campus have not only NOT helped you, but shunned you also?  I guess they dont want to take sides, but still I'm amazed that no one sister or person tried to help you with your problems.

6. And this is all because you are trying to learn Arabic for what sound like some good causes?

I would say sister, if I have understood the situation correctly, that I do feel for you.  It is admirable that you are still continuing your studies, where most would have quit.

The lack of help you received from others is also distressing I'm sure.

I'm sorry I havent really got any useful advice.  But as Im sure you already know, Allah sometimes gives us testing times to test our resolve.  Also as I understood it, bearing false witness against somone, especially against a Muslim woman's chastity is a very serious thing.  I wish you luck, and pray Inshallah you will receive guidance of what steps to take next.

[wlm]

Re: invasion of privacy
al-ajnabia
04/06/04 at 18:24:10
[slm]
Dealing with question one:
there was a problem before that.  In that there is the proverbial "if I knew then what I know now I would have done differently".  I felt it would be a great hardship to have to give upthe year of language credit I had to take two more years of another language.  In the end I had to do that anyway.
Dealing with question two which sort of relates to question one:
At the time I was only polite to him, I did not realize how he was "handeling" me.
I lived alone off campus and had been harrassed quite a bit, also one noight somone broke into my apartment. Now I know he was behind all of these things,(I over heard him discussing various aspects of this and others have also been less than discrete who were also involved) so that I would feel vulnerable and be less in my resolve. I admit I felt scared and alone, but I knew life would be worse for me than it already was iff I comprimised my values.
At one point he asked me what I thought could happen here meaning our teaching situation. I said that I wanted a professional professional relationship, and I wanted my personal relationshiips to be honorable.  He saw he had upset me and hugged me then held me back in a way suggestive that he wanted me to kiss him, I didnt. There was not any more instruction after that. I guess that is how he showed me what I needed to do if he was going to teach me.  
He told his superiors that the whole "problems in regular class thing" had been me throwing a temper tantrum, and the next semester I was put back into regular class where none of the issues I had brought up had been addressed so I dropped the class and enroled in spanish.
I took another Arabic class with another instructor the next year, but she also avoided teaching me, possibley she was inforcing his descision that I would not be taught, but I do study on my own and I have learned some arabic. This is why Iknow of the total invovlement of the whole department against my instruction.  They are so confident that as a student of theirs I cant possible understand any arabic that he talks about it even when sitting directly behind me.
My current instructor also refuses to teach me, and if I get an A on anything she will grade something subjective harsh enough to cancel it out even if it was the same as what I have handed in before. She also shamelessly wastes class time and refuses to use methods that proove effective. Can you imagine an advanced class in any  language tha is spent entirely in the conjigation of verbs?
She also knows I am dyslexic and only tests those aspects of language such as reading outloud and dictation where dyslexia causes problems.
Also When she gives dictation her own pronunciation is so bad that even when I write what she said she marks it wrong.
This will be my last arabic class at this university.  I plan to teach english and I hope to teach in Qatar.  I feel that it will be better for me if I continue my study of arabic at that time, and continue to file official complaits against this department, since arabic is an important languge and deserves to be dealt with seriously by qualified instructors.
04/06/04 at 18:26:13
al-ajnabia
Re: invasion of privacy
Nadeem
04/07/04 at 13:54:29
[slm]
There are some not very nice people in the world.  >:(
Even some who are "of our own".  :(

Sister, I admire your courage to keep going on, and wish you all the best in achieving your goal of teaching in Qatar. Inshallah, in the meantime may Allah give you the strength to deal with the adversities that comes your way.  Indeed this is what I wish for all of us.

[wlm]


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