Because men born in Qatar get an annual salary from birth and a house when they marry, they are more apathetic toward education than women are, in the opinion of philosophy teacher Linda Finlay, who recently taught at the Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar.

In a lecture at the Tompkins County Public Library, Oct. 18, she gave this as a reason why so many women attend the medical school in Qatar. She spoke of culture shock, gender inequality and the challenges of teaching Western philosophy in the Eastern world in her lecture, "Teaching Plato in the Muslim/Arab World." Finlay, who taught philosophy at Ithaca College for 27 years before retiring, talked about her experience this year teaching philosophy to students from Syria, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates and Russia in Qatar.

The medical students in Qatar, she said, often are torn between tradition and the demands of school. Tradition mandates that students put their family first, and "families want them to do traditional chores ... what they don't understand is how demanding medical school is," Finlay said.

Women students also must cope with arranged marriages, often at inconvenient times -- for example, during final exams. Finlay said she was impressed by the innovation and perseverance of her female students. Two women in her class, for example, arranged deals with their families that their family would not arrange a marriage for them until after graduation.

In her class, which was the equivalent of a "writing in the majors" course offered at Cornell, the students read and critiqued Plato's "Socratic Dialogues." The students tackled questions of great weight: What is piety? What is justice? How is knowledge different from opinion?

However, Finlay said, she was struck that all of her students wrote in very elaborate prose when she asked them to write a strong argument, a skill they need for their future medical writing. She later discovered the problem: In the Muslim/Arab world, it is rude to drive a point home. Asking these students to be concise and straightforward was counter to how they had been taught to speak and write. Further, all courses are taught in English, so her students were working in their second or third language.

Despite the challenges, Finlay said she was very impressed by her students. "The thing that struck me the most was how incredibly valued knowledge is. It really is. They do all their assignments."

The event was co-sponsored by the Ithaca chapter of the American Association of University Women, the Tompkins County Public Library and the Multicultural Resource Center.

Christin Munsch is a writer intern with the Cornell Chronicle.