Bay Street Theater will host a new lecture series titled New Perspectives, a forum for local voices and experts in their field to bring critical issues to East End audiences.
The first two talks will be presented by Sag Harbor resident and Middle East expert Ken Dorph, who will deliver a two-part lecture entitled “Hidden Cosmopolitanism of the Arab World,” which examines the diversity of Arabs with a focus on their evolving views on religious minorities and gender. Part I will be held Thursday, April 20, at 7 p.m. Part II will follow on Thursday, April 27, at 7 p.m.
As Dorph illustrates, the U.S. media present an image of Europe and Israel as beacons of pluralism and democracy with the Arab world narrowly summarized as ISIS. He has spent a good deal of his life in the Arab world, from Morocco to Iraq, and has lived the breathtaking diversity of the region. Dorph will explore the surprising historical tolerance of the Arabs, which has been deeply and negatively impacted by Western intervention, the rise of the oil economy, and the conflicts with Israel. In two related, but independent, presentations he will first ask the question: “What is an Arab?” And will then look at the diversity of the people called Arabs, with a focus on the evolving views on religious minorities and gender. Guests are left to ponder the fragility of a cosmopolitan society, how acceptance of diversity is undermined, and how communities can build a more caring and cosmopolitan world.
Dorph is a leading financial sector consultant with unusual expertise in the Middle East. He has an MA of Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Michigan, including a Fulbright in Damascus, and an MBA from the Wharton School. He is fluent in Arabic, Spanish and French and conversant in several other languages. He has lectured or led panels at the University of California at Berkeley, the Wharton School, the University of Michigan, the New School, Georgetown University, the World Bank, the Harvard Arab Weekend, and the annual C3 US-Arab Summit. Dorph is an expert in Islamic finance and teaches an occasional seminar on shari’ah compliant home finance at the Wharton School. He lives in Sag Harbor where he is known for his advocacy of walking and biking and for his passion for building bridges among disparate communities.
Thursday April 20, 7 p.m. — “Hidden Cosmopolitanism of the Arab World: Part 1”
The focus will be on the position of religious minorities in the Arab world, the “people of the book,” and the overall greater tolerance in Muslim Arab societies compared with Christian European. Dorph is particularly interested in the experience of Jewish Arabs. He celebrated Passover in Morocco in 1972, taught at the Jewish school in Tunis in 1975, swam each Saturday with Jewish friends in Damascus in 1979, and his closest friends in Cairo were a Christian-Jewish couple, the wife among the few remaining Jews in Cairo. Dorph was honored to introduce his late Sag Harbor friend and neighbor Lucette Lagnado, author of “The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit,” to the extraordinary Jewish community of Tunisia.
Thursday April 27, 7 p.m. — “Hidden Cosmopolitanism of the Arab World: Part 2”
Dorph will look at the question of gender and gender minorities in the Arab countries and in the context of Islam. Perhaps no issue raises more hackles with Americans than the treatment of women and the LGBTQ community in Arab countries. Yet Dorph knows that the reality is far more complex. He has been an observer of gender geography and roles in the Arab world and the Mediterranean for over 40 years. Dorph published an original treatise examining the contrasting evolution of Islamic divorce in the three Maghreb countries that is still used as a reference. More recently, he was asked by USAID to examine the status of the LGBTQ communities in the region, from Iraq to Algeria, to serve as a basis for programs of support. Much of his current work focuses on financial inclusion for women, from Saudi Arabia to Morocco. He has spent time examining gender topics in an array of non-Arab Muslim countries, including Indonesia, Pakistan and Turkey, and his travels and work in over a hundred nations gives him a broad base of comparison.
Tickets for the talks are available by a suggested donation of $20 at baystreet.org or 631-725-9500. Both presentations will be followed by questions and discussion and a reception in the lobby. Bay Street Theater is on Long Wharf in Sag Harbor.
Staff Writer on Mar 12, 2023