Jordan Times
Monday, May 21, 2007
Queen Rania calls on WEF community, larger
audience to deconstruct prejudices
AMMAN (JT) — Her Majesty Queen Rania on Sunday joined Harvard Professor Daniel Shapiro for a frank
discussion about the imminent need for communication and understanding across cultures.
“The word is self-explanatory,” the Queen said, defining multiculturalism, “… It means having cultures
living alongside each other, which is what describes our world today, but it does not mean it is being
done well or actively… Multiculturalism should be a decision, a choice, an act of will and it’s hard work.”
“We may be connected, but we’re not connecting… and that’s the difference between a courteous neighbour
and a concerned neighbour,” she added.
Queen Rania reminded the audience of both the personal and economic benefits of breaking down prejudices
and increasing communication across cultures.
CEOs and executives working abroad need to embrace the cultures they are in, and be sensitised to their
work environment, otherwise they miss the opportunity to cater to the needs of the society, the Queen said,
“it results in a stronger bottom line.”
At the individual level, she noted how rewarding it is for people to gain insight about other cultures.
“Looking at the world from someone else’s perspective adds texture and depth to our own insights... and
enriches your perspective,” she said.
“I’m very lucky to understand both the Eastern and Western cultures, but it’s more than luck… it’s a responsibility,”
Queen Rania said, drawing on her own multicultural background,
This responsibility, she added, falls on all individuals, to actively and passionately pursue a multicultural approach
to dialogue and to put more of an effort in learning about other cultures and understanding habits and traditions.
The Queen cautioned, however, that it is not enough simply to research other cultures.
“[With the use of computers] it’s easy to learn about other cultures, but that can give us the false sense of knowing,”
she warned, advocating for people to reach out across borders and cultures and actively embrace others different from
themselves.
“Nothing compensates for human to human interaction,” she said.
In teaching a culture of acceptance, Her Majesty noted that “education begins on a mother’s lap… it is important to
teach [our children] how to be good global citizens… and equally important is what we don’t pass on to them like
stereotypes and prejudices.”
Her Majesty drew on some personal examples, where she has observed her children interacting with other children from
different cultures with ease.
“Children play and interact with each other without any prejudice… and we need to learn from them,” she said.
“Go back to the time when we were younger and a little more open, before we became a little more cynical and started
acquiring these layers of judgement… we need to go back to that time and deconstruct [our prejudices] and start with
a clean slate when dealing with those in front of us,” Queen Rania urged the WEF community and the larger audience.
Comparing the interaction across cultures to a global family, she noted that even though family members disagree,
ultimately they get along and are about support and understanding.
Acknowledging that sometimes the term “global family” seems “just a sound bite because we’re not actually practising
it… If we can take the family model and apply it outside the family, then that’s where we can make a difference,”
Queen Rania told the audience.
When asked about her ideal world, Queen Rania said she would hope for a “world where we’re indifferent to our
differences… where there’s no us and them — just we.”
During the second half of the session which focused on sector-specific experiences of multiculturalism, Search for
Common Ground Senior Vice President Susan Collin-Marks, and US Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and
Cultural Affairs Dina H. Powell, spoke on the power of multiculturalism in their lives.
Collin-Marks experienced the end of apartheid in South Africa, while Powell, an Arab American, has retained her
family’s Egyptian traditions as she has gone on to work for the US president.
Both women challenged the participants to assimilate an appreciation for multiculturalism in their everyday lives,
and to work to accept difference and celebrate diversity even as they focus on what makes them an individual.