Studying in Morocco vs. in the US

It's interesting learning about the same stuff from a Moroccan professor than from an American professor. First of all, they are much more interested in the theories of discourse, even in an intro class. They are very aware of the effect that different interests, be they colonial, national, or otherwise have on the view of the Arab World. I realized one of the major weapons that the West has had over so much of the rest of the world: the ability to shape discourse. Even when the rest of the world tried to retake the discourse, they did it in such a way as to go against the Western discourse directly, which still meant that it was shaped by how the West saw the East. Now things are changing, but the west has already created the definitions that the rest of the world has to work with. What is a tribe? What is a nation state? What defines feminism? Why has the veil become central to discourse on Arab feminism? It is amazing that the assumptions that I, as a westerner, have taken for granted have been adopted by non-western academics as well...