Internationalizing Middle Eastern Politics (MEP): A Study of the Educational Potential of Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) for Middle East Politics Pedagogy

Abstract

Middle East studies, and in particular the study of the politics of the Middle East stands at a crossroads pedagogically a decade after the Arab Spring. This study observed an experimental pre- or partial Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) engagement between Political Science students in New Zealand and the Sultanate of Oman to investigate whether COIL-based approaches, couched in decolonizing pedagogical theory and new digital communication technologies, could offer a useful tool for instructors and students in the field to begin to address enduring western (un)conscious paradigms of “The Middle East.”.