Rethinking Public Health Pedagogy in Muslim Countries Postcolonially

Abstract

This article discusses the history of modern education in developing countries and attempts to look at Public Health (PH) education and curriculum from a Muslim and postcolonial perspective. It argues that, since modern PH pedagogical practices in Muslim countries are derived almost entirely from the western educational model and paradigm, they need reconstruction mainly for compatibility and relevance checks. The reconstruction of PH that this paper proposes aims at complementing and enriching the existing syllabi and involves three stages: fundamental, intermediate and advanced. In the first stage, students are equipped with a strong foundation of western and Islamic philosophies; the second one involves the incorporation of Islamic principles into the existing PH curriculum; while the third entails a critical analysis and deconstruction of some PH concepts and approaches in order to nurture students’ creativity in solving complex, emerging problems in the light of Islamic teachings as well as the need of Muslim sociocultural settings.