As the UAE has grown rapidly over the past years, a lot of the sources on history and culture can be obtained from people directly. For our first essay assignment, I decided to ask my Mom for clarifications on two topics to help with my writing:

The first one being about the poetry scene in the UAE, long before the UAE became a country one of the most prevalent events within our culture revolved around poetry. According to my Mom, most people from around a hundred years ago to 60-ish years ago were illiterate and their main means of communicating poetry was through memorization. Everyone had a duty bestowed upon them to remember each other’s words and to pass the poems on. I’m hoping to examine the pros and cons of relying on verbal communication within the UAE and how the lack of inscription and the reliance on community relates to our culture.  There is much more to examine within this topic and I’m merely scratching the surface but I’m hoping it will all make sense when I draft the first paper.

As for the second topic, it was common for people that lived on islands to rely on a person as a messenger. Due to everyone being illiterate, they relied on the messengers to carry their messages verbally across to the other islands. This topic is somewhat similar to my previous one as it touches on the aspect of communities and cultures that form and stay together due to their forms of communication. Furthermore, another way of communicating to other islands which were closer and visible was hanging pieces of cloth as a flag that would indicate that the islanders needed something. The receivers of the message would then send someone, a messenger, over to examine the situation and see what they needed and then rallying the message back.

I think both of my topics touch on the same concepts revolving around communities forming over verbal communication due to the lack of literacy. I also find it somewhat ironic that the source I am relying on was verbally communicated to me through my Mom and her experience.