Andrew Dumm
U.S. Fulbright Student to Jordan, 2007-2008
Winner of the 2008 Marine Corps Marathon

Like all of my fellow students, my Fulbright experience was incredibly enriching and formative.  I spent my first three months continuing my study of Arabic on a Critical Language Enhancement Award at Yarmouk University in Irbid in the North, taking intensive media Arabic courses and doing my best to keep up with an introductory journalism class with Jordanian undergraduates. I moved to the capital Amman in January to carry out research on emerging forms of digital news media in Jordan. After six months of close reading of English/Arabic political blogs and Jordan's nascent Internet-only Arabic newspapers, I delved into Jordanian press laws and carried out interviews with about a dozen bloggers and media professionals. My goal was to probe digital news media's role (and future potential) as an alternative voice to Jordan's traditional mainstream media--and investigate how these new forms were able to both advance content quality standards like investigative journalism within the limits of Internet penetration and evade sometimes restrictive free speech laws and a tradition of self-censorship.

My research was very rewarding. Apart from self-directed study, I was able to collaborate a bit with Jordan Fulbright Scholar William Knowles, a Professor of Journalism at the University of Montana teaching at Petra University. I sat in on Jordan's first blogging conference "Sha3shabouneh" (~Daddy Long Legs), and raised issues of Internet access and digital press freedoms in the context of cross-cultural youth communication during the Project on Middle East Democracy/American's for Informed Democracy Amman Conference "We Are Connected; But Are We Communicating? American Foreign Policy and Jordanian Society--A Dialog."

Unlike a lot of Fulbright students, perhaps, my personal story is anchored by a bizarre and lasting passion for running.  Any Fulbright experience is enhanced by what students and scholars choose to pursue outside of or alongside research. For me, my passion for running was a natural compliment to research and daily life. Having run competitively for the University of Virginia for four years, it was nice to have a year to rediscover the sport as recreation and therapy, and to discover for the first time its ability to bring cultures and peoples together. Daily runs in small, conservative Irbid were not without their difficulties. Stray dogs were always an exciting x-factor and pants were standard even in the hot summer. In the capital, however, running loop after loop on the short trail in Amman's "Sports City" was a great escape. There I met and remain close friends with police department racing teams and members of the Olympic development program.

Although my formal Arabic was great for research, and my dialect was coming along nicely, it took me a while to pick up the colloquial running lingo--words I very much take for granted in English. But eventually, being able to relate to my Jordanian friends and competitors and talk about our shared passion for the sport was the quickest way I found all year of toppling cultural barriers. I really believe sport is above politics and nationality, and my fellowship with some of Jordan's runners truly proved the point. It was a really unexpected compliment to the mission of the Fulbright program, but I think in some (admittedly) small way my experience with running in Jordan helped bridge some cultural gaps.

I have a number of cherished memories of running in Jordan. My favorite was probably the 250 km all-night relay run "Dead to Red," which, as its name may imply, pits teams of ten against each other in a race from the Dead Sea to the Red Sea--about half the north/south length of the Kingdom. My team of US embassy staff and American/British/Jordanian friends came from behind to snag third by less than ten seconds after over 16 hours of racing. Equally memorable, though, was a solo run towards the Saudi border I made from our friends' isolated campsite in the desert nature preserve of Wadi Rum. The sun quickly set and I spent over an hour longer than I planned frantically running and searching for our tents under the moonlight. Not a smart move, but all is well that ends well.

Winning the Marine Corps Marathon is as much a cap to my year of ex-patriate running as it was the beginning of a new chapter. Either way, the race was really special to me, not only because I exceeded my personal expectations, but because my father and brother (Brian, who was fifth) were also competing. Since returning to the US, I've started a graduate program in Middle Eastern Studies/Politics at American University.  I plan to keep running---and if I'm lucky maybe on a level that may once again send me abroad and bring me face to face with many other cultures.

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