Northeastern State University

NSU to host its first Fulbright Scholar

Northeastern State University will host its first Fulbright Scholar through the Fulbright Visiting Specialists Program "Direct Access to the Muslim World."

With the help of in-kind partners and associates the Confucius Institute at the University of Oklahoma-Tulsa, the Islamic Society of Tulsa, Connors State College, Tulsa Community College and the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Tahlequah, NSU was awarded the program last July.

The Fulbright Program, under the Council of International Exchange of Scholars (CIES), lauded NSU’s application for its "enthusiasm" and wrote"[T]he review committee was very interested in the proposal and… its thoroughness, schedule, and…appropriateness of the host."

The Visiting Specialist, Dr. Muhammed Syamsuddin, will live on the NSU campus and visit, lecture and be involved in public forums around northeastern Oklahoma, Oct. 11 – Nov. 23. Syamsuddin will teach a Monday-Wednesday-Friday class on Muslim cultures, 2-4:15 p.m., that includes visits to Tulsa mosques on Friday prayer days. These visits count for general education credit.

He will also give public lectures and talks with faculty and community leaders regarding comparative religions and Interfaith Dialogue, women in Islam, Violence in Religion, Neo-Confucianism, and Liberation Theology in Asia.

Syamsuddin received his Bachelor's and Master's degrees at Gadjah Mada University in Yogyakarta, Java, Indonesia, where he teaches Philosophy and Philosophy of Religion. He received his Ph.D. at Hanuk University of Foreign Studies in Seoul, South Korea, in 2006 with his dissertation on “Merleau-Ponty’s Solution to the Mind-Body Problem and Its Philosophical Implications for Understanding Korean New-Confucianism’s concept of Self-Cultivation.”

Dr. Syamsuddin’s home country, Indonesia, is the world’s largest archipelago, located in Southeast Asia off the coast of Malaysia. It is the world’s most populous Muslim country.

For more information regarding Dr. Syamsuddin’s appearance on campus, contact Dr. Andrew Vassar at 918-456-5511, ext. 2728.

10/7/2009