From Durham to Tehran presents a Persian literature specialist's impressions and reflections on his field of study and profession, based on two research trips, one to Durham, England in 1986 and the other to Tehran, Iran in 1989. With a format of travel diary entries, the book intends to suggest issues which American students of non-Western literary cultures face in their professional lives. It highlights ambiguities which characterise the situations and experiences of American students of living non-Western literatures. Moreover, it suggests that involvement in an older non-Western literary culture impels the American to reflection on his or her own roots and cultural history. It includes memories of many notable literary figures including Jalal Al-e Ahmad, Ali Shariati and Sadeq Chubak.

From Classroom to Courtroom tells the story of how fifteen American university academics in a Middle Eastern Studies department got embroiled in serious unacademic conflicts with serious consequences. From 1994 onward, these academic colleagues made or faced official complaints and allegations of favoritism, intimidation, abuse, harassment, and racism, and charges of prevarication and dishonesty, and ethnic, religious, and gender discrimination. They initiated three or four faculty grievances. An exodus of graduate students from the department consequently took place. Five or six faculty careers ended in the process, which culminated in a law suit. From Classroom to Courtroom details behavior of the author and six or seven of his departmental colleagues and two university administrators in conflict situations within, between, and among the department's Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, and Turkish sections. The author develops this part of the narrative mostly through a paper trail of official letters, reports, memoranda, e-messages, and court deposition testimony In highlighting cross-cultural dimensions of cited conflicts, From Classroom to Courtroom suggests arguably culture-specific behavior on the part of departmental colleagues, only two of them born in America. Such behavior, the book implies, may derive from cultural conflicts between some academics of Arab, Iranian, and Israeli origin, on the one hand, and American academics of European origin, on the other, between some Muslim and Christian Arabs and some Jewish Israelis, and between some Middle Eastern and American men and some Middle Eastern women. In its chronological narrative leading up to a law suit filed by an Arab Muslim woman academic against her department and college, From Classroom to Courtroom also tells the story of the book's author and first-person narrator, describing the daily life of a Middle East language/literature professor at a large state university, a life of teaching, writing, departmental politics, family, and travel.

From Classroom to Courtroom tells the story of how fifteen American university academics in a Middle Eastern Studies department got embroiled in serious unacademic conflicts with serious consequences. From 1994 onward, these academic colleagues made or faced official complaints and allegations of favoritism, intimidation, abuse, harassment, and racism, and charges of prevarication and dishonesty, and ethnic, religious, and gender discrimination. They initiated three or four faculty grievances. An exodus of graduate students from the department consequently took place. Five or six faculty careers ended in the process, which culminated in a law suit. From Classroom to Courtroom details behavior of the author and six or seven of his departmental colleagues and two university administrators in conflict situations within, between, and among the department's Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, and Turkish sections. The author develops this part of the narrative mostly through a paper trail of official letters, reports, memoranda, e-messages, and court deposition testimony In highlighting cross-cultural dimensions of cited conflicts, From Classroom to Courtroom suggests arguably culture-specific behavior on the part of departmental colleagues, only two of them born in America. Such behavior, the book implies, may derive from cultural conflicts between some academics of Arab, Iranian, and Israeli origin, on the one hand, and American academics of European origin, on the other, between some Muslim and Christian Arabs and some Jewish Israelis, and between some Middle Eastern and American men and some Middle Eastern women. In its chronological narrative leading up to a law suit filed by an Arab Muslim woman academic against her department and college, From Classroom to Courtroom also tells the story of the book's author and first-person narrator, describing the daily life of a Middle East language/literature professor at a large state university, a life of teaching, writing, departmental politics, family, and travel.