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This textbook takes a new approach to teaching creative writing
that centers the concerns of multicultural students. It focuses on
the experiences of those who wish to write through their diverse
identities, including ethnic, cultural, racial, national, regional,
and international identity as well as gender identity, sexual
preference, class position, and disability. Combining the study of
culturally diverse literature with the process of writing, students
are encouraged to engage with various texts and to use them to
inspire their own work. Organized around a series of writing
prompts and discussions of literary readings that address identity,
place, perception, family, community, encounters, inheritance, and
resistance, this book offers both writers and teachers a way to
engage with the practice of writing from a multicultural
perspective.
They went to Cairo, leaving behind the adobe houses built along the
edge of the Nile and the villagers who all knew each other and who
had lived on this land for more centuries than their names could
count. Behind them, they left the imprint of their footsteps for
others who might follow. Â This family saga begins when
Salim, the eldest of three brothers, moves to Cairo at the start of
the twentieth century with dreams of opening his own bakery. His
decision to leave his ancestral village of Kom Ombo despite his
parents’ objections reverberates across generations, kicking off
a series of migrations that shape the lives of his family and their
descendants throughout the decades that follow. These migrations
only intensify after the revolution of 1952—with Misha, Salim’s
eldest grandchild, being the first to flee to “Amreeka,” his
annual phone calls home becoming briefer and briefer with each
passing year. Â Culminating with the 2011 protests in Tahrir
Square, Pauline Kaldas’s The Measure of Distance is a detailed
portrait of immigration against the backdrop of an Egypt in
constant flux and an America that is always falling short of the
fantasy. Alternating between tales of those who migrate and those
who stay, this expansive novel follows its characters as they
determine the course of their lives, often choosing one uncertainty
over another as they migrate to new lands or plant their roots more
firmly in their homeland.
The first edition of Dinarzadas Children was a groundbreaking and
popular anthology that brought to light the growing body of short
fiction being
written by Arab Americans. This expanded edition includes sixteen
new stories athirty in allaand new voices and is now organized into
sections that invite readers to enter the stories from a variety of
directions. Here are stories that reveal the initial adjustments of
immigrants, the challenges of forming relationships, the political
nuances of being Arab American, the vision directed towards
homeland, and the ongoing search for balance and identity.
The contributors are D. H. Melhem, Mohja Khaf, Rabih Alameddine,
Rawi Hage, Laila Halaby, Patricia Sarrafian Ward, Alia Yunis, Diana
Abu Jaber, Susan Muaddi Darraj, Samia Serageldin, Alia Yunis,
Joseph Geha, May Monsoor Munn, Frances Khirallah Nobel, Nabeel
Abraham, Yussef El Guindi, Hedy Habra, Randa Jarrar, Zahie El
Kouri, Amal Masri, Sahar Mustafah, Evelyn Shakir, David Williams,
Pauline Kaldas, and Khaled Mattawa.
When her husband is offered a six-month Fulbright grant to teach
American literature at Cairo University, Pauline Kaldas embarks on
a new journey - and an opportunity to return home. A native of
Egypt, she immigrated with her parents to the United States when
she was eight years old. Returning now with her own children Kaldas
writes from her perspective as an Arab American, straddling two
homelands and two identities. Through a colorful collection of
letters, journal entries, essays, and even local recipes, she
provides a richly detailed portrait of life in Cairo, recording
daily revelations - and eventually reconciling past and present.
""Looking at it, I feel that I exist firmly balanced."" With keen
observation and deeply personal reflections, the author presents a
thoughtful meditation on the meaning of place, family, and origin.
Kaldas offers insight into the complexities of Egyptian culture,
alternately taking on roles of linguist and political interpreter,
and covering everything from class issues and political activism to
education and the impact of Western culture. But it is her moving,
often entertaining letters and her children's emails and poems that
will charm readers and resonate with devotees of travel essays and
multicultural literature. This book captures the images, character,
and passion of an extraordinary country. Marked by spare, graceful
prose, drawing on observations and friendships past and present,
Kaldas offers a unique lens into Middle Eastern societies, one that
the reader will not soon forget.
This anthology brings together the voices of both new and
established Arab American writers in a compilation of creative
nonfiction that reveals the stories of the Arab diaspora in styles
that range from the traditional to the experimental. Writers from
Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine, and Syria explore issues related
to politics, family, culture, and racism. Coming from different
belief systems and cultures and including first- and
second-generation immigrants as well as those whose identities
encompass more than a single culture, these writers tell stories
that speak to the complexity of the Arab American experience.
This anthology brings together the voices of both new and
established Arab American writers in a compilation of creative
nonfiction that reveals the stories of the Arab diaspora in styles
that range from the traditional to the experimental. Writers from
Egypt, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine, and Syria explore issues related
to politics, family, culture, and racism. Coming from different
belief systems and cultures and including first- and
second-generation immigrants as well as those whose identities
encompass more than a single culture, these writers tell stories
that speak to the complexity of the Arab American experience.
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