[LCM Events] [Leb4ever] An Evening with Evelyn Shakir - "Remember Me to Lebanon: Stories of Lebanese Women in America"

[Loai Naamani]

 <http://web.mit.edu/lebanon> 



a book reading & signing with
Evelyn Shakir

R e m e m b e r  M e  t o  L e b a n o n:
Stories of Lebanese Women in America

thursday | may 10 | 7pm | mit | e51-376 | 70 memorial drive (map
<http://whereis.mit.edu/map-jpg?selection=E51&Buildings=go> )
free & open to the general public

 


About the Book
The tales in Evelyn Shakir's Remember Me to Lebanon: Stories of Lebanese
Women in America are set in various eras, from the 1960s to the present and
occasionally hark back even to the turn of the twentieth century.
Protagonists range in age from a teenager who resists her father's
understanding of honor, to an elderly woman who returns from the grave for
one last try at whipping her family into shape.  Most of the stories
dramatize personal issues involving negotiation between generations and
cultures.  But others have a political dimension-one is set against the
backdrop of the Lebanese civil war; another is a response to 9/11, narrated
by a woman who keeps watch all day on the Arab family next door.  (Remember
Me is published by Syracuse University Press.)

About the Author
Evelyn Shakir, daughter of Lebanese immigrants to the United States, and a
pioneer in the study of Arab American literature is author of Bint Arab:
Arab and Arab American Women in the United States (Praeger 1997), which will
soon appear in an Arabic-language edition.  As a Senior Fulbright scholar,
she has taught American literature to university students in both Lebanon
and Syria; under the auspices of Bentley College (where she is professor
emerita), she has taught similar courses in the kingdom of Bahrain. She
holds degrees from Wellesley College, Harvard University, and Boston
University.

Reviews of Shakir's Bint Arab
"Weaving together the personal narratives of a number of women of different
generations and experiences (including those in her own family), Shakir
compares their lives and experiences as they negotiated their way between
the demands of their own cultural traditions and the opportunities provided
by their new adopted country. A rich and complex portrait of Arab women and
their culture emerges, one that should serve as a corrective to the negative
and simplistic stereotype about Arab women in the West."
  - Choice

"A sweeping mosaic, rich and colorful in human experience, brought to life
in a collection of observations of life in their lands of origin and,
primarily, in the U.S., where events in the Middle East continued to shape
their identity."
  - Al Jadid

"A gem of a book....[and a] valuable insight into the changing generational
perspectives of what it means for an Arab-American woman to be a good
daughter, sister, wife, and mother."
  - Journal of Palestine Studies

"Shakir presents the material in a coherent, logical manner, adding comments
or background where necessary, but never judging. Bint Arab is a worthwhile
book for Arab Americans and all others interested in knowing more about the
women of this little-known ethnic group."
  - International Migration Review

"A major and enjoyable contribution to the understanding of Arab and Arab
American women....[Shakir] gives voice to women's struggles when they
navigate between their Arab family values and those of their new country."
  - MESA (Middle Eastern Studies Association) Bulletin

"American libraries and bookstores have long been waiting for a book like
Evelyn Shakir's Bint Arab....Shakir has written a thoughtful and moving text
that brings to light, through a skillful blend of scholarship and oral
storytelling, the largely untold history of a century of Arab immigration to
the United States....Never before has the Arab-American experience been
chronicled in just this fashion....Shakir should be thanked for having had
the courage to write it."
  - Wellesley

"[T]he women's voices which Shakir enlists to flesh out the big picture
bring fresh insights to an otherwise stale story. Compelling as they are
diverse, the stories stand on their own as worthy of interest. They touch on
every conceivable subject--marriage and divorce, religious fundamentalism
and modern feminism, cultural racism and social embarrassment, domestic
violence and interdenominational marriages. The Lebanese and Palestine women
assembled by Shakir, immigrants and native born, engage the reader's
interest as they wrestle with various pressures and demands placed on them
to conform to mainstream culture....[A]dds a new dimension to the
understanding of what, for the lack of a better term, has been called the
Arab-American experience."
  - Journal of American Ethnic History

"Shakir manages to provide an interdisciplinary approach in her work, giving
the reader an insight into Arab customs and traditions, and into the women's
intimate consciousness... The book is a valuable reference on the America
society seen through Arab women immigrants' eyes... It is with great joy and
interest that I read this book!"
  - Journal of Third World Studies

 

Lebanese Club at MIT C 2007| http://web.mit.edu/lebanon

 

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