Alex Shams

El Salvador Reporting USA

Reconstructing the Village of the Divino Salvador

October 31, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Los Angeles Review of Books on October 31, 2017. EVERY AUGUST, Salvadorans around the world celebrate the Festival of El Salvador del Mundo, the patron saint and

Iran Iraq Opinion USA

The Weaponization of Nostalgia: How Afghan Miniskirts Became the Latest Salvo in the War on Terror

September 6, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published by “Ajam Media Collective” The debate over Afghan women’s miniskirts have become the latest salvo in the War on Terror. Last month, Donald Trump announced that the US

Iran Reporting USA

Sedentary Fragmentation: Toward a Genealogy of Chicago’s Iranian Art Scene

August 22, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ajam Media Collective. In 1951, a young Iranian man named Hannibal Alkhas moved from Tehran to Chicago, where he spent the next decade studying at the Art

Iraq Palestine Reporting

The Iraqi soldiers who sacrificed everything to defend Palestine in 1948

May 15, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ajam Media Collective on May 15, 2017. The main road north from the West Bank city of Nablus winds between rolling hills covered in olive groves, abandoned

Iraq Reporting

The Joys of Akitu, the Assyrian New Year

April 5, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ajam Media Collective on April 5, 2017. Assyrians around the world marked the festival of Akitu this week, a spring holiday that commemorates the beginning of the

Opinion USA

Trump’s ‘honour crimes’ order is a racist distraction

March 11, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Aljazeera on March 11, 2017. The key to protecting American women is defeating American sexism and racism, not scapegoating migrants or Muslims. Trump’s proposal to track ‘honour

Opinion

On Women’s Day, Thinking Beyond American Flag Hijabs

March 8, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ajam Media Collective on March 8, 2017. Among the most iconic images from the Women’s March in January was a poster of a woman wrapped in a hijab covered

Palestine Reporting

Yacoub Shaheen, the Assyrian singer from Palestine taking Arab Idol by storm

February 17, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published by Ajam Media Collective on February 17, 2017. In just a few short months, Yacoub Shaheen has gone from a local singer in the West Bank town of

Opinion

Don’t normalize Trump’s vision for America

February 2, 2017 by Alex Shams

Originally published on CNN on February 2, 2017. I am a child of a Muslim refugee. My father found safety and shelter in the United States after fleeing violence in

Featured India Reporting

Welcome to the Beef Capital of India

November 20, 2016 by Alex Shams

In Hyderabad, a cosmopolitan culinary culture fights back against the Hindu nationalist current sweeping the nation. A dish of tallava gosht slow frying in peanut oil on a cast-iron tava