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Lebanon

Lebanon Reporting

‘They Hit Everyone and Anyone’: From Lebanon, residents share what life has been like since Israel launched its attack.

Posted on October 2, 2024 by Alex Shams

Originally published on Oct 2, 2024 in New York Magazine. As told to Alex Shams. On September 17, Israel launched a military assault in Lebanon. It began with attacks that

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Featured Mexico Reporting

The Arab heart of Mexico City

Posted on November 15, 2016 by Alex Shams

Originally published on Middle East Eye on November 15, 2016. Arab immigrants have become a normal part of everyday life, but in many ways they remain a community apart A

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Lebanon Reporting

Not Just Decor: The Struggle for Real Women’s Rights in Lebanon

Posted on January 16, 2012 by Alex Shams

Originally published on Transit, the blog of the Goethe Institute in the Middle East. On Saturday, January 14th 2012, Lebanese women and men marched against rape, demanding law reforms that criminalise marital

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Lebanon Reporting

Beirut’s revolutionary space: Martyr’s Square

Posted on May 14, 2011 by Alex Shams

Originally published in Mashallah News on May 14, 2011. “Think Lebanese, think secular” The Arab and global audience has borne witness in recent months to massive pitched battles in the central

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About me

Alex Shams is an Iranian-American writer and a PhD student of Anthropology at the University of Chicago.

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Recent posts

  • Workshop: Investigating Power
  • The “Terrorists” in My Grandmother’s Neighborhood
  • A Persian Christmas Story: How A Jewish Shrine in Qazvin Connects Palestine and Iran
  • ‘They Hit Everyone and Anyone’: From Lebanon, residents share what life has been like since Israel launched its attack.
  • Iran Braces for Uncertainty After President Raisi’s Death
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About

Born and raised in an Iranian-American family in Los Angeles, Alex Shams has long been fascinated by the stories that places can tell us. Growing up, he learned Persian and Spanish; in college, he learned Arabic and studied abroad at the American University of Cairo before moving to Beirut after graduation. After receiving his master’s in Middle Eastern Studies from Harvard, he moved to Bethlehem, Palestine, where he was a journalist at Ma’an News Agency, the largest independent Palestinian news organization. He received his PhD. from the University of Chicago in Sociocultural Anthropology. His dissertation, entitled “Constructing Islamic Modernity: Power, Religion, and Masculinity in Post-Revolutionary Iran,” was based on three years of ethnographic research in Iran, Iraq, and Pakistan as well as archival research in the British Library and Ba’ath Party Archives.

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Popular posts

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  • Workshop: Investigating Power
    Workshop: Investigating Power

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