The Middle East in America
For more than three decades the Center has pursued a dual project focusing on the presence and impact of the Middle East in the United States. Conceived and directed by Jonathan Friedlander and supported by Center Directors Georges Sabagh, Irene Bierman and Leonard Binder, the two initiatives explore the history and status of Middle Eastern Americans in the US, and conversely the representation of the Middle East in the American psyche and culture.
CNES' scholarly output on Middle Eastern Americans is considerable. It includes pioneering studies of Arab labor migration (Sojourners and Settlers: The Yemeni Immigrant Experience), Iranian emigrés and exiles (Irangeles: Iranians in Los Angeles), a study of Middle Eastern immigrants in the context of Ethnic LA (Russell Sage Foundation), as well as a NEH funded documentary entitled Arabs in America funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities.
The wealth of academic, literary and visual output and studies concerning Middle Eastern Americans can be explored on the interactive database MEARO – Middle Eastern American Resources Online – jointly produced by the Center for Near Eastern Studies at UCLA and the Middle East and Middle Eastern American Center at City University of New York.
For more than a decade CNES has been documenting, collecting and interpreting representations of the Middle East in the realms of architecture and the built environment, consumerism and marketing, festivals, pageantry and entertainment, including film, music and dance. The concept of American Orientalism emerged from a series of panels on the subject held at meetings of the Middle East Studies Association and the World Congress for Middle Eastern Studies. The Center is presently developing an online publication of American Orientalism with an archive of textual, visual and aural resources that will be featured in an exhibition at the UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History, which will serve as a repository for the growing collection of Middle Eastern Americana.
