Muslims in the Media - Firoozeh Dumas December 19, 2008

Favorite:

Complete video at: http://fora.tv/2008/11/23/Firoozeh_Dumas_Laughing_Without_An_Accent

Iranian-American author Firoozeh Dumas criticizes American media for promoting what she views as an overly negative representation of Muslims.

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Often lost in the rhetoric of debate about the United States' immigration policy is this: although each immigrant's country of origin and reason for leaving are widely diverse, the experience of being an immigrant in the United States crosses all cultural divides.

For the past five years, Firoozeh Dumas has traveled the country reminding us that our commonalities far outweigh our differences ... and doing so with humor.

In 2001, with no prior writing experience, Firoozeh Dumas decided to write down her family stories as a gift for her two children. Those stories became the book Funny in Farsi, a San Francisco Chronicle and Los Angeles Times bestseller and a finalist for the PEN/USA award and for an Audie Award for best audio book (She lost to Bob Dylan).

She was also a finalist for the prestigious Thurber Prize for American Humor (she lost to Jon Stewart), and is the first Middle Eastern woman ever to be considered for this honor.

Dumas's latest book, entitled Laughing Without an Accent, was published in May 2008 - Grace Cathedral