The Essential needs of Iranian Woman today, a conference

“Dad, would you rather I were a boy?” The first time my daughter asked me that she was in her teens, arguing for easier curfews and a more liberal attitude towards boyfriends. What she was really asking was, “Why is my worth as a human being disproportionately tied up in my chastity?”

As I browse the program for the 19th international conference of the Iranian Women’s Studies Foundation, I see that some of the lectures and panels pose same question from different angles.

For example, Sharareh Shahrokhi’s lecture topic will be, "The right to choose what to wear: an essential need for an Iranian woman or a superfluous one?"

Though the hejab topic gets top billing in Western media, Iranian women activists who live under IRI laws wonder what priority they should give the hejab relative to, say, unfair divorce laws. Does it make sense to bicker over a piece of cloth while custody of your child is threatened? On the other hand, bowing to the hejab symbol gives up turf even before the battle has begun. Gender segregation works against equitable family law.

Iran’s adultery laws are another place where justice and symbolism are at odds. Stoning cases are few and there is a moratorium on carrying out such sentences. But the very fact that adultery is a capital offense in the law books, means that in principle the IRI assumes the power to end a human life based on her sexual behavior. Moreover it has reserved its most hateful form of punishment for adultery. Stoning in its original intent is execution by collective injury at the hands of one’s own community.

Conference panelist Soheila Vahdati Bana, a leading activist against Iran’s stoning laws, has argued that the punishment affects women disproportionately. Iranian Family Law allows female child marriages, restricts a woman’s right to divorce, handicaps the mother in child custody cases, and is biased in favor of the husband in domestic abuse cases. All these factors tempt the wife to seek affection outside the marriage.

The second time I got the question from my daughter, “Dad, would you rather I were a boy,” she was no longer fighting curfews. She was wondering about gender and the nature of power and leadership as she embarked on a long period of professional training.

I don’t know where in the world she will end up living-- Iran ,US, Europe Africa. But I had assumed the disadvantages of being a woman in Western cultures are fast disappearing. Both senators from my state of California are women, and a powerful California Congresswoman is the Speaker of the US House of Representatives. By comparison women in Iran are virtually deprived of a share of official power. The power and leadership question depends on which country you’re talking about, or so I thought.

Guest speakers, Soraya Fallah and Sakineh Sahebi may disagree. Conference organizer Jamileh Davoodi says these thinkers look beyond national boundaries to the more fundamental issues of Patriarchy. “There is no external or internal Patriarchy. Our borders are not different,” Davoodi paraphrases.

A year ago, I had little idea what she may be talking about. But during the Hillary Clinton campaign there was an unease in American society that told me there is something to “get” that has nothing to do with whether a woman can hold high office, and may even be unrelated to sexism as it is normally defined. I hope to find clarification by listening to these speakers’ discourse on fontierless patriarchy. Right now the feeling is vague; rather like the pause after you unknowingly invite a vegetarian to your barbecue.

While thinking globally, there may be reasons to act locally by seeking solutions in the unique context of each culture’s history and political circumstance There will be representatives from Iraq and Palestine at the conference, and one question that I hope comes up is whether it is good strategy for Iranian women to approach their problem from the global view of Islamic repression. While breaking formation has the advantage of better focus, cooperation and shared strategies have also proven very effective. For example the famous Million Signature Campaign to end gender discrimination in Iran is modelled after a political mobilization program that began in Morocco. Mitra Shodjaie will be there to discuss this groundbreaking campaign.

The conference also includes discussions on the contribution of the Internet to free speech, the new sexual risk taking patterns of urban women, and the specific needs of younger generation of Iranian women.

I’m also rooting for Partow Nooriala’s talk to be a hit. Her topic, “The necessity of shattering traditional images of women in cinema,” reflects the wisdom of the conference organizers in recognizing how art brings about social change. Naturally, there will be music, singing, and this play.

Here is the contact infor for the conference.

San Jose Human Rights Seminar on Iran

Everyone who went to the recent San Jose Human Rights Seminar on Iran got a copy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). During the presentations there was much discussion of religion, and it is possible to review the event by comparing the UDHR to a much older declaration in the Bible.

There are ten commandments in the laws of Moses, and three times as many in the UDHR. The first four laws that came down from the mountain aren't at all about how humans should treat each other; rather they establish the authority of the lawgiver:

1. I'm God.
2. Don't worship any other god.
3. Respect my name.
4. Every seventh day is "God day." [see note 1]

After God uses up almost half the space on the tablet with pictures of his police badge and gun, he finally gets around to saying we shouldn't rob and murder each other.

By comparison, none of the articles of the UDHR claim the power to enforce. The first article, for instance, simply says, "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood."

There is no reference to authority because the code isn't meant for individuals; it is meant for states. Lawgivers themselves. The only god able to lord over these super beings is History. This is reflected in the preamble to the UDHR, which basically warns:

1. I'm History.
2. Respect human rights and your reward shall be peace and joy.
3. Violate human rights and your punishment will be war and a pissed off population.

The conference itself was a showcasing of restrained but powerfully articulated anger. Smoke and rumbling from Mount History.

Religious minorities:
Bahais are the most severely persecuted religious minority in Iran. Their leaders are jailed or executed. They are denied access to higher education. Employers are pressured to fire Bahai employees, and lawyers are intimidated into refusing Bahai clients.

Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians have nominal freedom under Islamic law to practice their religions. But IRI laws are cleverly designed to whittle away at these rights. One conference speaker, Dr. Jaleh Pirnazar mentioned an IRI law where if one member of a family in a religious minority converts to Islam then all the rights of inheritance go to that person, disinheriting the other family members. These sneaky persecutions slowly institutionalize our culture's traditional mistrust and contempt for members of minority religions.

The audience questioned critically whether defending the right to religion does not go against the secular grain of human rights. After all, which of these God based institutions wouldn't do the same to Muslims if the situation were reversed? The answer seems to be that if the UDHR is powerful enough to liberalize Islam, then it would also restrict intolerance in other faiths.

At one point in the panel discussion Neda Shahidyazdani, speaking for the Bahi, told a story that transcended even the articles of UDHR. A Muslim man broke into tears after handing over the body of an executed Bahai to the victim's mother. He said he wished he were not part of a system that would commit such crimes. Is it not a human right to live in a society where one does not contribute to crimes of conscience? As an American I feel this violation of my human rights every time I remember my taxes are paying the salaries of torturers in Guantanamo prison.

Women's rights:
The Million Signatures Campaign to stop gender discrimination in Iran is currently at the frontlines of the human rights efforts in Iran. IRI laws discriminate against women regarding polygamy, divorce, child custody, inheritance, blood money, court testimony, travel abroad, public appearance, and other issues. Women's rights activist Fariba Davoodi Mohajer made a strong play for leadership of the dissident community by pointing out that the vigor in the women's movement could energize other movements too damp to ignite.

She's right! Current political winds are backing women's movements. The universal upheaval in gender attitudes reminds us of the dramatic days when class wars were reshaping the world. During her "can do" style PowerPoint presentation Davoodi Mohajer outlined the successes of the campaign in reaching, educating, and activating Iranian women, setting an example for organized action against unfair laws.

Daringly, Davoodi Mohajer chastized the traditional leftists for ignoring women's rights in their agendas when the Left held the world's attention. The shoe is on the other foot now, but has the lesson been learned? I wonder how much cooperation exists between the women's movement and, say, the labor movement. Conversely, how many signatures is the labor movement collecting towards the million?

There is tremendous support for the Million Signature Campaign outside Iran, including a recent youth demonstration in Geneva that helped pressure the IRI to free some of the campaign's activists from prison. Other diverse dissident groups in Iran could pitch in with resources, and get profitable returns on their investment by supporting the internationally favored women's movement.

Which brings me to a great new Farsi word Dr. Mansour Farhang used during his talk on cooperation. Faraajenaahi, coined by Iran scholar Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak means "non-partisanship", a desperately needed word and concept for Iranian activists.

Admittedly, cooperation is sometimes unpleasant. For example the Million Signature Campaign does not seek regime change, only changes in the law. This may deter regime change supporters from participating in the effort. Yet another word that is fairly new to our ancient language may be of some help. The word Siaasat used to mean "good administration." But when the concept of citizenship evolved around the 1906 constitutional movement, Siaasat started meaning "politics" [see note 2]. This word democratized negotiating, coalition building, power brokering, and yes, distasteful alliances. So everyone can get in the mud now, not just ministers and kings. In a sense, politics is democracy, and getting dirty is a privilege not a dishonor.

Nevertheless, for the virtuous and the principled, The faraajenaah nature of the Iranian Society For Human Rights makes it an ideal vehicle for coalition building, and the most formidable tool yet for a multi-pronged democratic assault on the IRI. In fact we know the IRI is threatened by the human rights weapon because, it has responded by creating its own center for human rights studies and holds its own conferences on the topic.

Despite the ushaven faces and the retro taste in fashion, IRI supporters are cutting edge politicians, and know how to avail themselves of democratic teamwork when needed. Their common Shiite faith isn't their only instrument of unity. As for the opposition, the moral strength of the Universal Declaration Of Human Rights is a good replacement for faith in God, but the rest has to come from smart politicking. In this God versus Man contest, the winner will be whoever forges the strongest union. May the best man win.

Note 1: This is the Torah grouping of the Ten Commandments. There are other groupings.
Note 2. See State And Society in Iran by Homa Katouzian page 6.

Shahnameh Millennium Concert at the Iranian Studies Biennial

Ferdowsi packs so much literature in his verses that storytellers, singers, percussionists, and painters have traditionally helped unpack his work for us. For a thousand years, this collaboration of the letters and the arts in ghahveh khaneh (coffee house) settings has upgraded and refreshed the Iranian national identity. To commemorate the Shahnameh millennium, the Seventh Biennial conference of the International Society for Iranian Studies will include a multi-media concert combining Shahnameh storytelling (naghali), Shahnameh-inspired orchestral music, and visual presentations of scenes from the epic.

To bring the concert to this Toronto gathering of hundreds of Iran scholars, program chair Mohamad Tavakoli-Targhi invited Shahnameh narrator Morshed Torabi to collaborate with the Toronto Symphony Orchestra. He then invited concert pianist Ariana Barkeshli, who is also a music researcher, to be the artistic director for the event. Barkeshli recommended Persian Trilogy (Seganeh e Parsi), a suite of Shahnameh-inspired symphonic poems by Juliard composer Behzad Ranjbaran.

Looking back on a previous musical rendition of the Shahnameh, Iranians were so awed by composer Loris Tjeknavorian's Rostam va Sohrab that, despite its orchestral format, they welcomed the work into Shahnameh's exclusive tonal tradition. So I asked Barkeshli about her choice of Ranjbaran. In reply, she sent me the London Symphony Orchestra's recording of Persian Trilogy. Ranjbaran's work is mature in the way Sohrab would have been if the Shahnameh story had a happier ending. Confident, strong, wise, compassionate, yet youthful and contemporary. I was ready for drums and clashing daggers, but instead was humbled to find musical substance and emotional depth.

On the other hand, the audience for this multi-media presentation will be a lot tougher than I. It will include the world's largest concentration of experts on Iranian literature, history, art, anthropology, sociology, politics, whatever. Imagine playing a recital where seated in the first row are Bach to Bernstein, Rodrigo to Rohani. Add to these luminaries a Liberace or two who would delight in prima donna wisecracks. Nightmare!

Yet Barkeshli has no pre-performance anxiety. She is proud of her choice. Persian Trilogy is up to the challenge. Seemorgh, The Blood of Seyavash, and Seven Passages, simply dazzle. Maestro JoAnn Falletta apparently agrees. An avid promoter of Ranjbaran's talent, the internationally sought -after conductor will be interpreting Persian Trilogy for the large Toronto audience.

To appreciate Ranjbaran, the listeners will keep in mind the modern work that Iran scholars have done on Shahnameh's symbolic content. For example one Ferdowsi authority, Mahmoud Omidsalar, has done much to elevate the image of the epic from an action-adventure story to a thoughtful riddling of the human psyche. Due to Omidsalar's literary analysis, The Seven Trials of Rostam (Haftkhan) can now be seen as a dream sequence rather than an actual experience of the ordeal. Omidsalar points out that before some of the trials Ferdowsi has Rostam fall asleep. In fact Rostam does not fight the first battle at all. His steed, Raksh, kills the lion while his master sleeps. [See note 3]

There are several wispy, dreamlike demarcations in Seven Passages but the composer may or may not be proposing Omidsalar's Jungian take on the trials. Though he does mention in the CD notes, "I was inspired by the symbolism evident in the story." He adds, "The music reflects my general impression of the story rather than following it faithfully. It is one continuous piece organized tightly around a three-note motif (B, A sharp, B) transforming in the heroic finale to its inversion (B, C, B)." He too seems to view the seven trials as symbolic of the upheaval that occurs in our passage from a state of childhood to maturity. Or to take the symbolism a step further, the inversions that occur as lower levels of consciousness blossom into true awareness.

The audience will also be listening for how well Morshed Torabi melds the tenor of his narration into the texture of Ranjbaran's music. The art of naghali is a one-person show, with an occasional drum or bell. Strings, woodwinds and brass are new to this art form. Torabi will be arriving 10 days prior to the performance for rehearsals. I would pay a lot just to watch the Morshed emerge triumphant after he battles his own Seven Trials in this historic transformation of the art of naghali.

What sort of dialog will Torabi hold with the Persian miniature images projected onto the stage as he paints his own images in words? If Torabi is a pardeh khan (scene narrator) as well as a naghal, he may feel more at home surrounded by burly Qajar-style figures than with classical Persian miniatures. Will the sound tech know to capture the clap of the hand or the slap on the thigh? How does an actor who is used to being his own director share the stage?

Like Rostam's vanishing dragon there will be dangers invisible to the hero that others may have no trouble spotting. Shahnameh recitations are seamless with Persian tonal intervals and rhythmic declarations. Will Torabi's authenticity come through in the context of Western sounds? How much of the intimate coffeehouse warmth will this able naghal salvage in a performance hall that seats over 2500? How will he conjure the aroma of tea and the clink of saucers against glass? If you don't think this is a trial, try telling a campfire story without the dark woods and the embers.

Hopefully this multimedia experiment will raise some good debate. In fact the very idea of having cultural events at the once purely academic gathering of Iran scholars is still novel and controversial. But as our academics begin more and more to appreciate the enormous impact of art on human thought, I believe the disagreements will seem absurd in hindsight.

"The Iranian attitude towards art has come a long way though, hasn't it Ariana?" I told Barkeshli knowing it would bring emotion to her voice. As cousins we both remember how her father, Mehdi Barkeshli, kept repeating the lesson that art, literature and science are tonic, mediant and dominant in the strum of a single chord. The Sorbonne-educated physicist and musicologist worked hard constructing a theoretical foundation for the radif (system) of Persian music. Meanwhile he managed to found the Department of Music and Theatre at the University of Tehran-this accomplishment from a man whose traditional Iranian father once threw his son's violin into the fire.

Such outrageous behaviors of intolerance writ large by the IRI continue to make the Iranian diaspora cringe in embarrassment. Shahnameh Millennium Concert's program chair Tavakoli-Targhi says large-scale policies of intolerance are alien to Iran's cosmopolitan psyche. An accomplished Iran scholar, Tavakoli-Targhi points out insightfully that lovers in the Shahnameh--Bijan-Manijeh, Rostam-Tahmineh, Seyavash-Farangis-are mixed couples. This concert's vision in marrying a beautiful symphonic work to a handsome Shahnameh narration is the sort of vision Ferdowsi may have had for us from a millennium ago.

The Shahnameh Millenial Concert is scheduled for August 2 in Toronto's Roy Thompson Hall.

Note 1: The conference also includes a film festival. See details here.

Note 2: Here is a brief interview with "Gordafarid," Iran's first woman naghal. Morshed Torabi mentored her.

Note 3 : Shahnameh versions may vary from one coffee table to the next. This gem of a paper by Omidsalar on the haftkhan of Rostam uses the Khaleghi-Motlagh version.

Lies, damned lies, and statistics

The fastest way to build trust and generosity in someone is to spike her nasal spray with a dose of the hormone oxytocin. But hurry to the point--money, promotion, sex, whatever it is you can't get without cheating; the drug degrades to half its strength in only three minutes. The science article with this info coincidentally comes with a graph that suggests, among 29 nations, Iranians are the fourth least likely people to resort to this sort of deceitfulness. Norwegians stole the gold medal in trustworthiness, Denmark grabbed the silver, and if it hadn't been for the Chinese, Iranians would have come home with the bronze. Intrigued, I went surfing and found data that I liked even better. According to a World Values Survey of no less than 88 nations, the top scores in the trust games were Denmark: 60.1, Sweden: 62.4, Norway: 63.9, Iran: 65.4! Whatever you do though, don't leave your nasal spray unattended in Brazil. They scored dead last in the survey with a score of 4.8. If honesty were soccer, Iran would clobber Brazil 13.6 to one.

But before we start the doodooridooing, it is fair to ask how the integrity score is calculated. Simple; the score is the percentage of the population sample in each country who say other people can be trusted. To make sure a high score doesn't indicate a nation of trusting fools, these numbers are checked against "wallet drop" tests. The two approaches correlate well. This means if you drop your wallet in Iran, there is a 65.4 percent chance it will be returned to you-or maybe it means if you drop a wallet with $100 in it, you'll get back $65.40; take your pick. [see note 2]

Iran's first place result was so astonishing that one study using the World Values Survey threw out the data for Iran altogether, citing some technical equivocation. I checked the authors expecting to find a list of Brazilian sore losers. Instead, there was only Dr. Christian Bjornskov of Danish nationality (fourth place). His paper "The Determinants of Trust" posits that trust in a society is a kind of capital just like any other kind of economic asset. This economist belongs to a school of thought that says high levels of trust in a country bring about social goodies like economic growth, rule of law, democracy, clean government, good education, and low crime. The IRI is sitting on the world's largest reserve of social capital, yet it is still waiting for prices to come down. This is why our glorious score was thrown out as suspect.

Yet Bjornskov objectivity is also suspect. According to his research many Muslims use the phrase "Inch' Allah" (sic) in their daily life. He concludes, "...which means that only contingent on a number of factors do people feel morally obliged to keep their promises. This God given uncertainty naturally could lead to lower trust in fellow citizens."

Most Iranian Muslims I know refrain from saying "Inch' Allah," or dare think it. A similar sounding phrase, often mumbled, advertises the speaker's belief in an entity that would dip him in molten lead if he doesn't return people's wallets. If the above Iranian mumbled things like, "110% absolutely," then I would know he is clueless about the melting point of lead, and would not trust him. Invoking the will of Allah is a trust builder, not a trustbuster.

Bjornskov's reasoning is more at home in analyzing his native Nordic phrases. He notes that the old Viking saying, "a word is a word," is sometimes followed by "and a man is a man". This shows that, "...if a man was to break his word he would no longer qualify to be treated as such." Assuming every Danish male wants to be treated "as such," Bjornskov's predictor guarantees a minimum integrity score of 50% for his country. Presumably, the balance is contributed by Danish women who happen to be virtuous for unexplained reasons.

Before our dispute descends further into mother/sister name-callings, let me say I was actually impressed by Bjornskov's masculine appeal to "a word is a word, and a man is a man." Despite his low opinion of Islamic peoples, he seems familiar in a Viking way with the Iranian concept of looti gari. This makes me phrase my reaction to him in different terms: "Daashteem Pahlevoon? When did it become the rasm of the best and brightest of Vikingdom to spread misunderstandings as social science?"

As for the misunderstanding about Brazilians, no amount of oxytocin is going to make me believe that communities can be different from each other by trust factors as high as 13.6. Here's what I propose to Brazil: we Iranians are often desperate for a good soccer coach, and you folks obviously need world class coaching in how to respond to surveys. Shall we shake hands on the deal, or would you trust a mustache hair as collateral?



Note 1: The survey scores can be found in the appendix at the end of Bjornskov's paper, "The Determinants Of Trust," linked to in the above the article.

Note 2. In the second paragraph, the technical term "correlate" is used with some artistic license. A score of 65.4% in the survey doesn't necessarily mean a score of 65.4% in the "wallet drop" test.

Iranian Scholarship Foundation 2008 gala

Comedian Maz Jobarani finagled his complicated schedule so he could accept Iranian Scholarship Foundation’s invitation to speak at their fundraising gala. An alternate choice for the event had been graphic novelist Marjane Satrapi. But Jobrani was more stubbornly persuasive in beating back his schedulers. A stellar cluster of young Iranian scholars needed his support, and no other engagement seemed more important.

Jobrani immediately challenged his audience with a hilariously multi-layered routine about how his mother wanted him to be a lawyer--when he really wanted to be an actor.

Mother: You want to grow up to be a clown?
Maz: Mom, I just want to act.
Mother: Well being a lawyer is a kind of acting. Isn’t it? You act in front of the jury, that’s twelve people right there. Throw in the judge; that makes thirteen. And then there’s the weekends. Why don’t you act on weekends, ghorboonet beram.

Of course none of the scholarship students are attending clown school. Berkeley, Stanford, UCLA, Yale, Harvard, Cornell, Columbia, are all institutions with superb curricula in law and the sciences. But Jobrani’s clever routine seemed to be asking if the Scholarship Committee treated the arts seriously. As though in answer, one of the student speakers gave us the delightful news that his new play was about to be professionally produced. Later I found out another scholarship student majored in fashion design. In the case of Lawyer vs. Clown, the Scholarship Committee had been an impartial jury.

This impartiality is expressed tersely by Selection Committee member Dr. Abbas Milani. He says, "Once I determine a candidate has the four qualifications--grades, need, Iranian ancestors and contribution to promotion of Persian culture--then a composite of all four, along with the quality of statement and recommendations determines a students final rank."

On the emotional level, however, the four qualifications can be better understood in a Wizard of OZ format: brains, courage, heart, and vision.

The brains part of the story is easiest to see. A GPA of 3.5 in this need-based scholarship qualifies to apply for it, but some of the students carry strings of uninterrupted “A”s coupled with near perfect SAT scores.

Courage is the domain of Professor Jaleh Pirnazar, another of the six committee members. Venturing beyond academic achievement, undeterred by imperfect grades, she scours the applicant’s written essay, seeking strengths where a gamble may bring big payoffs. The qualities that impress her are leadership, perseverance against hardships, and a good sense of community responsibility. Tellingly, a recipient is obligated to perform 100 hours of community service each year so that his/her conscientious faculties continue to get a workout. Outside of class, look for ISF students in places like the Big Brother/Sister Program or cancer help centers.

Heart is symbolized by Mehdi Safipour. Ask any of the students who hold him up as their role model for commitment. When I saw Safipour last Sunday, I lied to him about looking less tired than he did during previous galas. He has not stopped to rest since he joined the committee years ago. The force of his dedication supplies even the tiniest administrative capillary of this foundation. In the middle of a busy financial accounting day, he has been known to take the trouble of making reminder calls to students who may be late in their paperwork, or who may need counseling towards a particular course credit.

Azadeh Hariri is the Dorothy archetype, symbolic of the students' vision . Her dream of happier futures drives the ISF narrative. An heiress to pre-revolution textile wealth, Hariri is the financial mill of the foundation. At first encounter she comes across as an unpretentiously rich altruist. Good students shouldn’t have to worry about money while in school.

At a broader level Hariri sees a time when the best Iranian minds are contributing to American culture. As politicians, judges, artists, entrepreneurs, professors, medical scientists, journalists, and economists they will fuse the wisdom of their Iranian heritage with the traditions of American democracy, creating better policies and decisions.

Of course if some of these students were to win Nobel Prizes, Oscars, or Pulitzers—and it's a safe bet—Hariri’s collection of intellectual gems will outshine any ornament she could put behind a glass. But this takes Hariri's philanthropic strategy too lightly. To explain, she pays all the costs of the foundation including the huge annual gala, so that 100% of the donations go to the students. One may ask if she’s got so much money why doesn’t she just pay the tuitions directly? Because the social institution of Iranian-Americans rolling up their sleeves to support each other could use help being built. Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach him to fish and…

Among the farsighted organizations teaching our community to fish, few are able to grant up to a $10,000 yearly scholarship four academic years in a row. Also, the selection committee never considers an applicant’s politics or religion in the award decision. At the gala there is a student who wears an Islamic roosari. This recipient--who scored first place in Iran's national university entrance exams--has bonded with Bahaiis, Jews, Christians and other Iranian youth of undetermined creed.

Packed with donors this year, at each event the numbers at the gala have been growing. Still, more funds are sought to invest beyond obviously “blue chip” students. There is hidden talent out there for historic Iranian-American innovations. With rising support and exposure, ISF hopes to go after matching university funds, potentially doubling its capacity to reach out to our community.

This year’s gala brought in over half a million dollars, including the auction overseen by hostess Rudy Bakhtiar, the journalist who occasionally lights up the CNN newsroom with her Persian charm.

The journalist Bakhtiar hosted us, the actor Jobrani gave us critical perspective, and the Persian Jazz singer, Ziba Shirazi, recorded the event in our emotional memories. Humming a Ziba Shirazi tune during the drive home, I wondered when the scholarship custom began in history. Back in the fifteenth century the wealthy Medici family took in a 13 year old kid who wasn’t much into school, but liked to draw. This is one early instance of the secular scholarship tradition that I could think of. The kid's name was Michelangelo.


Important note:
The May 31 deadline for ISF applications is approaching. Here’s the link if you know a student from anywhere in the US who would like to apply. Check out interviews with some of the ISF students here.

Confessions of a Farsiholic: reviewing a one-letter epic.

The first time I was fined for saying “Farsi” instead of “Persian” I didn’t fight the ticket because back then the action was all about French. French fries had become “Freedom” fries, ruining a flavorful shortcut to khoresh-e-gheimeh. Flag wavers claimed fried potatoes sliced lengthwise should never have been called French fries in the first place. There were “chips” to go with fried fish in England as early as 1864. Surely the US adopting fries in the 1930s, should have named this calorie bomb after her freedom-loving ally, and not after folks who would leave Iraqis in peace.

The Francophile in me worried that the logic of Iran experts who said the term “Farsi” broke ties with prestigious Persia, could also apply to French culture. I was nervous that Freedom fries, instead of French fries, would confuse historians as to the location of the Louvre and the nationality of Inspector Clouseau. If this renaming becomes a trend, I fussed, Americans would no longer think of Descartes when they eat French toast, or of Voltaire when they look out of French windows. Cardinal Richelieu would never again leap to mind as soon as anyone stuck a tongue in someone else’s mouth.

In this crisis, I reached out to an abridged history of the potato, which tentatively placed fries in Paris in 1840, almost a quarter of a century before the first chips greased the streets of London. I could go back to enjoying khoresh-e- gheimeh without feeling a party to the looting of Iraq’s civilization. More importantly, American English could begin reversing its Orwellian decline.

Throughout this time, though, I kept falling off the “Persian” wagon. Supportive friends promised that love would eventually come to my arranged marriage with this word. Yet I philandered with “Farsi,” and English cheerily egged me on. She gets a kick out of making her speakers and writers squabble. For example, did I tell you about the black eye I got over Star Trek’s “To boldly go where no man has gone before?” English has been on red alert status since the original sci-fi series first came out in the sixties. Is it correct English to insert the adverb “boldly” between “to” and “go?” I was in the coalition that said even in the 23^rd century Captain Kirk had no right to split his infinitives. He should have said, “To go boldly where no man has gone before.” We thought we had the opposition finally outgunned, when Harvard cognitive scientist Steven Pinker suddenly decloaked in front of us.

In his book, The Language Instinct, Pinker explained the origin of the taboo against split infinitives, making our side look very silly. Showing off your Latin was a sign of good education in England, and in Latin you can’t split the infinitive even if you wanted to. Latin infinitives are like Farsi “raftan.” Where can you put “boldly” in “raftan?” Surely not “raft boldly an!” But natural English does allow us to boldly split infinitives. So for years over-educated English academics had unnecessarily disfigured their beautiful language with the syntax of Cicero.

The Language Instinct, more than histories of the potato, transformed my lust for the word “Farsi” from a sin to a fact of nature. Though Pinker focuses on English grammar rather than word usage and doesn’t mention Farsi, his book exposes the organic, dynamic, and inborn aspects of human language. Pinker’s work made me think that the English language has adopted “Farsi” for natural reasons, not because Iranians have passed on a bad habit to English speakers.

To find out why English speakers feed “Farsi” but shoo away “Persian,” I spoke with American novelist and prolific short story writer Elliot Fintushel. Fintushel’s prose should never be taken with other amphetamines, but this ultra-modern writer has a subconscious so close to his normal awareness that he can explain why he does or doesn’t choose a particular word. By the way, he knew nothing about The Farsibition when I phoned him.

Ari- Hello Elliot, what do you think of when I say, “The Persian language?”

Fintushel- Well, uh…Sanskrit!

This educated and worldly American writer prefers “Farsi” to “Persian” because his image of historic Persia is at odds with his modern interactions with Iranians. He says “Farsi” because his mind can no longer put Iran in a museum. Television, globalization, immigration, Youtube, cheap travel, all conspire to break the “Persian” display glass for him. While the culture of Sohrab allows the old to kill the young, Fintushel ‘s Oedipal culture has no qualms against slipping the dagger of novelty deep into Rostam’s heart. “Persian” withers, “Farsi” flowers. English sighs, remembering her own virgin days when brave men called her “Angelisc.”

As for the Iranian speaker of English, there are also natural reasons why “Persian” sounds like a trademark and “Farsi” the real thing.

First, developmentally. “Farsi” is what our moms said our language was called, and if English wants to imitate us, then she has realized—perhaps by sensing our adamancy—that “Persian” is no longer the right word. Remember, until recently English didn’t have much contact with Iranians except through our classical culture. Never mind that the French don’t use their own word for their language when they speak English. Fintushel’s tongue isn’t allergic to “French” but he does break out in hives with “Persian.” The word “French” doesn’t fight his reality of who the French people are; “Persian” does! Thankfully, the ultimate authority on American English has baptized “Farsi” into the English language and here’s a link that swears to it:

Webster also says that the English word “Persian” primarily refers to ANY of the SEVERAL Iranian languages dominant in Persia. Iranians who tell hapless Webster-toting Americans that they speak Persian are suggesting they may be fluent in several languages including Tajik, Dari and Judeo-Bukharic.

Secondly, there is an organic link between words and voice/body gesturing. Here’s a revealing test for Iranian-American writers and poets: with which concept do you best associate the following sounds? Aakh, oho, evaa, ah’, vaay, digeh, bah’, baabaa. Imperial Persian or Farsi e khodemooni? The interjection I most associate with “Persian” is Maz Jobrani’s famous “meow.

Third, mechanically. Farsi rolls off the tongue better than “Parsi,” or “Persian.” The “P” sound is a sudden plosive consonant; “F” is a smooth fricative, takes less force. In an onomatopoeic sense (the closeness of a sound to its intended meaning), Farsi may reflect our subtler post-Empire maturity better than “Parsi.” Sure, Arabic voice mechanics changed “Parsi “to “Farsi,” but why didn’t it change “Paarsaal” to “Faarsaal?” Yes, we were flattering Arab administrative jargon, but there must have also been a social advantage in the consonant change that somehow served the common speaker. This advantage may not exist today—whatever it was—but it was there. To speculate as to what this utility may have been, poetic ears may notice there is an inclusivity of regional sounds in the lovely name “Khalijeh Fars” that is lost in its unrealistically exclusive—and bumpy-- translation, “Persian Gulf.” When I contemplate why “F” and no longer “P,” I hear songs, not battle cries. I see pens, not swords.

Finally, there are patriotic aspects to using the term “Farsi.” Ironically this has to do with our protective feelings for our classical literature. To an Iranian writing in English, it feels unfair to allow Greece at the height of its splendor to name a language that eventually surpassed Greek in poetic expressiveness. When Herodotus was calling us Persians (Persikos) none of Iran’s classical poets had been born to measure up to Homer, Hesoid and Sappho. But some centuries later, 300 Khayaams kicked ass against a million Greeks. “Persian” reflects Hellenistic cultural supremacy; “Farsi” starts the clock when we had our strongest claim to high culture, documented by our own historians.

In our day-to-day experience “Persian” covers just a small subset of the Farsi that buzzes around our ears. Colloquially we may call it Farsi e Aflaatooni. But this Persian of the distinguished Yarshater, Davis and Nicholson is just one bee in the bustling hive of contemporary Farsi. In fact the other bees are so busy making up new words for modern nuances, they sometimes steal from other languages. Young people occasionally use the English word “money” when they covet a hard-to-afford luxury, and the traditional “pool” when they buy gum. They use the English “number” for digits that dial a date, and the old “shomareh” when they call their parents. Among a different group, the Arabic proper name “Zeid,”--Farsi equivalent of “some dude”-- now also comes with a Russian suffix: “Zeidowfski!

Sometimes there is ethnic influence. Daaf for girl is Kalimi Farsi, so is “Zaakhaar” for “boy,” occasionally meaning, ”mate” in the Australian sense. There are new descriptive verbs like “Yazeed shodan” as in to suddenly explode into anger—from a mean character in Shiite plays—but we also have “love tarakaandan” for public display of affection.

Haveej is used for street cleaners—refers to uniform color, as does kaaktus for police. BBC can be a spy or a cell phone. To this add the journalistic and technical vocabulary factories that coin Farsi expressions daily like the Feds print money, making my Farsi dictionary as useless as a stack of dollars. One Nobel Prize winner throws around words like faraa ravesh (methodology) and shahrvand (citizen). Remind me, which Persian dynasty popularized the word shahrvand? If all this activity makes your head spin, you need a daroon paalaa (exorcist)

In this dynamic linguistic community, I speak a variant that could be termed "Farsi e Dolaari." Yet I am aware that there are Javaads, Ghazanfars, Manijehs and Shahlaas stuck in Tehran traffic in their Jaaroo barghee (vacuum cleaner), jaa saaboni (soap dish), and pejhoo kaarmandi (Dilbert mobile). They watch film e aamoozeshi(over 21 “documentaries”) and spend esken, money, peel, maayeh.

There are narm afzaar (software) geeks kleeking away on their raayaanehs (computers) building taarnamaas (websites). After I explain to Fintushel about the double entendre in daroon gozaasht (input) and beeroon daad (output), you would have to drag him to Egypt and waterboard him before he gives up “Farsi” for a word that conjures up Sanskrit to his readers.

To be sure in academic circles where precision is more important than expressiveness, “Persian” is an indispensable technical term. But should Persian literature academics dictate to English speaking writers, poets, casual speakers, standup comics, or rappers, which English words are allowed? Would they bully little Luke on Valentine’s Day if he’s hard up for something to rhyme with “Marcy?” The attempt reveals a disappointing absence of communication with the social science building next door where they study how communities create and use language. The intrusion of our culture’s dictatorial vices into the common man’s English is ungracious, whereas our tolerant and humble flip side is magnetic.

The marketing approach, promoting “Persian” as a brand name, has been harmful to Iran’ s sincere modern culture. For example, my interview with contemporary Iranian-American playwright Sepideh Khosrowjah rankled a commenter who was frustrated about the article’s use of the term “Farsi.” This commenter obviously has an interest in the arts or he/she wouldn’t have read the piece. In the spirit of this shared love, I propose we redouble our efforts in encouraging our living cultural treasures, even as we struggle to rescue our threatened antiquity. Artists like Khosrowjah wield a formidable language. They contribute to one day making “Farsi” as prestigious as “Persian.”

The commenter asks rhetorically if my use of “Farsi” has a political motive.

You bet!

Some notes:

1.For an informative and entertaining study on Tehrani Farsi vernacular see Farhag va Loghaateh e Zaban Makhfi, by Dr. Seid Mehdi Samaai. info@nashr-e-markaz.com

2.The touching and beautiful Zoroastrian Gathas do compete with, and arguably transcend, ancient Greek poetry, but their number is few in comparison and their subjects limited to devotional concerns.

3.To explore why Greeks had historians and pre-Islamic Iranians possibly had only mytholgy, see anthropologist Donal E. Brown's work on hereditary caste societies.

"In Memory of Kazem Ashtari," backstage

Backstage, after seeing “In memory of Kazem Ashtari,” I told actress Bella Warda that I thought her character, the resilient Mahin Ashtari is in very good hands. If you haven’t been backstage after a play, prepare for a jolting experience. There is strong magic in speaking to someone--still in costume and sweating from the ordeal--who has just returned from the story world. This is something film can never do.

As I waited to congratulate actress Sepideh Khosrowjah, she was still the ambitious yet easily dominated character, Shafagh Gooya. The fact that as playwright Khosrowjah created Shafagh and all the other characters in the comedy belonged to the reality she was just coming back to.

Director Hamid Ehya was thoughtful, absently submitting to our praise. What worked, what didn’t work with the audience? I bet he wishes Mahin’s wisecrack to Shafagh were true.

Shafagh- But do you even know how to direct?
Mahin—Directing doesn’t need any knowing how!

Funny line! Ehya’s task was far messier than “simply” interpreting the work. For example, Warda has strong stage tactics. Like a good chess player she goes after the center and holds it, inclining the other characters to speak towards center stage instead of out to the audience. Remedying this without diminishing Warda’s presence takes careful problem solving.

Here’s another example, this time in set design. There is a door-answering phone where Mahin’s daughter, Atefeh, gives us the first “oh shit” moment of the play. Someone’s at the door she did not expect. This event begins the story’s climb; yet its comic impact is threatened by a small stage that forces the phone in an awkward out-of-the-action place. The young actress Shadi Yousefian has funny body and face language when the sky falls down, and stage limitations diminished one of her good moments. But to borrow from Donald Rusmsfeld, you direct with the stage you’ve got. Budget, time, and resource juggling makes the director as much mathematician, as artist. When you see the play, watch for the limitations to appreciate the director.

Putting on his artist hat, Ehya has introduced a clever sideshow that takes place before the curtains open and during scene changes. In this slide show appear the play’s characters in their earlier days. We see film director Kazem Ashtari pretending to be chummy with Iranian film icons Behrooz Vosoghi and Mohammad-ali Fardin. There he was stretching to match heights with the great filmmaker Bahram Beizai, proudly displaying Atefeh when she was a baby, and smiling next to his stunning young wife, Mahin. There are also pictures of his abysmally designed B-movie film posters, graced only by the face of the beautiful actress Shafagh Gooya. These images are intermingled with unintentionally hilarious condolence cards from a film industry that rightly did not take Ashtari seriously while he was still alive.

These preludes add greatly to the emotional and comedic impact of the play; they help especially with act one which is often the thinnest act in any play.

In act two the plot heats up. Mahin Ashtari has published the love letters her husband had sent to Shafagh Gooya. Mahin has prefaced the collection with, “Dedicated to my wife, Mahin, my only love in life.” Shafagh storms into Mahin’s house, pissed about the blatant lie. But Mahin, who over the years has transmuted her pain into wisdom, makes a devious proposition to Shafhagh. A proposition that eventually makes Kazem Ashtari deader than he was before.

After the show I saw Kazem Ashtari sucking up to Hamid Ehya. I wanted to warn Ehya about what a scoundrel Ahstari is, never mind that Ehya was really consulting with Mansour Taeed, the wonderful actor and promoter of Iranian culture. Backstage magic takes a long time to wear off. Try it though!

Playwright Sepideh Khosrowjah

When playwright Sepideh Khosrowjah was two years old her parents gave her a doll, which she immediately destroyed. “Toys were boring,” she says. I can understand why dolls would frustrate a future playwright; there’s nothing inside them. Darvag performance company has recently staged Khosrowjah’s Farsi language play, “Dar Soogeh Kazem Ashtari,” and there is plenty inside the characters. Besides humor, love, cunning, ambition, jealously, shame, and frustration, there is also a surprising secret. It was fun reading the play twice, the second time knowing the characters were hiding something from each other..

I asked Khosrowjah, “can you tell when people are acting in real life, and is that necessarily a sign of insincerity?” She replied,

“Everyone acts in real life. We all act all the time. We play different characters under different circumstances; I play a mom with my son, a professional woman at work, a cool person with friends, a good girl with older people, etc. This is not at all a sign of insincerity most of the time; it is a sign of how life is just a constant play. Those insincere people are bad actors both in real life and on stage.”

After 23 years of writing plays, Khosrowjah would know what makes a bad actor. In fact one of her characters in “Dar Soogeh Kazem Ashtari,” is a so-so actress. I look forward to watching this character on stage, as it takes an accomplished performer to play a mediocre actress. Actually I’m doubly curious because Khosrowjah herself will be playing this difficult role.

The playwright revealed something about her approach to acting when I asked her about her favorite character in any work of fiction.

“My favorite character in a play is Jessie in “Night' Mother,” a play by Marsha Norman. She is a woman who has come to the end in life and she wants to commit suicide. The play is about her last night and how she wants to put everything in order for her mother before leaving. She gets to explain why she has decided to end her life or as she puts it to ‘get off the Bus of life.’ When you listen to her you realize the alienation in life and how we lose opportunities to make thing different for each other. It is a very sad play, but it is a masterpiece. I was lucky enough to play Jessie many years ago, but it made me so depressed that I could not think of going back on stage again, like with Jessie dying I was also dead as an actor.”

“How did it come about you auditioned for Jessie's role in ‘Night' Mother,’ and would have ended the play differently?” I asked.

“One of the advantages of having your own theater company is that you don't have to audition. People who have worked with you for years know you and are aware of your abilities. Hamid Ehya translated the play to Persian and directed it. Darvag produced the play and I got to play Jessie and Mojdeh Molavi played the mother. I would have not ended the play differently. It was totally justified for Jessie to end her life. I can't think of any different ending. This was the tragedy of the play and the tragedy of our lives. You understand the character so well that you don't dare give her the usual clichés about thinking positively! “

Yet “Dar Soog…” does dare think positively, though not in clichés. A thoughtless act of insincerity by the deceased, Kazem Ashtari, has created chaos for his wife, his daughter and his mistress. In response, the three women characters defy expectation by making the right decisions! Now we begin to sense these women’s mediocrity in life was perhaps due to Kazem Ashtari’s influence.

“Was there ever a period in your life when a man seemed to dull your talents?” I didn’t really ask that question. If life were so straightforward, we wouldn’t need artists. Khosrowjah does say, though, that when she started acting she realized not many playwrights were telling her story. This is why she began writing her own plays at the age of 25. Her first play aptly named “Aghaz,” began a long career in the dramatic arts, not just as a playwright and actress but also as a theater company founder.

“I was one of the co-founders of Darvag. With a few friends who loved theatre, we established Darvag in August 1985, but after the first production, Darvag became much more than a few of us. I just became part of a group of wonderful people who also loved theatre. Mansour Taeed who is playing in Dar soogeh Kazem Ashtari was also one of the founding members and Bella Warda [also in the play] joined us from the first play, and Hamid Ehya [director] joined us in 1986. It is amazing how we still enjoy working with each other. Of course, we had lots of ups and downs, but we are still together after 23 years. We are so happy and excited that Shadi Yousefian also joined us in this play. Shadi is a young, beautiful, talented, energetic artist who is an amazing addition to our group and I hope she will carry the torch after my generation.”

Here in America, not many performance companies are telling our story either. Darvag is one of the few, and we would certainly like to see more productions. Khosrowjah identifies the challenge in this way,

“I have been writing plays for 23 years and after all these years my book containing three of my plays were published in Iran by Nila publishing house. I really enjoy doing my art and don't like to promote it as much because the time I should take to promote my work I can think about writing another play. I always like to think of the flying because I know the bird will die, "Parvaz ra beh khater bespar, Parandeh mordanist" (remember the flight, the bird is mortal). Creating art is like flying and you want to go higher and higher to be free!”

So that more birds will fly, the sky must invite.