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Tag: queerarabs

Episode 146 [in English]: Yalla Bye Bitch

With Donald Trump finally out of the White House, Ellie, Alia, and Nadia took this episode to look back on the flurry of damages he’s caused over the last four years, particularly with regards to immigration and LGBTQ rights. (Not lost on us was the irony of Trump using a vague notion of “gay rights” to justify the Muslim ban, while persistently rolling back actual protections for queer and trans Americans.) Many of his executive orders were eventually struck down in court, but not without inflicting serious harm and leaving us psychologically drained. 

We also discuss our tentative hopes, concerns, and criticisms surrounding the new administration (it’s definitely not a quick fix for our prison-, police-, and military-industrial complexes). But as a start, we’re so relieved to see the orange fucker gone!

Thank you to Ellie for the policy research in this episode!

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Episode 145 [in English]: Michael Zalta

Photo credit: Jenna Hamed (IG: @j7md)

Michael Zalta is a queer Syrian-American Jewish writer, researcher and playwright interested in the intersections between Media Theory, Biopolitics and Decolonial Aesthetics. His recent play “Who the Fuck is Ahmed” is about the psychosexual misadventures of an American-Jewish couple who moves to Haifa to raise a family, when a metaphysical ghost from historic Palestine drives a wedge through the relationship.

Michael discussed growing up in Brooklyn’s Syrian Jewish community (and the deep similarities he saw in David Adjmi’s memoir), and becoming a “Foucault Fuckboy” at NYU to overcompensate for the particular myopia of his upbringing. We talked about the psychology and performance of perpetrator’s guilt and the work that inspired him to become a playwright. He also described some of his recent essays unpacking concepts of racialization within Jewish communities internationally. 

https://www.heyalma.com/david-adjmi-is-filling-the-gap 

https://prtcls.com/article/hallucinatory-ethnicization/ 

https://www.zamancollective.com/all-posts/michaelbeyondashkenormativity

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