Middle Eastern American Theatre

Michael Malek Najjar is an associate professor of Theatre Arts at the University of Oregon, USA with a specialization/ concentration in Arab American and Middle Eastern American Theatre forms. He is the author of Middle Eastern American Theatre: Communities, Cultures and Artists and Arab American Drama, Film and Performance, 1908 to the Present. He is the editor of Heather Raffo's Iraq Plays: The Things That Can't Be Said, The Selected Works of Yussef El Guindi, Four Arab American Plays: Works by Leila Buck, Jamil Khoury, Yussef El Guindi, and Lameece Issaq & Jacob Kader and co-editor of Six Plays of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. He is on the advisory board of Arab Stages and the steering committee of MENA Theatre Makers Alliance.

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
Preface

Introduction: Polyculturalism, Transnationalism, and Diaspora
1 Major Middle Eastern American Companies
2 Return to the Homeland Plays
3 Persecution Plays
Governmental Persecution: Back of the Throat; Truth Serum Blues; Zafira and the Resistance
Societal Persecution: Autobiography of a Terrorist; Me No Terrorist; Roar; Mosque Alert; Lubbock or Leave It!
4 Diaspora Plays
Middle Easterners in the Entertainment Industry: It’s Not About Pomegranates! and Browntown
Living Between “Here” and “There”: 444 Days; This Time; Twice, Thrice, Frice…; Reading Hebron; Noura; Dragonflies; Suitcase; Living in the Hyphen-Nation
Keeping Tradition Alive: TRAF; A People: A Mosaic Play; Detour Guide
Searching for Roots: Baba and (dis)Place[d]
Diaspora and Its Discontents: Stunning, Deep Cut, and The Man in the Sukkah
5 Plays Set in the Homeland
Plays Exploring the Refugee Crisis: Urge for Going, Not My Revolution
Holocaust Plays and Plays Set in Israel and Palestine: The Zionists, Abraham’s Daughters, and Food and Fadwa
Plays and Musicals About the Troubled Homeland: Pera Palas, The Band’s Visit, and We Live in Cairo
6 Conflict Plays
The Palestinian-Israeli Conflict: The River and the Sea; Abraham’s Daughters, Facts, Martyr’s Street, Wrestling Jerusalem
Plays of the Armenian Genocide: March!; Night Over Erzinga
Civil War Plays: Scorched; Game of Patience; Smail
7 The Current State of Middle Eastern American Theatre
8 Critical Perspectives
“Theatre that Disrupts Our Unconscious Bias with Humor and Joy”: An Interview with Maia Directors Kareem Fahmy, Evren Odcikin, Megan Sandberg-Zakian, and Pirronne Yousefzadeh
“Be a Part of Changing the American Narrative About the Middle East”: An interview with Golden Thread Productions Artistic Director Torange Yeghiazarian and Silk Road Rising Artistic Director Jamil Khoury.

References and Further Reading
Notes on Contributors
Index