Novelist Porochista Khakpour's family moved to Los Angeles after fleeing the Iranian Revolution, giving up their successes only to be greeted by an alienating culture. Growing up as an immigrant in America means that one has to make one's way through a confusing tangle of conflicting cultures and expectations. And Porochista is pulled between the glitzy culture of Tehrangeles, an enclave of wealthy Iranians and Persians in LA, her own family's modest life and culture, and becoming an assimilated American. Porochista rebels--she bleaches her hair and flees to the East Coast, where she finds her community: other people writing and thinking at the fringes. But, 9/11 happens and with horror, Porochista watches from her apartment window as the towers fall. Extremism and fear of the Middle East rises in the aftermath and then again with the election of Donald Trump. Porochista is forced to finally grapple with what it means to be Middle-Eastern and Iranian, an immigrant, and a refugee in our country today.
Brown Album is a stirring collection of essays, at times humorous and at times profound, drawn from more than a decade of Porochista's work and with new material included. Altogether, it reveals the tolls that immigrant life in this country can take on a person and the joys that life can give.
Khakpour is in conversation with Myriam Gurba, a writer, spoken-word artist, and visual artist.
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Produced by Maddie Gobbo & Michael Kowaleski
Theme: "I Love All My Friends," a new, unreleased demo by Fragile Gang.
SKYLIT: Beth Morgan, "A TOUCH OF JEN"
SKYLIT: Calvin Leonard, "FOR THE LOVE OF FILM"
SKYLIT: "NEPANTLA FAMILIAS" Group Reading
SKYLIT: UC Riverside MFA Panel
SKYLIT: Christina Catherine Martinez, "AESTHETICAL RELATIONS" w/ Isabel Slone
SKYLIT: Daphne A. Brooks, "LINER NOTES FOR THE REVOLUTION" w/ Lynell George
SKYLIT: Joseph Rodriguez, "LAPD: 1994" w/ Ruben Martinez
SKYLIT: Joie Davidow, "AN UNOFFICIAL MARRIAGE" w/ Esmerelda Santiago
SKYLIT: Miriam Feldman, "HE CAME IN WITH IT" w/ Jen Pastiloff
SKYLIT: Emma Ramadan, "IN CONCRETE"
SKYLIT: Claire Boyles, "SITE FIDELITY" w/ Zac Hug
SKYLIT: Katie Love, "TWO TICKETS TO PARADISE"
SKYLIT: WAYFINDING Poets
SKYLIT: David Leo Rice, "DRIFTER" w/ Matthew Spellberg
Handsell, Ep. 20: "Kelsey Norris/Libro.fm"
SKYLIT: Laura LeMoon, "A THOUSAND LITTLE DEATHS"
LIVE ON CROWDCAST: Danielle Henderson, "THE UGLY CRY" w/ Ann Friedman
SKYLIT: Brittany Ackerman, "THE BRITTANYS"
LIVE ON CROWDCAST: Rosecrans Baldwin, "EVERYTHING NOW" w/ Charles Yu
SKYLIT: Rupert Thomson, "BARCELONA DREAMING"
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