Mapping Arab Diasporas
International Conference
April 27- 29, 2006
Fairlane Center
19000 Hubbard Drive
Dearborn, MI 48126
The post-9/11 atmosphere of Islamaphobia and racial profiling of Arabs, Central and South Asians and the targeting of immigrants for detention and deportation makes the study and analysis of the relationship of marginalized diasporic communities to the countries in which they live an absolute necessity- both intellectually and politically. In so doing, we planned a conference that accounts for race/ethnicity, gender/sexuality, class and wealth, citizenship and immigration status, and other structural inequalities that shape and influence the lives and experiences of Arabs in the diaspora and their interaction with their socio-political context. In challenging geographically bounded area studies, we hope that the conference will highlight the centrality of transnational networks through which immigrant communities maintain their links at home with the homelands from which they or their ancestors descended. Finally, this conference also builds on the mission of the Center for Arab American Studies to contribute to a better public understanding of Arab experiences and concerns in the Americas, and to the promotion of a culture of justice, dignity, tolerance, and peace, for peoples of all racial, ethnic, religious, and cultural groups.
Organized by the Center for Arab American Studies (CAAS), the first and only academic center in the world dedicated to the study of people of Arab descent who live in the Americas, the conference brings together junior and senior scholars, public intellectuals, cultural workers, and activists to network, exchange ideas, and analyze the current as well as the historical experiences of displacement and exile.
[Preliminary MAPAD Conference Brochure]