This study is a multidisciplinary work that draws on fields of history, sociology, literature, politics, anthropology and cultural studies to explore the origination, development, and continuation of racist ideas in Iran. It analyzes the relationships among European racist ideas, the creation of the Indo-European language family, and the emergence of modern racism in Iran, interrogating the construction of notions such as Aria, Aryan race, and Aryanism in an Iranian context. By situating Iran within the Orientalist discourse, and by exploring its cultural, linguistic, and ethnic developments in light of Orientalist/Aryanist reconstruction of Iran's history, the study examines various levels of nation-building, nationality-construction, overt nationalism and aggressive chauvinism in Iran. It shows the way in which nationalism and racism worked to place the Indo-European speaking Persian ethnic group in a position of advantage vis-a-vis Iran's non-Persian nationalities, ethnic groups, and communities. In so doing, it challenges conventional notions about Iran's history, culture and language by privileging the multinational, multicultural and multilingual character of Iranian society. Employing multiple perspectives and theoretical frameworks, the study analyzes issues of ethnic inequality, exclusion, and oppression in Iran from anti-racist and anti-colonial standpoints. It establishes the existence of racism in Iran as a salient determining factor in creating social inequality, oppression, and unequal power relations. Surveying select works of history, literature, religion, politics, and various official and non-official publications, the research examines how the dominant group uses sites such as literature, history, language, and the education system as strategic spaces from which to justify its privileged position in society. Through a critical exploration of the dominant discourse, the study suggests the possibility that the minoritized can also use their own discursive sites to resist acts of racism, colonialism, and oppression. To this end, it offers an analysis of a 'counter-hegemonic' discourse created by the marginalized to resist and combat racism. The study points to obvious limitations of these sites for the colonized and offers ways to improve their effectiveness. By way of a conclusion, the study highlights future directions for research and possibilities for democratic transformations in an Iranian as well as a Middle Eastern context.

This interrogates the racist construction of Aria and Aryanism in an Iranian context, arguing that these concepts gave the Indo-European speaking Persian ethnic group an advantage over Iran's non-Persian nationalities and communities.

This interrogates the racist construction of Aria and Aryanism in an Iranian context, arguing that these concepts gave the Indo-European speaking Persian ethnic group an advantage over Iran's non-Persian nationalities and communities.

When Roya, an Iranian American high school student, is asked to identify her race, she feels anxiety and doubt. According to the federal government, she and others from the Middle East are white. Indeed, a historical myth circulates even in immigrant families like Roya's, proclaiming Iranians to be the "original" white race. But based on the treatment Roya and her family receive in American schools, airports, workplaces, and neighborhoods--interactions characterized by intolerance or hate--Roya is increasingly certain that she is not white. In The Limits of Whiteness, Neda Maghbouleh offers a groundbreaking, timely look at how Iranians and other Middle Eastern Americans move across the color line. By shadowing Roya and more than 80 other young people, Maghbouleh documents Iranian Americans' shifting racial status. Drawing on never-before-analyzed historical and legal evidence, she captures the unique experience of an immigrant group trapped between legal racial invisibility and everyday racial hyper-visibility. Her findings are essential for understanding the unprecedented challenge Middle Easterners now face under "extreme vetting" and potential reclassification out of the "white" box. Maghbouleh tells for the first time the compelling, often heartbreaking story of how a white American immigrant group can become brown and what such a transformation says about race in America.

A compilation of 3M voices, memories, facts and experiences from the company's first 100 years.

Explores the interactions between culture and development and puts forward proposals in the form of an international agenda aimed at motivating people to recognize cultural challenges.