Alexandria, Egypt
Session 7: July 7 – Sept 10, 2009

Alaa Khaled, a poet and essayist, and Salwa Rashad, a visual artist, are from Alexandria, Egypt. They have collaborated extensively on a wide range of projects, contemplating the city through Rashad’s images and Khaled’s prose. Since 1999, they have published the literary magazine Amkenah, dedicated to the “poetry of place.” With Amkenah, they explore the relationship between people and place, and attempt to find new possibilities for investigating the problematic existence of the urban individual.

Alaa Khaled and Salwa Rashad have been interested in how various immigrant populations, and particularly Arab immigrants, have shaped and been shaped by Los Angeles’s cultural, economic, architectural and environmental landscape. Khaled and Rashad framed their research project on the idea of walking through different parts of Los Angeles, in order to meet up with Arab immigrants with whom they engaged in discussions and interviews. The UFI Fellows hoped to gain some understanding of people’s experiences at different points in their lives. In particular, the two are curious about whether there is conflict, discord, or struggle between older memories that belong to the countries in which the immigrants first lived and new memories that grow out from time spent in Los Angeles. Does a new identity arise from this mixture? In the context of the immigrant experience, what does the word “homeland” mean?