Iran
"Speaking Intimately: Iranian Diasporic Generation X and Negotiating Sexuality Online." "By the 1990s, the media landscape changed in the Iranian diaspora and the internet became an important mediated space for Iranians and Iranian diasporics alike. One website that encapsulates the Iranian diasporic online expression is Iranian.com. Established in 1995 by Jahanshah Javid, the site was modeled after the The New Yorker, which is reflected in its initial title, The Iranian until it changed to the net-friendly title of Iranian.com in 2004. Before the creation of Iranian.com, there were very few Iranian exilic media outlets catering to non-Persian speaking diasporic Iranians. As Javid further stated in an interview with Afshin Molavi for Iranian.com’s 10th anniversary that, “I saw a very large Iranian community spread out in the U.S., Canada, Western Europe, and Australia which understood English better than Persian. I knew many were longing to tell stories of survival and assimilation, as well as homesickness and nostalgia” (2005: Iranian.com). Essentially, Javid created a bridge between Generation X Iranians, both in the diaspora and in the homeland, who felt that neither the Iranian exilic media outlets nor the media outlets in the homeland reflected their generation’s experiences and view points. This is especially true with regards to conversations about gender issues and sexuality." ~ Sanaz Raji, Excerpt from Generation X Goes Global Remix Video of Another Brick in the Wall "Hey Ayatolla"
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Sanaz Raji. PhD scholar at the Institute of Communications Studies, University of Leeds (United Kingdom). Her doctoral research explores the use of subversive humor on Youtube and other social media spaces created by second generation Iranians in the diaspora as part of a larger discourse on the dynamics of being hyphenated Iranian in a post-September 11th context. Sanaz has a chapter entitled, "The Iranian diaspora in the West" in Kim Knott and Sean McLoughlin's edited book, Diasporas: Concepts, Identities, Intersections, Zed/Macmillan Press (2010). She previously worked on the London team of the Media & Citizenship: Transnational Television Cultures Reshaping Political Identities in the European Union project based at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). |