New Books In Middle Eastern Studies

How does a group become defined as white? And does that group define themselves that way as well? Neda Maghbouleh‘s new book, The Limits of Whiteness: Iranian Americans and the Everyday Politics of Race (Stanford University Press, 2017), uses interview and ethnographic data to better understand how Iranian Americans perceive themselves and are perceived. “Caught in the chasm between formal ethno-racial invisibility and informal hypervisibility,” Iranian Americans often straddle a space in which they are sometimes defined as white but other times not. Through the voices and experiences of 80 young people, Maghbouleh exposes the reader to the inner workings of their lives at school, at home, and abroad. By comparing and contrasting experiences in different social systems and situations, the reader becomes immersed in the lives of these youth and is connected to their racialized experiences. At home, these youth are often told that they are white and that they should be proud of their heritage; however, the yout