Interview | Growing Up Irooni- House of Pod's Kaveh Hoda on being Iranian-American in Medicine
Kaveh Hoda is a physician, musician and host of the medical podcast House of Pod in San Francisco. His expertise is in gastroenterology, hepatology and, according to him, making fun of medical grifters. He cohosts the humor adjacent medical podcast, the House of Pod, which is how I first learned of him. Along with his cohost Lizzie, he explores topics related to the medicine, which, as we touch on in the interview, is really a microcosm for society at large. Medicine is something that affects all of us in one way or another, and we’ve especially seen how important the medical field is now during this pandemic. So, I’ve really been enjoying listening to his podcast, learning more about a field I don’t have any personal connections to.
7 Apr 202125min
Interview | Growing Up Irooni- Persian Poetics, Growing Up in Detroit and Discovering the Love of Persian Poetry
My name is Leyla Shams, host of the Learn Persian with Chai and Conversation podcast. Today’s interview is with Mohammad Ali, better known as Persian poetics on both Instagram and twitter. He went viral just a few months ago on a twitter thread where he talked about the bestselling poetry book in the English language, a translation of Rumi’s poems by Coleman Barks. In the thread, he went through a details look at Coleman Bark’s translations, and revealed that Barks doesn’t even know the Persian language- so how is he translating Rumi? Since the thread went viral, Mohammad Ali has picked up the pace of his own more accurate translations of Rumi and other Persian poetry. He has a lot of other wonderful poetry content that we’ll talk about in this interview. His own personal story is very interesting too, of how he was born in Detroit and grew up there as well, but became enamored by Iranian culture and eventually the language and of course, the poetry. Find Persian Poetics on Instagram and on Twitter.
24 Mars 202134min
Speak Lesson 71 | Nowruz (Vocabulary Sprint)
In this Persian (Farsi) lesson, we go over vocabulary associated with the most important Persian holiday, Nowruz. We'll learn about the haft seen table, and the items associated with the haft seen table. In addition, we'll learn a few different ways to wish people a happy Nowruz holiday, including 'aidé shomā mobārak' and 'nowruz mobārak'. Also, check out our Complete Guide to Living Your Best Nowruz for day to day instructions on how to have the best Nowruz ever!
14 Mars 202117min
Poetry | Ahmad Shamlou's raz Part 3
In this lesson, we continue our study of Ahmad Shamlou's poem, Rāz. We learn the words and phrases in the second half of the poem.
8 Mars 202113min
Poetry | Ahmad Shamlou's raz Part 2
In this lesson, we go over the first half of Ahmad Shamlou's poem, Rāz.
24 Feb 202115min
Poetry | Ahmad Shamlou's raz Intro
In this lesson, we introduce the iconic Iranian poet Ahmad Shamlou, and talk about his poem ‘Raz’ or راز, meaning ‘the secret’. Shamlou was born in 1925 in Rasht, and he died in 2000, after a few years of health problems. He went through a few revolutions, he was put in jail and he was a journalist for a while. He wrote about politics and was part of the Toudeh party. And so he did live through a lot of turmoil in Islamic Republic, and he stayed in Iran- he didn't leave, like so many others. For a few years after the Islamic revolution happened, he did go silent. But he emerged after that, and did tours of Europe and he did tours of the US. He was nominated for a Nobel Prize in 1984. He remains one of the most famous contemporary poets from Iran to this day.
10 Feb 202134min
Interview | Growing Up Irooni- John Ghazvinian on America and Iran: A History, 1720 to the Present
John Ghazvinian joins us to talk about his new book, America and Iran: A History, 1720 to the Present, a comprehensive new survey of the bilateral relationship, based on years of archival research in both Iran and the United States, which he has been working on since 2008. For the past many decades, the relationship between the United States and Iran has been very hostile and toxic, defined by coups, hostage crises, inflammatory slogans, devastating sanctions. But it hasn’t always been this way, and the two countries actually had quite a lot of mutual admiration in the past. The book chronicles that, all the way back to 1720. Iran is often on the front page of the news in the US these days, but you will probably be surprised to find out that it was often on the front page of the US news in the 18th century as well!John was born in Iran but moved to London at the age of 1 and to Los Angeles in high school- I wanted to talk to him about his relationship to Iran and the language growing up, and what led him to write the book, much of which relied on primary source material in the Persian language located in Iran.
26 Jan 202124min
Interview | Growing Up Irooni- Yara Elmjouie
Yara Elmjouie is a Webby Award-wnning, James Beard-nominated video producer, journalist, and host at AJ+. He's also a great voice in the Iranian American community, creating engaging videos explaining current conditions in Iran, and documenting the experiences of Iranian Americans. He was born in Los Gatos, California, but grew up visiting Iran often. By the time he got to high school and college, he had an insatiable thirst for deep diving into his language and culture. He currently lives in New York City, and much of his current work chronicles the experiences of the Iranian diaspora.
8 Dec 202036min
