Funny in Farsi author, Firoozeh Dumas, spoke to Paly students today, focusing on attitudes towards Middle-Eastern Americans and touching on the cultural differences between Iran and America.

In a question and answer session with Eric Bloom’s Ethnic Studies class, Dumas responded to questions about the change in American opinions about Persians since she was a child during the Iran-Hostage Crisis.

"There is more racism directed towards Middle-Eastern Americans now, than there ever has been in the history of the United States," Dumas said, citing an incident when students publicly burned copies of her book. "The fear I’ve felt is nothing like what it is now. That’s the climate of the country right now."

Dumas, drawing on her experiences of Iran and America, compared the personal and political ideologies of each country.

"The pace of life here is insane," Dumas said. "In Iran, family is always together. We get together to eat, talk, and tell stories. In America, you don’t get that. Everyone’s so busy here."

"One of the greatest things about this country is freedom of speech," Dumas said. "Freedom of speech doesn’t mean being disrespectful and rude, but it allows for people to hear contrasting opinions. In Iran, we don’t have freedom of speech. We hear one voice and we believe it."

Leaving students with a few words of wisdom, Dumas said that the main message of Funny in Farsi is "shared humanity."

"Our commonalities outweigh our differences. What I really don’t want is people being afraid of people who are different from them. When I think about myself, I don’t think about my nationality. I’ve always felt like a human before anything else. We have a shared humanity."

Inspired by reading groups in Seatle, Orange County, Whittier, CA and Cape Ann, MA, Palo Alto City Library selected Dumas’s novel, Funny in Farsi, for the citizens to read for the next month.

According to the City of Palo Alto website, "Palo Alto Reads…Funny in Farsi is a month-long series of programs that aims to foster a sense of community by bringing people together through literature."

Dumas recently attended a kick-off event for Palo Alto Reads, this past Tuesday at Paly. Though Dumas will continue her book tour across America, Palo Alto will hold a series of book group meetings and is sponsoring events providing tastes of Iran. Readers of all ages are invited to attend the Parent/Teen Book Discussion at Mitchell Park Library on October 15 at 3:30pm.

This article has been revised since it was first published to clarify the context and meaning of quote(s) by selected speakers.