You Can’t Translate ‘Shake n’ Bake’ Into Farsi – Firoozeh Dumas

March 222010

Complete video at: http://fora.tv/2008/11/23/Firoozeh_Dumas_Laughing_Without_An_Accent

Author Firoozeh Dumas describes the difficulty of translating her best-selling book “Funny in Farsi” from English into Farsi, so that Iranian censors could clear it for distribution in Iran.

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Often lost in the rhetoric of debate about the United States’ immigration policy is this: although each immigrant’s country of origin and reason for leaving are widely diverse, the experience of being an immigrant in the United States crosses all cultural divides.

For the past five years, Firoozeh Dumas has traveled the country reminding us that our commonalities far outweigh our differences … and doing so with humor.

In 2001, with no prior writing experience, Firoozeh Dumas decided to write down her family stories as a gift for her two children. Those stories became the book Funny in Farsi, a San Francisco Chronicle and Los Angeles Times bestseller and a finalist for the PEN/USA award and for an Audie Award for best audio book (She lost to Bob Dylan).

She was also a finalist for the prestigious Thurber Prize for American Humor (she lost to Jon Stewart), and is the first Middle Eastern woman ever to be considered for this honor.

Dumas’s latest book, entitled Laughing Without an Accent, was published in May 2008 – Grace Cathedral

Duration : 0:3:48


[youtube vnqAk0p0lZw]

11 Responses

  1. jillijello27 Says:

    I think some of you …
    I think some of you missed the point of the video?

  2. kossmikham Says:

    Ah, spoken like a …
    Ah, spoken like a true sore loser. At least you recognize your mental disability. That’s something. Go and educate yourself. Maybe learn some English, and perhaps some history.

  3. encrypttie Says:

    Fighting on the …
    Fighting on the internet is like running in the special Olympics… Even if you win, you are still retarded.
    so i leave the battlefield to you ;)

  4. kossmikham Says:

    No, check YOUR …
    No, check YOUR dictionary, and if says “always” means “throughout a long period of time”, toss in the trash and buy yourself a real dictionary. I use the OED, the AHD and M-W (I hope I won’t need to fully spell those out for you, but if you don’t know what they are I’ll be happy to do so). Mine ALL agree on the meaning of “always”, which is as follows:

    1. At all times; INVARIABLY
    2. FOREVER, PERPETUALLY
    3. At any rate; in any event

    Based on these definitions her statement is patently FALSE.

  5. encrypttie Says:

    Whatever it means, …
    Whatever it means, it’s way different than “ever since its establishment!”. Check your dictionary, always can refer to “throughout a long period of time”, which is true in this case!

  6. kossmikham Says:

    Mate, what does ” …
    Mate, what does “always” mean in your version of English?

  7. encrypttie Says:

    Mate, She’s not …
    Mate, She’s not talking about 1400 years ago!

  8. kossmikham Says:

    And unfortunately …
    And unfortunately ill-informed. Iran has NOT “always been a predominantly Muslim country” as she claims (2:30). Any Iranian with a 5th grade education knows this.

  9. ShaydahMarie Says:

    She seems really …
    She seems really down to earth. I like her!

  10. BlackGatchaman Says:

    Very good. Thanks …
    Very good. Thanks for posting this. Good luck at working on peace and understanding between muslims and the West. May be the West and the Middle East will become genuine friends before another decade goes by. : )

  11. WhyNotTruth Says:

    holshow shadam batu …
    holshow shadam batu sobat keridam.

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