Hamid Dabashi is an Iranian-American professor at Columbia University. He has authored more than 20 books and has expertise in subject areas including Iran, US foreign policy, the Middle East, identity politics and empire. 

Dabashi grew up in Ahvaz in Iran, moved to Tehran in the 1970s and then relocated to the USA with his family in 1976.

In this interview he speaks about what life was like growing up in an Iran that was ruled by the CIA-backed shah and what it was like experiencing the Iranian revolution from afar, seeing the repressive regime of the Shah being replaced by a repressive theocracy.

Dabashi then touches on confronting the US empire and white supremacy as a brown-skinned Muslim in a period when the US has been engaged in wars in Arab and Muslim lands. 

He recollects his long-standing frie ...