An Interactive Forum on New Media and Social Change in Iran: New Generation, New Perspectives, New Media
A prestigious group of over a dozen Iranian scholars, media entrepreneurs, and democratic activists will discuss the role of new forms of media in the pursuit of social change within Iran. The forum will feature a series of talks in Low Library in the morning and interactive break-out sessions on various topics in the afternoon. For more information and registration, please visit: www.newgenerationforum.org
Co-sponsored with the Center for the Study of Democracy, Toleration and Religion.
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Speakers Bios
Ali Afshari is a leading political activist from Iran who has championed the cause ofdemocracy for over a decade. Beginning with his involvement in 1995 with the Islamic Student Association (ISA) at Amir Kabir University, of which he was secretary for three years, Mr. Afshari organized numerous protests and demonstrations against the Iranian government’s repressive and often violent measures directed against reformist students and intellectuals. Through his work with the ISA’s Office to Foster Unity, he helped to mobilize Iranian civil society to vote for reform-minded candidates in the historic 1998 city council elections, the first such elections in Iranian history.
Masih Alinejad (by video) is a renowned Iranian journalist and writer. Masih is well known for her courageous criticism of Iranian authorities. She was a parliamentary reporter for ILNA and a journalist at Hambastegi Daily and Etemad Melli Daily. Several of her articles were followed by harsh criticism from conservative parties in Iran. In 2008, former Iranian head of parliament apologized after an article by Alinejad was published in Etemad Melli Daily on economic problems in Iran.
Maziar Bahari is an Iranian Canadian journalist, playwright and film maker. He is a reporter for Newsweek. Bahari graduated with a degree in communications from Concordia University in Montreal. He has produced a number of documentaries and news reports for Channel 4 and BBC on subjects as varied as Ayatollah Sistani, Muqtada al-Sadr and human rights in Iraq. A retrospective of Bahari’s films was organized in November 2007 by the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam. Bahari was imprisoned by the Iranian government from June-October 2009 for covering the post-election protests.
Fariba Davoodi Mohajer is a journalist and human rights activist. She is the former member of the supreme council and head of women committee of Advare Tahkim-e Vahdat (The Organization for the Alumni of universities in the Islamic Iran) and at the same time she has served as the Secretary of the Union of Young Journalists, an inspector of the Organization of Defenders of Media and Press Freedoms in Iran and a board member & head of legal department of Female Journalists Association.
Nazila Fathi was born and raised in Iran. She did her undergraduate studies in Iran, in English Translation and started working with Western media as a translator and stringer since 1991. She did her graduate studies in political science and women’s studies at University of Toronto from 1999 to 2001. She was accredited as the New York Times Reporter since 2000 and was the only reporter for an American publication who lived consistently from 2001 until July 2009 in Iran. She also translated a book by Shirin Ebadi, The Documentation of Human Rights in Iran, from Persian into English. The book was published in 2000.
Mehdi Jalali is an Iranian journalist and political commentator. He has hosted four hundreds weekly TV shows in Persian language on the issues and events related to the Middle Eastern affairs. His area of expertise includes Islamic transitional societies, new media and communications as well as Islamic jurisprudence and Shiite clerical establishment. As a Regent and Chancellor scholar, Mehdi studied political science at Berkeley, and obtained MIA from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs. His concentration is international security policy and the Middle East.
Roozbeh Mirebrahimi is a notable Iranian Journalist and blogger. He has written, as political editor and writer for several reformist newspapers including Jomhuriyat, Roozna and EtemadeMelli, Etemad, Hambastegi, and Sharq. As a Hamlet-Hamnet international award winner from Human Rights Watch, he was among the first bloggers who were arrested and forced to confess in a show trial in September and October 2004. Roozbeh has written many books including Untolds of Revolution, Eslahat Zire Hasht (Reform Under Eight). Currently as a visiting scholar at Arthur L.Carter Journalism Institute in NYU, he writes and appears in international media outlet on the topic related to Iran’s post-upheaval election.
Ali Mostashari, Ph.D. is the Director of the Center for Complex Adaptive Sociotechnological Systems (COMPASS) and an Associate Professor of Systems and Enterprises at Stevens Institute of Technology. His research is focused on the interactions between society and technology, including the impact of cyber-enabled mobilization on social movements in Iran. Prior to his academic career, he served as a strategic advisor to the Assistant Secretary General of UNDP for Africa. He has served as a commentator on BBC World Service and independent news media. He served as the Editor of the MIT Iran Analysis Quarterly (2002-2007) and was a co-founder of the Iranian Studies Group at MIT.
Kelly Golnoush Niknejad is the Founder of Tehran Bureau. She studied political science and writing in college, and emphasized international law in her coursework in law school, including two summers of residential studies in European law in Paris, France. She was admitted to practice law in California and before the United States District Court for the Southern District of California. She then moved to New York City and earned two masters degrees in journalism from Columbia University. Golnoush is on the board of the Arab and Middle Eastern Journalists Association. She has reported for the Los Angeles Times, the San Diego Union-Tribune, TIME Magazine, California Lawyer and PBS/Frontline, among others.
Trita Parsi, Ph.D. is founder and president of the National Iranian American Council and an expert on US-Iranian relations, Iranian politics, and the balance of power in the Middle East. He is the author of Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Iran, Israel and the United States (Yale University Press 2007), for which he conducted more than 130 interviews with senior Israeli, Iranian and American decision-makers. Treacherous Alliance is the silver medal winner of the 2008 Arthur Ross Book Award from the Council on Foreign Relations.
Iran Davar Ardalan is a civic journalist with decades of newsgathering and Executive leadership roles in Public Broadcasting.  From community engagement to innovative ways to engage the public online to news programming choices during a crisis, Ardalan was at the forefront of digital innovation at NPR News. Most recently, Ardalan was in charge of Weekend Edition, two of NPR’s most popular newsmagazines.
Mehdi Yahyanejad, Ph.D. is the founder of balatarin.com, one of the most central social media websites in the Persian language. In post-election upheaval balatarin.com has significantly served as the main source of cyber communication among Iranians both inside and outside the country. Mehdi received his Ph.D. in Physics from MIT and served as a co-founder of the Iranian Studies Group at MIT.
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