I have dedicated my life to what I describe as literary activism: organizing and sustaining the social force that literature can generate. For over two decades, both in Iran and now in Canada, I have directed and curated literary events that link artistic work with social care. In Iran, through initiatives such as the Tehran Hopkins Club, Karnameh Poetry Nights, and the Parallel Academy, I organized poetry readings and gatherings whose proceeds supported relief efforts for natural disasters and poverty-stricken communities. In Canada, through The Global South and collaborations with venues such as The Arch Café Bar, Drom Taberna, and La Palette, I have continued this commitment, using literature as a form of community building and collective resilience across cultures.
This presentation examines how literature organizes communal life and mobilizes social care, through a comparative account of my pre- and post-exilic practice. In Iran, I convened and moderated programs through the Tehran Hopkins Club, Karnameh Poetry Nights, and the Parallel Academy, while helping coordinate relief initiatives such as Yari-ye Yaran, Foroorikht, and classroom programs with Avayeh Mehreh Darvazeh Ghar in South Tehran. These efforts supported Kurdistan earthquake victims and, earlier, Azerbaijan earthquake victims, and included creative writing and art-therapy workshops for children and families in precarious conditions. In Canada, I have continued this work through The Global South and events at The Arch Café Bar, using bilingual readings, translation talks, and community dialogues to raise support and build resilient networks across diasporic communities. Readings from The Tree of Life: A Fragmented Elegy and HAIRAN: Poems of Hair and Freedom anchor a discussion of how poetry generates solidarity, practical aid, and shared moral imagination in the face of repression and displacement.
This workshop invites participants into a bilingual collective poetry reading and open discussion on the constructive and communal dimensions of literature. Each poem is presented in its original Persian and in English translation to ensure accessibility for all participants. Drawing on my long-term projects—from Yari-ye Yaran, Foroorikht, and Avayeh Mehreh Darvazeh Ghar in Tehran to The Global South in Toronto—the workshop examines how poetry can sustain collective reflection, empathy, and social responsibility. Readings from The Tree of Life: A Fragmented Elegy and HAIRAN: Poems of Hair and Freedom anchor the session, followed by shared analysis focused on how literary creation can help communities articulate healing, belonging, and moral imagination through language.
This session introduces students to poetry and translation as active forms of empathy, collective inquiry, and cultural understanding. Drawing on my extensive teaching experience with university students, volunteer adult learners, and ill-guarded children in South Tehran through Avayeh Mehreh Darvazeh Ghar, I structure each presentation in a Socratic–dialectical format—an open conversation that questions the foundations, uses, and enduring significance of literature. Readings from my bilingual Persian–English poetry collections serve as springboards for dialogue about art’s social function, the ethics of language, and the constructive imagination literature makes possible. Drawing also from my Toronto work with The Global South, the session encourages students to see literature not as an academic object but as a shared civic and emotional practice.
