Semester Award Granted
Spring 2025
Submission Date
May 2025
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Fine Arts (MFA)
Thesis/Dissertation Advisor [Chair]
Andrew Furman
Abstract
This is a work of memoir and social commentary that touches on issues of identity, race, religion, gender, and indigeneity. The author, an American Jewish journalist who spent 20 years covering the Middle East and other parts of the Islamic world, examines her experiences of passing (i.e. as a local, native, or indigenous person) in the countries she covered, and questions how this impacted her understanding of the region and her empathy for the people she wrote about as a foreign correspondent. The memoir invites readers on a journey that extends through multiple countries in a time of war, most notably Iraq, Afghanistan and Israel-Palestine. The style of writing draws on nonlinear storytelling techniques, lyric essay, and a weaving of past and present-tense narratives. The work was influenced by contemporary literature on passing, liminality, racism, colorism, feminism, Islamophobia, and antisemitism, as well as ancient Jewish texts in which characters pass as others as a means of survival.
Recommended Citation
Prusher, Ilene, "PRESS PASS: A MIDDLE EAST MEMOIR OF IDENTITY AND EMPATHY" (2025). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 37.
https://digitalcommons.fau.edu/etd_general/37