PODCAST · society
Kerning Cultures
by Kerning Cultures Network
Stories from the Middle East and North Africa, and the spaces in between. Kerning Cultures is produced by Kerning Cultures Network. Support this podcast on https://www.patreon.com/kerningcultures for as little as $2 a month. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Episodes
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So…what are we thinking?
If you have been enjoying this podcast, we want to hear from you! Understanding who you, our dear listeners, are helps us make decisions as we continue to grow at the Kerning Cultures Network. Help us understand you better by filling this short survey linked below, it won’t take more than 5...
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Mo Amer: Stand-Up Comedian and Actor
We’re thrilled to share another podcast from Kerning Cultures Network with you: al empire. al empire returns for Season 3 with more stories of exceptional Arabs from around the world and their journey to the top, from comedians and entrepreneurs to musicians and media mavericks. This season of al...
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Aizen – Epilogue
Since our series about 'Aizen' ended, many of you have been in touch asking for an update on his story. When we left you at the end of the last episode, he had arrived in Europe, three years after leaving his home in Kabul and travelling through a labyrinth of smuggler networks. He claimed asylum...
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The Black Panthers in Algeria
When Elaine Mokhtefi landed in newly independent Algeria in the early 1960s, she was only planning for a short visit. But she quickly found herself at the centre of a special period in the country’s history, as Algiers played host to liberation groups from across the world – earning a reputation…
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Word on the Street
Two stories about two streets, and the justices and injustices hidden in their names. Follow us to Tehran and Khartoum as we uncover two histories brought together by one common denominator. This episode originally aired in February 2021, and was produced by Zeina Dowidar with editing by Dana...
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A Past Life
When Heba was very young, there was a knock at the door at her home in Lebanon. It was another family from the village, claiming that they knew her… from a past life. Now, as an adult, she still wonders: Have I always been Heba? Or was there another life before this one? This episode was produced...
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Somalia's Banana Battles
You might remember Somali bananas from your childhood, lining the shelves at your local supermarket. During the late 80s and early 90s, Somalia made millions of dollars exporting its coveted bananas to Italy and the Middle East. But this thriving export business ground to a halt suddenly in 1991,...
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What's in a Name?
'Yasir?' That's too difficult. I'll just call you Tony. This episode originally aired in October 2017. Kerning Cultures is a Kerning Cultures Network production. Support this podcast on Patreon for as little as $2 a month. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Bone of Contention
In 2014, the palaeontologist Nizar Ibrahim went public with an astonishing discovery he’d made while studying a set of dinosaur bones from the Moroccan Sahara. But almost immediately, it caused a rift amongst his colleagues – forcing them to question everything they’d ever known about their work....
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Viva Brother Nagi
Nagi Daifallah was a young farm worker from Yemen who moved to California in the early 1970s, when he was just 20 years old. He went on to become one of the organisers of the influential 1973 grape strikes in California, led by Cesar Chavez. But one night, after a day of striking, he was beaten…
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Aizen – Part 4: Do Good & Throw it in the Sea
After finally reaching Europe, Aizen was back in jail. He had calculated that the journey from Afghanistan to France would take three months. But more than two years later, he was somewhere completely different. Then, finally, his luck started to turn. This episode was produced by Al Shaibani and...
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Aizen – Part 3: King of Serbia
Through smugglers, barbed wire fences and forests, Aizen arrives in Europe. But the sense of relief he feels at making it this far is short-lived: the physical and mental toll of travelling so far from home begins to weigh heavy. This episode was produced by Al Shaibani and edited by Alex Atack…
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Aizen – Part 2: The Game
‘A game’ is what smugglers and migrants call attempting to cross illegally from one country to another. As Aizen leaves his childhood behind in Afghanistan, his only way to get to Europe is to play the game, travelling through this dangerous network of human traffickers. This episode was produced...
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Aizen – Part 1: I Hate Wednesdays
‘Aizen’ says he’s the most unlucky person in the world. This football-obsessed teenager from Afghanistan grew up in the chaos of Kabul, and at 15, was imprisoned in one of the worst adult prisons in the world. All for a crime he didn’t commit. In this four part series, we’re following Aizen’s...
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Tunisia’s Liquid Gold
When you think of good quality olive oil, which countries first come to mind? This week, we’re travelling to the heart of the world’s largest exporter of organic olive oil to learn all about the liquid gold that graces dinner tables around the globe. And it’s not where you’d expect. This episode...
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Armenian Pilgrimages: A Journey to the Homeland
A father and daughter journey to their ancestral homeland, looking to track down the place their family had lived before being forced to flee the Armenian genocide. They’re among hundreds of Armenian families who, over the last three decades, have returned to their ancestors' home on a search for...
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Scoring the World Cup
This is the final week of the first World Cup hosted in the Middle East. And it’s been a tournament like no other: We’ve seen Morocco advance further than any Middle East or African team has before, making the whole region proud. And we’ve seen many joyous moments go viral as fans from across the...
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The Assassination of Alex Odeh
Alex Odeh was well known in the Arab community in Santa Ana, California. He was often on TV or writing into newspapers, talking about discrimination against Arabs in the US or about his beloved homeland, Palestine. But on the morning of October 11th 1985, he stepped through his office door and a...
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Coming up on season 4 of Kerning Cultures...
Kerning Cultures season 4 launches next week, December 8th. Subscribe wherever you get podcasts so you don't miss an episode. Support this podcast on patreon.com/kerningcultures for as little as $2 a month. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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The Secret Somali Tapes
It’s 1988, and Somalis are fleeing the city of Hargeisa. People are trying to get out, trying to save their families. But in the city’s radio station, staff are packing cassettes and reel to reel recordings into a secret underground bunker. On them: A slice of their country’s musical heritage, to...
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Sheikh Imam: Voice of Dissent
A blind oud player from humble beginnings, Sheikh Imam's destiny changed drastically when he met a dissident poet called Ahmed Fouad Negm, and they formed a duo. Together, they would go on start a new era in Egyptian popular music. Their songs would shake regimes, travel the world on cassette...
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The Intifada Tapes
Stuck in his Palestinian hometown of Jenin during lockdown, Mo'min Swaitat walked into an old music shop where thousands of dusty cassettes lined the walls. They contained decades of Palestinian music and field recordings once confiscated by the Israeli army, long since forgotten, and never meant...
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Rocket Man
In the 1960s, a college professor and his group of students were determined to build and launch rockets into space. And so, they did. This week, on Kerning Cultures, a story about the first-ever rocket launched from the Arab world into space. This episode first aired in 2020 and was produced by...
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Saving Mesopotamia's Marshes
Azzam Alwash remembers the marshlands of southern Iraq as a magical place, where he would spend long days gliding through the thick reeds by boat with his father. But for decades now, the area has been under threat, so Azzam has become part of the effort to save the natural wonder before it's too...
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The Perfect Renaissance Man
In the 1930s, the architect Nasri Khattar had an idea to singlehandedly overhaul the Arabic script. For the next 47 years, he worked day and night to get the world to adopt his writing system, Unified Arabic. Ultimately, he failed. This is his story. This episode was produced by Jahd Khalil and...
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The Sleeping Children
In 2012, a Yazidi family fled to Sweden in the hope of a better life, far from persecution. After nearly six troubled years struggling to seek asylum without proper paperwork, their traumatised daughter “fell asleep” - and didn't wake up again for another five years. For half a decade she has…
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The Rise and Fall of #MeToo in Egypt: Part 2
A warning: This episode contains descriptions of sexual violence and assault. As Egyptian women celebrated the arrest of serial predator and rapist Ahmed Bassam Zaki in the summer of 2020, another case came to light: An alleged gang rape in the upscale Fairmont Hotel. If the men involved were...
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The Rise and Fall of #MeToo in Egypt: Part 1
A warning: This episode contains descriptions of sexual violence and assault. In the summer of 2020, a 22-year-old Egyptian woman made the difficult decision to publicly call out her harasser on social media. In a moment of rage, she picked up her phone and typed out a post that would end up...
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Zabelle
In 1917, a musical prodigy called Zabelle Panosian recorded a song that captured the heartbreak of a generation of Armenian Americans in the aftermath of the Armenian Genocide. She toured the world, selling thousands of records. And then, she was almost completely forgotten. This episode…
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The Burning Library
In 1962 the library at the University of Algiers was burned to the ground, turning hundreds of thousands of books to dust. But it was overshadowed by Algeria's independence from the French, and was largely forgotten. So one man has made it his mission to answer a simple question: are these books...
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A note to listeners
We're holding off on releasing this week's Kerning Cultures episode. Instead, we're sharing resources on how to help the crisis in Ukraine. You can read the full list here.We'll be back next week. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Hi Jolly
This week, we're following the trail of an elusive camel herder called Hadj Ali (or, as the Americans called him; Hi Jolly). He was one of the first people from the Middle East to move to the USA, and although he died penniless, alone and almost entirely forgotten, he played a big role in…
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Mother Tongue
How do you preserve a language when your government is actively trying to erase it? Abduweli Ayup is a Uyghur linguist who was trying to stop the Chinese government from replacing Uyghur with Mandarin. He had been studying the language's history, teaching Uyghur to younger students and writing...
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The Freemason
A family secret, hidden for decades by a grandfather in Iraq, gets uncovered by his grandson - who chooses to revive a potentially dangerous legacy. This episode was produced by Alex Atack and Tamara Juburi, and edited by Dana Ballout with additional support from Nadeen Shaker and Zeina Dowidar....
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Syria's Stolen Memories
During the Syrian war, a group of archeologists risk their lives to record the damage being done to their country's cultural heritage, just as it was being taken away from them. This episode was written and produced by Zeina Dowidar and Alex Atack, and edited by Dana Ballout with additional…
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Operation Boulder
Since 9/11, US governmental agencies have poured millions of dollars into spying on Arabs, Muslims and Arab Americans. Their surveillance has changed countless lives as ordinary citizens all over the country were interrogated, arrested or had their homes raided. But this didn't start in 2001....
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This season on Kerning Cultures...
Kerning Cultures season 3 launches next week, January 27th. Make sure to subscribe wherever you get podcasts so you don't miss an episode. Support this podcast on patreon.com/kerningcultures for as little as $2 a month. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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A conversation with the team
Ahead of the latest season (which launches at the end of this month!), our team gets together to talk about what they're excited for, and what they've learned from producing the upcoming season of Kerning Cultures. Kerning Cultures' season three launches on January 27th. Make sure you're…
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Loving Lynn
Lynn left behind her hometown village in the Philippines for a housekeeping job in Lebanon at the age of 23. It was only meant to be temporary… until she met Butros, her employer's nephew, and they fell in love. But for Lynn, marrying Butros has meant choosing to settle down in a country where...
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The Things That Can't Speak
Ronnie Chatah started giving his walking tours of Beirut in 2008, during a period of stability for the city. He would guide tourists through the city, telling stories of Phoenician ruins, French architecture and Ottoman houses. He'd also talk about Lebanon's civil war, and the problems that came…
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The Missing Archives
In 1968, a trio of Palestinian filmmakers began making films about life under Israeli occupation. Almost 15 years and over 90 films later, their film unit became a dominant force in the Arab film industry. But in 1982, their film reels disappeared. Overnight, decades of footage and thousands of...
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Escape to Cairo
In October 1960, the walls were closing in for Patrice Lumumba. Months earlier, he had been celebrated as the Congo's first democratically elected prime minister after decades of brutal colonial rule. But now, he had been overthrown in a coup and was being kept under house arrest by his political...
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Abandoned Ships: Part 2
After their employer abandoned the vessel they was working on, Vikash Mishra and his crew spent nearly three years stuck on a slowly sinking ship off the coast of the UAE. This week on Kerning Cultures: Vikash's ordeal, and how he eventually made it back home to his family in India. This is the...
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Jerusalem Calling
Because of what's happening in Palestine this week, we're holding off airing our usual programming. Instead we're going to re-air one of our favourite episodes from last season: Jerusalem Calling. With this episode, we hope to remember the rich history of Palestine, and that the occupation and...
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Abandoned Ships: Part 1
When seafarer Mehmet Gulsen stepped on board the Kenan Mete, he thought he was signing up to a pretty standard 7 month contract, and then he'd be home in Ukraine with his young daughter and his dog. But a few months in, things started going wrong, and he ended up abandoned with his crew at a port...
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Exodus
Loving Lebanon is one thing; living there is another. Generation after generation, surviving in the homeland sometimes costs too much. This essay was written and read by Zahra Hankir, and it was originally published in Guernica. The episode was produced by Alex Atack with support from Dana…
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Found Sound
Two stories of music getting lost… and then found again. A record producer unearths a Moroccan masterpiece in the back of a dusty electronics shop in Casablanca, sending him on a long and complicated mission to find out what happened to the artist. And, a song that was never meant to be heard...
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Collateral Damage
In 1942, Lebanon's National Museum opened in Beirut, celebrating the country's golden age, and inside, it housed some of the region's most important artifacts. So when the Lebanese war started in 1975, the museum staff came up with an elaborate scheme to save everything inside the museum. This…
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Viva Brother Nagi
Nagi Daifallah was a young farm worker from Yemen who moved to California in the early 1970s, when he was just 20 years old. He went on to become one of the organisers of the influential 1973 grape strike in California, led by Cesar Chavez. But one night, after a day of striking, he was beaten to...
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Flagged and Stamped
Over the last half century, as many nations around our region have gained independence or been through regime change, they've have had to ask themselves big questions. Like, what makes our country, our country? What are the symbols that define us? And, who gets to decide the answer to those...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Stories from the Middle East and North Africa, and the spaces in between.
Kerning Cultures is produced by Kerning Cultures Network. Support this podcast on https://www.patreon.com/kerningcultures for as little as $2 a month.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
HOSTED BY
Kerning Cultures Network
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Kerning Cultures have?
Kerning Cultures currently has 144 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Kerning Cultures about?
Stories from the Middle East and North Africa, and the spaces in between. Kerning Cultures is produced by Kerning Cultures Network. Support this podcast on https://www.patreon.com/kerningcultures for as little as $2 a month. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
How often does Kerning Cultures release new episodes?
Kerning Cultures publishes regularly with 144 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to Kerning Cultures?
You can listen to Kerning Cultures on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Kerning Cultures?
Kerning Cultures is created and hosted by Kerning Cultures Network.
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