Despite many ups and downs and strict regulations, over the past decades, Iranian films have attained global recognition.

Sometimes an individual is representative of the times and deeply engaged with a specific locale. And at times that same individual goes beyond both and opens up uncharted possibilities that are worth contemplating in oral histories. Zeinab Khalifa is just such an individual.

In May 2013, Nick Pugliese, the only American to have played professional soccer in Afghanistan, helped Kabul’s Ferozi F.C. win the city-wide championship.

Alaa al-Aswany, a prominent Egyptian writer with a broad array of interests and accomplishments, is a lively man with a penchant for playful conversation. I sat down with him one spring afternoon in his Brooklyn apartment, and was easily drawn into the world he conjured, one small detail at a time.

In the 1970s, an African-American Muslim eclipsed Superman as the quintessential American male. Muhammad Ali still reminds us what it's all about.