'The Arab American Identity Was Born in Flint:' Scholar Shows Research in Exhibit at Sloan Museum
Hani Bawardi was a graduate student when he came across the information that might shape not only his career as a professor, but the narrative of what it means to be an Arab American.
“I wanted to find out who was the first person to open a grocery store in Flint,” he said, speaking of his thesis topic when he was studying at the University of Michigan-Flint.
What he found was a lot more.
He met Roy Farah, whose father, Ameen Farah, co-owned the Farah-Khouri grocery store on Fenton Road in Flint.
“He took me to his basement and his father’s papers and he gave them to me outright,” Bawardi said.
In those papers, he found out a lot more than just about grocery stores.
In short, he learned that the traditional story of Arab American identity might not be accurate.
He said the common story people tell is that the Arab American identity was created in the late 1960s and early 1970s, after immigration laws were changed that allowed more Arabs to come into the country.
Now Bawardi is telling a different story, one he’s telling in his book, “The Making of Arab Americans.”
“The main argument in my book is that the Arab American identity was born in Flint,” he said — and that it was born much earlier, in the 1920s and ‘30s by Ameen Farah and his contemporaries.
It’s also the subject of an exhibit at the Sloan Museum, which will kick off with a talk by Bawardi and will feature the papers and research he amassed for his book.The exhibit kicks off with an event Jan. 23 at 5:30 at Sloan that will include a lecture and discussion with Bawardi.
Among the papers were those of three different political organizations, all of which got their start in Flint.
In 1915, Ameen Farah founded the Free Syria Society, an organization that supported the home country while its members also strongly identified themselves as Americans, Bawardi said.
In the ‘20s, Ameen Farah and his contemporaries started the New Syria Party. Like the organization before it, their goal was to support the end of colonialism in and around Syria. After the Great Depression, they founded the Arab National League in 1936.
The ANL held four annual conventions. In 1939, it was held at the Durant Hotel in Flint.
Aside from being politically active and serving in World War I, Bawardi said those early Arab Americans also had their own newspapers and magazines that added to their culture.
“They came to the United States as children in the 19-teens, and they kept writing,” Bawardi said, efforts that led to “a rediscovery of who they are as a people, and they wrote from an American space.”
Still, he said, Arab Americans struggled to carve out an identity for themselves in America, which was partially due to there just not being many of them.
“We lag far behind Italians and Jews and Poles,” he said. “There’s a lot of writing about them. …We have none of that, for the most part.”
Aside from the restrictive immigration laws, Bawardi said another reason was that the Arab Americans spoke primarily Arabic, “a very difficult language and inaccessible to westerners.”
George Joubran, program assistant at the Flint Arab American Heritage Council, said he agrees that when many people talk about the beginning of the Arab American culture, they talk about the 1970s, but added that he and others in the Flint area are aware of their own history.
He referred to a book by Tony Mansour titled “Our Pioneers,” which looks at some of those early Arab American families in Flint such as the Hamadys, Maksouds, Josephs, Shaheens and Brackets.
Generally speaking, though, he said there isn’t a widespread awareness of those early generations.
“Most of them just came here to work, to make some money and go back to the home country, but a lot of them just stayed here. …I don’t think they really recognize the Arab Americans that came here for the industrial revolution,” he said. “If they came here in the ‘60s they don’t talk about the families that came here in the ‘20s.”
Thomas Henthorn is a University of Michigan-Flint professor and is also on the board at Sloan Museum. He’s working on a year-long project looking at the different histories Flint has beyond just the automotive story most people associate with the city.
He said he was always aware of the Arab American presence in the area, especially particular families that started well-known businesses, like the Hamady grocery store, but that he wasn’t aware of the extent of it until he became familiar with Bawardi’s work.
He said the original idea was to bring Bawardi in for a talk but that the more they talked about the idea, the more it seemed like a chance to turn it into an exhibit.
“I think this is an example of all the different fascinating histories in Flint that need to be told,” he said.
Scott Atkinson
MLive