This is my
story
Minoo Derayeh, PhD · York University
A daughter, granddaughter and sister. A student in Tehran, Shiraz and Montreal. A wife, mother and university professor. Across the Caspian shoreline and the Canadian winter, this is the story of a life carried between two countries — told, at last, in her own words.
Minoo Derayeh, PhD
Specialist on Iran, Islam, world religions and gender studies — and, in these pages, a storyteller.
A scholar's eye, a storyteller's heart
Dr. Minoo Derayeh is Associate Professor at York University in Toronto, where her work centres on Iran, Islam, world religions and gender studies. She received her MA in Islamic Studies from the Faculty of Graduate Studies and her PhD from the Department of Culture and Values at the Faculty of Education, both at McGill University.
Her research spans gender and justice studies, Persian literary works, culture, pop-culture, religion and human rights — a body of scholarship that informs, and is deepened by, the personal history she tells in
She currently teaches a range of courses including Women, Gender, Religion and Human Rights; Islamic Thought & Politics: Human Rights in Islam; Equity and Human Rights in Education; Equity and Human Rights in the Workplace; and Racism and Diversity in Education.
Position
Position
MA
Focus
Selected Publications
01 Justice, Patriotism and Religion in the Persian Literary Works
03 Depiction of Women in Iranian Cinema, 1970s to Present
04 The Myths of Creation and Hijab: Iranian Women, Liberated or Oppressed?
05 De-hyphenate, and De-theorize My Voice: ‘I Act, Therefore I Am’
This is My Story
A memoir of Persian culture, migration and belonging — sad and happy, and, above all, authentic.
"Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth, and compassion against injustice and lying and greed. You cannot swim for new horizons until you have courage to lose sight of the shore."
Dedicated to the memory of her grandmothers, Bala Khanoom and Seyedeh Sakineh, this memoir moves between the Caspian shoreline of Shahsavar and the winters of Montreal and Toronto.
Dr. Derayeh writes as a daughter, granddaughter and sister; a student at elementary school, high school and university; a wife and mother; and, eventually, a university professor navigating life as what she calls “an invisible visible minority” in the Canadian workplace.
Told outside the conventions of academic theory and method, the book stays close to its own guiding idea — that stories are theories, and storytellers are theorists. It traces a Persian girlhood, an education that crossed continents, and a professional life built far from where it began, without reducing any of it to a political or ideological argument.
Readers won’t be kept on the edge of their seats — but, in the author’s own words, the stories may well make them cry, and stay with them long after the last page.
Inside the Book
01 Nannie Sanambar
02 Who Am I? Parts One & Two
03 Shahsavar or Tonekabon, Dorchester or Rene Levesque
04 Chahar Shanbeh Souri and Norouz
05 Ahvaz, Ms. Joharchi and Fatemeh
06 Tehran: Jaam-e Jam High School
07 Shiraz: Pahlavi University
08 Goodbye Tehran, Hello Montreal
09 McGill University
10 Professor Me — Who Am I Today?
Speaking, media & correspondence
For interviews, speaking engagements, academic inquiries or reader correspondence, Dr. Derayeh welcomes you to reach out directly.
She responds personally to messages related to This Is My Story, as well as her academic work on gender, religion and Persian literary studies.
York University · Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Speaking, media & correspondence
For interviews, speaking engagements, academic inquiries or reader correspondence, Dr. Derayeh welcomes you to reach out directly.
She responds personally to messages related to This Is My Story, as well as her academic work on gender, religion and Persian literary studies.
York University · Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Preferred for academic and media inquiries
For speaking engagements and interviews