Firoozeh Dumas

Firoozeh Dumas was born in Abadan, Iran on June 26, 1965. She is a writer who is Iranian-American who writes in English. She is the author of the memoirs Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America (2003) and Laughing Without an Accent: Adventures of a Global Citizen (2008), as well as the semi-autobiographical novel It Ain't so Awful, Falafel (2009). Dumas and her family relocated to Whittier, California, when she was seven years old. She then returned to Iran, where she resided in Tehran and Ahvaz. She did, however, return to the United States, first to Whittier and later to Newport Beach, California. She started writing & submitting essays to get money for education. She studied art and history at the University of California, Berkeley, where she lived at International House Berkeley. Firoozeh grew up hearing stories of her father's experiences from her father, a former Fulbright Scholar. 

Despite having no prior writing experience, Firoozeh opted to produce her stories as a gift for her children in 2001.

These tales were published by Random House in 2003. Kazem, her father, takes the central stage in several of her anecdotes in her novel Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America. She is proud of her Iranian ancestry while mocking her father's obsession with "freebies" at Costco and television series like Bowling for Dollars. Dumas struggled as a child to fit in with her American peers, who understood little about Iran. She also recounts personal accounts of discrimination and bigotry she encountered as an Iranian in America during the Iranian Revolution. Throughout her trials, she highlights the importance of family strength and love in her life.

She has been busy on the lecture circuit since her debut book, Funny in Farsi, appearing at colleges, conferences, high schools, middle schools, and other places. Her writing has also appeared in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, Good Housekeeping, Gourmet, and the San Francisco Chronicle. She has also been a National Public Radio analyst and a panelist on “Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me!” Because of the success of Funny in Farsi, Firoozeh Dumas had been nominated for numerous awards, including the Thurber Prize for American Humor. Not only was she the first Iranian novelist to be nominated, but she was also the first Asian author to get such an accolade. She was defeated by Jon Stewart Jon Stewart is an American famous Television Host, >> Read More... . She was also nominated for an Audie Awards for best audiobook, which she lost to Bob Dylan. She received a PEN/USA Award for Creative Nonfiction. The National Council for Social Studies honored her with the Spirit of America Award in 2008.