AMEMSA+ History & Heritage Month, also called Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian+ Heritage Month, is a month-long commemoration of the history and achievement of AMEMSA+ people that takes place each April in the US. Arab Americans are immigrants or descendants of people from the Arabic-speaking world, which includes twenty-two countries in the Middle East and West, North, and East Africa. The countries include Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.
Jhumpa Lahiri surprised the literary world in 2000 when she won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction for her very first full-length effort, a collection of short stories titled Interpreter of Maladies. Full bio
Gibran sought and won acceptance from New York's artistic and literary world. His first work in English, The Madman, appeared in 1918. Following the release of several other titles, in 1923 The Prophet was published, selling more than 1,000 copies in three months. Full bio
Ralph Nader was born in 1934 to a Lebanese immigrant couple; He grew up speaking Arabic as well as English. As a young attorney, Nader took on a number of auto accident cases and in the process began to delve into highway mortality statistics. Full bio
Kamala Harris became the vice president of the United States in 2021 becoming the first woman, first African American, and first South Asian American to serve as vice president. Full bio
Bobby Rahal grew up around racing. In 1982, Bobby became the first rookie in twelve years to win an Indy car race and was voted the Championship Auto Racing Team's (CART) Rookie of the Year. Full bio
Rashida Tlaib is an American politician who is one of the first two Muslim women to join the U.S. Congress. Before that, she was elected to the Michigan House, becoming the first Muslim woman to serve in Michigan's Congress. Full bio
Fady Joudah, an emergency room physician and poet, has earned acclaim for his translations. His first collection, The Earth in the Attic, won the prestigious Yale Series of Younger Poets award in 2007. Full bio
The co-founder of Women for Women International, Zainab Salbi helps women in war-torn countries connect with women in the West. A native of Iraq, Salbi also offered insight into Saddam Hussein's regime with her 2005 autobiography. Full bio
Through his writings, research, and teaching, Fareed Zakaria has made an impact in the field of political science and foreign policy. A graduate of both Yale and Harvard, Zakaria writes extensively on the subject of international affairs. Full bio
Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha is an American pediatrician and professor who discovered high levels of poisonous lead in children in Flint, Michigan. She is credited as a hero for exposing the lead levels in water there. Full bio
Born Muzyad Yakhoob, Danny Thomas began singing on a Detroit radio station. In the 1950s he became one of the most successful television producers and his work included The Andy Griffith Show and The Dick Van Dyke Show. Full Bio
Paula Abdul made a name for herself in the 1980s as a dancer, choreographer, and vocalist. Her 1988 debut album, Forever Your Girl, launched her career. She later starred as a judge on the reality television competition American Idol. Full bio
Ilhan Omar is a Somali American politician. Omar was sworn into office as one of the first Muslim women in the House of Representatives in 2019. She is the first member of Congress to wear a Hijab. Full bio
Fazlur Khan was an innovative architecture who was involved in the construction of the Windy City's two landmark skyscrapers: the John Hancock Building and the Sears Tower (now the Willis Building). Full bio
Ibtihaj Muhammad is an American saber fencer and member of the 2016 United States Olympic team and was the first U.S. woman to compete in the Olympics wearing a hijab. Full bio
Har Gobind Khorana was an Indian organic chemist. His work in chemical genetics earned him: Merck Award of the Chemical Institute of Canada, Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize of Columbia University, and Nobel Prize. Full bio