GOOD TALK WITH RAED (EL) RAFEI

Raed (El) Rafei is a filmmaker, scholar, and multimedia journalist. Rafei directed award-winning documentaries and experimental films. As a journalist, he has worked for international publications like The Los Angeles Times and news outlets like CNN and Al-Jazeera Documentary Channel.

His films, which include TRIPOLI / A TALE OF THREE CITIES, 74 (The Reconstitution of a Struggle) and Al-Atlal (The Ruins), have screened at international film festivals and venues like IDFA, the Centre Pompidou in Paris, Doc Lisboa, Visions du Réel, and the Pacific Film Archives in Berkeley.

Rafei holds a PhD in Film and Digital Media from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and an MA in Journalism from the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism. He is an Assistant Professor of Film and Media Studies at the University of Pittsburgh. His research focuses on queer cinema in the Arab region and its diasporas. He is the author of two book chapters: “On the Natural, the Obscure and Anal Tests,” in Pink Labor on Golden Streets (2015), and “Queer Revolution and the Reawakening of the Belly Dancer” in Queer Contemporary Art of Southwest Asia North Africa (2024). His essays have been published in the Los Angeles Times, Kohl, Mizna and e-flux journal.

Expertise
I have twenty years of experience as a multi-media journalist, filmmaker, film scholar and educator. I have a PhD in Film and Media Studies from the University of California, Santa Cruz. And I am currently an Assistant Professor of Film and Media Studies at the University of Pittsburgh. Students/Audiences will gain from my vast experience covering the Middle East as a journalist as well as teaching a variety of topics related to film both theoretical and practical.

Speaking History
Since I moved to the US in 2017, I did Q&As about my films at the University of Oregon, Pitzer College in Los Angeles, the University of California, San Francisco Law School and Harvard Law school. I have presented my scholarly work at international conferences such as the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) conference and the Society for Cinema and Media Studies (SCMS) conference. As a journalist, I gave talks at Casa Arabe in Cordoba and Madrid, Spain, in the past.