Suad Amiry facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Suad Amiry
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| Born | 1951 (age 73–74) |
| Nationality | Palestinian |
| Occupation | Architect |
Suad Amiry (Arabic: سعاد العامري) is a Palestinian author and architect. She was born in 1951 and lives in Ramallah.
Contents
Education and Early Life
Suad Amiry's parents moved from Palestine to Amman, Jordan. She grew up there before moving to Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, to study architecture. She continued her architecture studies at the American University of Beirut, the University of Michigan in the United States, and the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.
Career as an Architect and Author
Suad Amiry worked at Birzeit University until 1991. After that, she became the head of the Riwaq Centre for Architectural Conservation. This center was started in 1991. It was the first of its kind to work on saving and protecting old buildings and historical places in Palestine.
From 1991 to 1993, Suad Amiry was part of a Palestinian group that worked for peace in Washington, D.C.. She has also been involved in important peace efforts between Palestinian and Israeli women. For example, she helped organize the Jerusalem program at the Smithsonian Institution's Folklife Festival in 1993.
Later, from 1994 to 1996, she served as a high-ranking official in the Palestinian Authority's Ministry of Culture.
Her book, Sharon and My Mother-in-Law, became very popular. It has been translated into 19 languages and was a bestseller in France. In 2004, the book won the famous Viareggio Prize in Italy. In 2006, she was chosen to be a vice-chairperson for the Board of Trustees at Birzeit University. This means she helped guide the university's decisions.
Riwaq Centre's Work
One of the first big projects at Riwaq was making a list of all the important historical buildings in Palestine. This list was finished in 2004 and included about 50,000 buildings. About half of these buildings were empty.
In 2001, Riwaq started a ten-year program called tashgheel. This program helped create jobs by teaching people how to fix old buildings using traditional materials and methods.
In 2005, they started the "50 Villages Project." This project focused on fixing up public spaces in villages and helping villagers restore their own homes. Riwaq has also done important work on special "throne villages" (qura al-karasi). These were important centers during the time of the Ottoman Empire.
Personal Life
In 1981, Suad Amiry visited Ramallah as a tourist. There, she met Salim Tamari, whom she later married. She decided to stay in Ramallah after that.
Books by Suad Amiry
- Space, Kinship and Gender: The Social Dimension of Peasant Architecture in Palestine. University of Edinburgh Press (1987)
- The Palestinian Village Home. British Museum Press. (1989) with Vera Tamari
- Traditional Floor Tiles in Palestine. Riwaq monograph. (2000)
- Earthquake in April. Institute of Palestine Studies. (2003)
- Sharon and My Mother-in-Law : Ramallah Diaries. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group (2005)
- Nothing to Lose but Your Life: An 18-Hour Journey with Murad. (Paperback) Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation Publishing (2010)
- Golda Slept Here. Hamad Bin Khalifa University Press. (2014)
- My Damascus. Olive Branch Press. (2021 - Italian edition 2017)
- Mother of Strangers: A Novel. Pantheon Books. ISBN: 9780593316566 (2022 - Originally published as Storia di un abito inglese e di una mucca ebrea, by Mondadori Libri S.p.A., Milano, in 2020)
Awards and Recognition
- NPR Books We Love for "Mother of Strangers: A Novel" (2022).
- Aga Khan Award for Architecture for Revitalization of Birzeit Historic Centre with RIWAQ (2013).
See also
In Spanish: Suad Amiry para niños
