“This book provides a narrative that depicts everyday lives of lesbians in the Middle East, moving beyond seeing victims of homophobic laws, in order to explore their desires and the possibilities for living life outside societal parameters. I Am You is unique in that it is the first novel published in Arabic to truly take up lesbianism as an issue, and I would argue, a cause. For indeed, it is a highly political novel, questioning every prevailing societal belief about homosexuality, and contending that homosexuality is a natural phenomenon. As the first text of its kind, I Am You will no doubt one day take its place as a lesbian literary classic, but, more importantly, it outs lesbianism in the Arab world (and specifically, in Lebanon), acting as survival literature, and perhaps, opening up a door for further lesbian representation in Arabic culture.”
– Dr. Rebecca Beirne, Author of Lesbians in Television and Text after the Millennium and editor of TelevisingQueer Women: A Reader

Dr. Elham Mansour is a senior scholar and chair of the philosophy department at the Lebanese University in Beirut. She has published a significant number of feminist novels in Arabic, including Hina Kuntu Rajulan, Ayuhuma Huwa? and more recently, Bil Ithn Min Sifr al-Takween. Dr. Mansour’s nonfiction work, Towards Women’s Liberation in Lebanon, was published by Mukhtarat in 1995.

About Samar Habib

Dr. Samar Habib is the author of Female Homosexuality in the Middle East. As well as being the author of several academic works, she also has published the novel, A Tree Like Rain, in 2005. Currently, she works at the University of Western Sydney in studies of Arab popular culture, gender, and Islam, as well as continuing her research into homosexuality in the Arab world. Dr. Habib is the chief editor of Nebula: A Journal of Multidisciplinary Scholarship.

Foreword

Introduction

Part I

Part II

Part III

Notes