Arab American comedians tackle their culture on the stage
Arab American comedians use their culture to connect with audiences.
Syrian American Laura Laham was glued to the TV watching comedy specials as a kid, but struggles to remember comedians she identified with growing up.
However, a few figures stick out in her memory: “There was Russell Peters, and he was talking about being a third-culture immigrant kid. There was Tig Notaro, she had a few jokes about being flat-chested. And then there was Jeff Dunham, who had an Arab terrorist dummy.”
Research has long shown that Arab Americans have had poor representation in mainstream media – and what they have had has often been marred by negative stereotypes.
“That's probably why I feel like it took so long for me to really find comedy to be a space welcoming for Arab Americans, because it just never seemed that way growing up,” Laham told ABC News.
For Arab stand-up comedians, the stage presents a way to challenge the mainstream misconceptions about the Arab American community, she said.
“Just being on stage and talking about all sorts of different topics, whether it's religion, whether it's sex, whether it's being a feminist, whether it's any of these topics that I think maybe the mainstream media doesn't necessarily show as a part of Arab American life,” Laham said.
Comedy is inextricably linked to their Arab American identity, some comedians told ABC News.
“In the Arab world, humor is its own language,” Laham said. “Anytime you have a gathering of people, you can basically guarantee that they're going to be joking with each other, ragging on each other, laughing, cracking jokes, being sarcastic. That's sort of their love language.”
Comedy combating conflict
After 9/11 and in the lead-up to the Iraq war, comedians Maysoon Zayid and Dean Obeidallah created the New York Arab American Comedy Festival to combat the vilification and discrimination Muslims and Arabs in America were facing.
Federal authorities saw a rise in violence, threats, and other incidents against Arabs, Muslims and other individuals perceived to be of Middle Eastern origin after 9/11, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Zayid, a Palestinian American, said that in this moment, amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, "comedy is the ideal language to discuss something nobody wants to hear."
“I'm not coming in and lecturing. I am not showing you the hundreds of images of amputated babies that I'm inundated with every single day," Zayid told ABC News. “But if while laughing, they learn something they didn't know or they stop fearing something they've always feared, then that's the cherry on top, but it really is about making people laugh."
Comedians often speak about their experiences -- but for some comedians whose identities are at the center of political debates, they say their truth has a heavier impact.
Speaking of her father, Zayid said that Palestinian men are seen as "completely disposable" amid war, "treated as these things that fall from the sky and are meant to be killed."
"They're not showing as compassionate and they're not showing as cheerleaders. I wouldn't be here without my dad. I don't mean biologically. I mean, my father taught me how to walk by putting my feet on his feet," said Zayid, who has cerebral palsy.
It's one of many aspects of life as a disabled, Arab woman that she spotlights in her comedy.
However, Zayid said even representation has its limits.
“I refuse to attempt to humanize myself. … If you don't think I'm a human, making you laugh while you drink is not gonna make me human,” Zayid said.
When Egyptian American comedian Eman Morgan takes the stage, he told ABC News that he connects with his audiences by being as honest about his life as possible. By the end of his set, he hopes audiences will see that people of all backgrounds are more similar than they realize.
"Every race and every culture on planet Earth goes through the same things that every Arab American, every Asian, every American, African American, and Latino American, everybody -- we all go through the same things, we all have the same challenges," Morgan said.
Comedy as culture
For Laham, she said her fellow Arab American comedians are the reason why she stays in comedy.
"The community is so encouraging," she said.
Morgan also credits the Arab American Comedy Festival for giving him the space to open up about his culture on stage, which he had not done much of before.
"Talking about being an Egyptian and growing up in an Egyptian household -- and that's literally what started my career, everything after that kind of opened doors and gigs and opportunities," Morgan said.
For audiences who may better understand her culture, Laham hopes audiences can resonate with the truths she tells on stage. Laham regularly performs in the Middle East, where audiences continue to surprise her by smashing stereotypes about what the community would enjoy or like.
"It's been eye-opening," she said.
"There's a perception of the Middle East ... that makes it seem so conservative and makes it seem just so entirely closed," said Laham. "I go there and it's just like, oh, I'm just myself and they love it just as much."
Some Arab American comics believe comedy is in their DNA: "You can't go to Egypt right now ... without hearing somebody laugh, or telling a joke every second," Morgan said.
Though representation has lagged for Arab stand-up comedians, Zayid notes that many famous American comedy actors were of Arab descent: Marlo Thomas, her father Danny Thomas, Victor E. Tayback, and Tony Shalhoub.
Morgan says his family is full of comedians by birth, arguing "Egyptians have a sense of humor, they were born with it."
And when Zayid was young, she spent her summer vacations in the West Bank, playing alongside her aunties as they embroidered and gossiped.
With no internet and no phone, she listened to them joke about others in their community for hours -- and she says their casual comedic storytelling has played a major role in her work today.
"So when I became a comic, that was the language I access," Zayid said.
ABC News' Dara Elasfar contributed to this report.