Azfar Hussain

Azfar Hussain
Hussain at TSC, University of Dhaka
Native name আজফার হোসেন
Born Bangladesh
Residence Michigan, United States
Education PhD (English and World Literature)
Alma mater University of Dhaka, Washington State University
Occupation Writer, Scholar, Teacher
Website www.azfarhussain.net

Azfar Hussain (Bengali: আজফার হোসেন) is a Bangladeshi theorist, critic, academic, bilingual writer, and translator.[1] He is Associate Professor of Liberal Studies/Interdisciplinary Studies at Grand Valley State University in Michigan, and Vice-President of the Global Center for Advanced Studies (GCAS) and Honorary GCAS Professor of English, World Literature, and Interdisciplinary Studies.[1][2] He taught English, World Literature, Ethnic Studies, and Cultural Studies at Washington State University, Bowling Green State University, and Oklahoma State University; while, in Bangladesh, he taught English at Jahangirnagar University and North South University.[3] He also worked as Scholar-in-Residence at the University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh.[3] He is an advisory editor of Rhizomes: Cultural Studies in Emerging Knowledge.[4] He is also an editorial board member of the Bengali journals Natun Diganta and Sarbajonakotha.

Hussain has published—in both Bengali and English—hundreds of academic, and creative pieces, including translations from Bengali and Urdu, and written on a wide range of topics from Native American poetics and politics to critiques of postmodern-poststructuralist-postcolonial theory to Marxist political economy to "third-world" literatures to globalization and imperialism to theories and practices of interdisciplinarity.[5] He translated into Bengali the stories of Gabriel Garcia Marquez and the poems of Stéphane Mallarmé,[6] Vicente Aleixandre,[7] and Roque Dalton, among others. He also translated into English the lyrics of Kabir [8] and the poems of Faiz Ahmad Faiz.[9]

Education and career

Azfar Hussain received his BA (Honors) and MA degrees in English from the University of Dhaka. He obtained his second MA in English under a Fulbright fellowship and his doctorate in English and World Literature—both with distinction—from Washington State University.[5] He also worked as Postdoctoral Blackburn Fellow in the Department of English at Washington State University prior to joining in 2004 the university’s faculty of the Department of Comparative Ethnic Studies, later renamed Critical Culture, Gender, and Race Studies.[10] Before migrating to the US in the mid-1990s, Hussain served as Acting General Secretary of Bangladesh Lekhak Shibir—an organization of progressive writers, artists, and activists. Hussain co-edited—with Serajul Islam Choudhury—a Bengali national viewsweekly called Somoy and worked as a contributing editor of the national newsweekly Sunday Express.[5] He also contributed numerous columns on political, social, and cultural issues to newspapers and periodicals in both Bengali and English.[5] In 2013 Hussain joined as Vice-President the Global Center for Advanced Studies and has been working in that position since then.

Personal life

Azfar Hussain divides his time between Bangladesh and the US. He currently lives in Dhaka and Allendale, Michigan.[11] He was married in 2002, and has a daughter, Salma Hussain.[11]

Selected publications

  • Chromatones: A collection of poems in English (1980)
  • The Wor(l)d in Question: Essays in Political Economy and Cultural Politics (2008)
  • The Phalgun Phenomenon (Translations of Bengali poems) (2008)

References

  1. 1 2 "Interview with Azfar Hussain - literature, culture, and politics". The Daily Observer. 16 January 2016. Retrieved 8 June 2016.
  2. ↑ "Azfar Hussain". The Global Center for Advanced Studies. The Global Center for Advanced Studies. Retrieved 8 June 2016.
  3. 1 2 "Alternative education for transforming the world". Dhaka tribune. Dhaka Tribune. 2 April 2016. Retrieved 15 July 2016.
  4. ↑ "About Rhizomes". Retrieved 15 July 2016.
  5. 1 2 3 4 "আজফার হোসেন". bdnews24.com. bdnews24.com. Retrieved 2 August 2016.
  6. ↑ "স্তেফান মালার্মের দুইটি গদ্যকবিতা". সাহিত্য ক্যাফে (in Bengali). 13 June 2013. Retrieved 15 July 2016.
  7. ↑ Hussain, Azfar (9 July 2013). "বিসেন্তে আলেকজান্দ্রের দশটি কবিতা". bdnews24.com. bdnews24.com. Retrieved 15 July 2016.
  8. ↑ "Kabir (d. 1575?): Selected Poems". public.wsu.edu. Washington State University. Retrieved 22 July 2016.
  9. ↑ "Faiz Ahmad Faiz (1914-1984): Selected Poems". public.wsu.edu. Washington State University. Retrieved 22 July 2016.
  10. ↑ "দেরিদা নিজেকে ম্যাটেরিয়েলিস্ট দাবি করেন কিন্তু তিনি ভূতুড়েপনায় আচ্ছন্ন : আজফার হোসেন". banglatribune.com. Retrieved 2 August 2016.
  11. 1 2 "বিষয় '‌‌বুদ্ধিজীবী' আজফার হোসেনের সঙ্গে আলাপ". bdnews24. bdnews24. Retrieved 2 August 2016.
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