Global Energy Cultures: How Energy Shapes Our Everyday Lives

Omar El Akkad

Omar El Akkad is an author and journalist. The start of his journalism career coincided with the start of the war on terror, and over the following decade he reported from Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay, and many other locations around the world. His work earned a National Newspaper Award for Investigative Journalism and the Goff Penny Award for Young Journalists. His fiction and non-fiction writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Le Monde, Guernica, GQ, and many other newspapers and magazines. His debut novel, American War, is an international bestseller and has been translated into thirteen languages. His new novel, What Strange Paradise, was released in July, 2021 was named a best book of the year by the New York Times, the Washington Post, NPR and several other publications.

Sheetal Majithia

Sheetal Majithia is assistant professor of literature and creative writing at NYUAD and co-lead of the Elements in the Anthropocene: Urbanism, the Environment, and Sustainability Research Kitchen, Division of Arts & Humanities Kitchen. Her book-in-progress examines secular modernity in contemporary Indian culture, including how conceived notions of progress are challenged by the Anthropocene. Her research appears in SAMAR, Modern Drama, and South Asian Review and her work has been supported by the Mellon Foundation and the American Institute of Indian Studies.