After the political and territorial devastation resulting from the 1967 Middle East war, she became active in grassroots organizations. During this time, at a conference in Cairo she met Clovis Maksoud, and they were married in 1974. The next year, with Clovis Maksoud’s appointment as the Arab League Envoy to the USA and Ambassador to the United Nations, they began their combined American journey.

Hala Salaam Maksoud was the quintessential expression of Arab and Arab American leadership. As a writer, academic, humanitarian, political activist, and leader with a vision, she made vast contributions to the causes that most compelled her. Politically masterful, and deeply compassionate, she possessed vision, wisdom, strength, and a boundless sense of humanity.

She believed that for Arab Americans to achieve their rightful place in American national life and in the broader global context, it is imperative for them to cultivate new generations of dedicated Arab American leaders.

Consistent with these ideals, she created The Hala Salaam Maksoud Foundation for Arab American Leadership in the final months of her life. The foundation’s goal is to identify, educate, and motivate outstanding young Arab Americans who demonstrate the promise of becoming tomorrow’s leaders.

Her remarkable work on behalf of human rights and women’s empowerment, and her inexhaustible dedication to advancing the Arab cause—both in the United States and in the Arab world—leave a shining, if challenging, path for others to follow.

Menconi, a world traveler, earlier served as teacher/ principal at the USAF Dependents School in France and Japan . After retirement as a teacher, Mencconi founded the William G. Abdalah Memorial Library, in her brother's memory. She also served as consultant to "The Arabic Hour" television program, collaborated in the publication of two cookbooks. She herself wrote numerous articles including "Arabs in the Boston Area" (Middle East Resources, 2000). To friends and family, she said, "This is my story!"

An activist in community organizations, Menconi received many awards for her service to the Arab-American community. Evelyn Abdalah Menconi's greatest joy was gathering friends and family together for Arabic food, conversation, laughter and fun. Her life-long mission of promoting peace and social justice is part of her enduring legacy.

The Menconi award for outstanding work on behalf of our literary organization expresses Menconi’s ideals as a teacher and community worker. It is accompanied by a $500. prize given by the Menconi?Shehan families.

The Said prize in career excellence is for work in activism, scholarship and literature, consistent with Said’s contributions.

The first place winner each year is a judge the following year. Other judges are drawn from the senior members of the organization. A 2nd and 3rd prize are also given to the runners up in each contest.

Salma Khadra Jayyusi is a scholar unmatched in this era for her copious research and subsequent publications of books and scholarly articles on Arabic literature. She has completed editing, with extensive introductions, eight important anthologies, all translations to English of Arabic literature or commentaries of literary issues. These include The Legacy of Muslim Spain , Jerusalem , Trends and Movements in Modern Arabic Poetry, Modern Palestinian Literature, Modern Arabic Drama, and the newly released Modern Arabic Fiction.

Jayyusi has lectured widely in the US , Canada , Asia , Europe and The Middle East . She abandoned teaching to found East-West Nexus/Prota Publications out of the belief that it was necessary to dedicate her time to the dissemination of Arab/Islamic culture through the publication of well selected translations and studies. She believed the paucity of Arabic literary and cultural material in world languages lay behind the misrepresentations. Other publications and work in preparation stemming from PROTA are: The Literature Of Modern Arabia , An Anthology , Arabic Short Plays, Classical Arabic Fiction, An Anthology,The Jocular Anecdote: Juha,Beyond The Dunes: Anthology Of Modern Saudi Literature. Her Books on Arabic/Islamic Civilization, The Medieval World Through Muslim Eyes, and Medieval Black Africa in Muslim Eyes are part of an ongoing project. The Poetry Of Mahmoud Darwish is ready for publication, as is her collections in Arabic Medieval China , India and other Far Eastern Countries in Muslim Eyes. She has also translated a number of single author and two books of translations of folklore.

Jayyusi works toward the goal of cultivating cultural ties inspired by her belief that all human cultures are the rightful inheritance of all people.. tat it is only the knowledge of the ‘other’ culture that fights prejudice and stereotyping.

The San Francisco Arab Cultural Center is an organization that nurtures a positive sense of cultural identity among Arabic-speaking people and facilitates mutual understanding between them and the community at-large through cultural and educational activities, including Arabic language classes, arts and music. Finally, but not finally, Nashashibi organizes the annual Palestinian festival in San Francisco. And finally she initiated the Annual RAWI Creative Prose Contest, largely funded it for 4 years, and working with authors and judges, administered the contest with dedication, conviction and efficiency.

Sahar Kayyal is a short story writer based in Chicago . Her 2005 RAWI first prize in creative prose was for her story “Virgins in Paradise ”. She is a contributor to the anthology of short prose Dinarzade’s Children (eds. P. Kaldas and K. Mattawa, published in 2004 by U. Arkansas Press. Her short story collection Shakespeare in the Gaza Strip was a finalist for the 2005 Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction.

Patricia Sarrafian Ward was born and raised in Beirut , Lebanon and holds an MFA from University of Michigan , where she received several awards including Hopwood Awards in Novel and Short Fiction. Her writing has appeared in a number of journals, most recently a short story in the anthology Dinarzad's Children and a satirical cartoon strip in Mizna. Her novel The Bullet Collection (Graywolf Press 2003) won the GLCA New Writers Award and the Anahid Literary Award. She has also received fellowships from Vermont Studio Center and Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, a Work Study Scholarship at the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, and First Prize in the 2002 RAWI (Radius of Arab American Writers) writing contest. She currently lives on Sandy Hook Bay in New Jersey .