Background

Ethnicity: Ansary's father is an Afghan and mother is an American.

Mir Tamim Ansary was born in Kabul, Afghanistan on November 4, 1948, to an Afghan father Mir Amanuddin Ansary and an American mother Terttu Maria Palm. He spent much of his 1950s childhood in the town of Lashkar Gah. Ansary lived in Afghanistan until he was 16, then he moved to the United States.

Education

Mir Tamim Ansary attended Colorado Rocky Mountain School, an American boarding high school in Colorado, on scholarship in 1966.

And he graduated from Reed College in Portland, Oregon with a Bachelor of Arts in literature in 1970.

Career

Mir Tamim Ansary worked at Portland Scribe in the position of staff writer from 1972 to 1976. Then he became an assistant editor of Asian Student. And from 1976 to 1979 he worked as an editor of development publications at The Asia Foundation. From 1980 to 1989 Mir Tamim Ansary was a school department editor at the Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

When Ansary worked at The Asia Foundation, he helped edit a bi-weekly publication about Asian culture and politics, mainly for Asian scholars in America. He had into textbook publishing, editing programs in history, social studies, reading, language arts.

Mir Tamim Ansary is a freelance writer, educational consultant, and columnist since 1990.

His career changed dramatically after the events of September 11, 2001. When the tragedy occurred, Mir Tamim Ansary was in the middle of writing a novel "Buried in Kandahar," about a young man who returns to his native Afghanistan just as the Taliban takes power. The next afternoon, Ansary, heard a talk on a radio station about bombing Afghanistan "back to the Stone Age." After that he sent out an e-mail to 20 friends about the pointlessness of such thinking: Afghanistan, he argued, had already been flattened by decades of internationally sponsored war.

Ansary’s message traveled with unusual speed, and Ansary, who makes his living writing nonfiction for children, had a new vocation: educating his fellow Americans about a part of the world they suddenly want to understand. He was delivering talks to crowds, doing a radio show about Islamic history, writing essays, books.

Ansary writes about Islam, Afghanistan, and history. His book "Destiny Disrupted" retells the history of the world through Islamic eyes. His book "The Invention of Yesterday" explores the role of narrative as a force in world history.

Achievements

• Mir Tamim Ansary is known for his e-mail message that circulated around the world. He was the first to speak up against statements made in the media after 9/11 that suggested Afghanistan be "bombed back to the Stone Age." The email was sent to about 20 of his friends who then sent it to another 20 of their friends, with this cycle continuing until it became a chain email that gained international media attention.
  
  Also Mir Tamim Ansary is known for his book "West of Kabul, East of New York" published shortly after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, is a literary memoir recounting his bicultural perspective on contemporary world conflicts.

Works

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  • The Invention of Yesterday: A 50, 000-Year History of Human Culture, Conflict, and Connection

    (From language to culture to cultural collision: the story...)

    2019
  • Games without Rules: The Often-Interrupted History of Afghanistan

    (By the author of Destiny Disrupted: An enlightening, live...)

    2012
  • Road Trips: Becoming an American in the Vapor trail of the Sixties

    ("Road Trips," recounts stories from Tamim Ansary's years ...)

    2019
  • Arctic Peoples

    (Turn the pages of "Arctic Peoples" to discover: how a hou...)

    2001
  • California Indians

    (Turn the pages of "California Indians" to discover: the m...)

    2001
  • Subarctic Indians

    (An introduction to the history, dwellings, artwork, relig...)

    2001
  • West of Kabul, East of New York: An Afghan American Story

    ("West of Kabul, East of New York" is an urgent communiqué...)

    2003
  • Northwest Coast Indians

    (Turn the pages of "Northwest Coast Indians" to discover: ...)

    2001
  • Southeast Indians

    (Turn the pages of "Southeast Indians" to discover: why In...)

    2001
  • Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes

    ("Destiny Disrupted" tells the history of the world from t...)

    2009
  • Plains Indians

    (Discover the traditional way of life of the Plains Indian...)

    2001
  • Earth Day

    (Turn the pages of this book to find out what causes air p...)

    2006
  • Plateau Indians

    (Find out how Native America lived long ago, what happened...)

    2001
  • Veterans Day

    (This book introduces Veterans Day, explaining the histori...)

    2001
  • Labor Day

    (This book introduces Labor Day, explaining the historical...)

    2001
  • Natural Objects

    (This book offers tips for collecting, organizing, and dis...)

    1997
  • All Around California: Regions and Resources

    (This book contains many fascinating facts and figures abo...)

    2009
  • Matter

    (This book explains the basic properties of matter through...)

    2002
  • People of California

    (This book contains fascinating stories of the many differ...)

    2009
  • California History

    (This book contains many fascinating, historical facts tha...)

    2009
  • Model Cars

    (This book presents beginning tips for collecting, organiz...)

    1997
  • The Widow's Husband

    ("The Widow’s Husband" is an epic story of British imperia...)

    2009
  • Insects

    (This book presents beginning tips for collecting, organiz...)

    1997
  • Dolls

    (This book presents beginning tips for collecting, organiz...)

    1997
  • Stamps

    (This book presents tips for collecting, organizing, and d...)

    1997
  • Eastern Woodlands Indians

    (Come along with us as we meet some of America's first peo...)

    2001
  • Martin Luther King Jr. Day

    (Turn the pages of this book to find out what dream Dr. Ki...)

    2006
  • Arbor Day 2001
  • President's Day 2001
  • Great Basin Indians 1999
  • Thanksgiving Day 2002
  • Columbus Day 1998
  • Southwest Indians 1999
  • Memorial Day 2001
  • Flag Day 1999
  • Independence Day 2002
  • Election Day 2002

Religion

Mir Tamim Ansary described his religious views as secular.

Politics

Politically, Mir Tamim Ansary is a liberal.

Views

Mir Tamim Ansary was the first to speak up against statements made in the media after 9/11 that suggested Afghanistan be "bombed back to the Stone Age." He thought that the United States would need to be deployed in Afghanistan to capture or kill Osama Bin Laden, that, in Ansary's opinion, this could start a third world war.

Quotations: "The role of memoir and of memory, in general, is something that I think is very important. It's my view that you find the meaning of your life in the arc that unfolds as you live. I am very interested in pushing this view here in America because I think the opposite point of view has a great hold on the American imagination, which is that the past doesn't matter - you don't need to think about it; just start from here and go towards tomorrow. My view is so strong that there is no "right here" without the past, and that remembering and finding the patterns and meaning of the past is very much not the same thing as living in the past. It's an attempt to find a meaningful pattern in what you're doing and where you are going."

Connections

Mir Tamim Ansary is married to Deborah Gale Krant since 1981. They have two children.

Father:

Mir Amanuddin Ansary

Mother:

Terttu Maria Palm

Terttu Maria's maiden name is Palm.

Wife:

Deborah Gale Krant

Daughter:

Jessamyn Ansary

Daughter:

Elina Ansary

References

• Mir Tamim Ansary (@MirTamimAnsary)
• Tamim Ansary – History, Memoir, Fiction
• Tamim Ansary