Interview | Growing Up Irooni- John Ghazvinian on America and Iran: A History, 1720 to the Present

John Ghazvinian joins us to talk about his new book, America and
Iran: A History, 1720 to the Present, a comprehensive new survey
of the bilateral relationship, based on years of archival
research in both Iran and the United States, which he has been
working on since 2008. For the past many decades, the
relationship between the United States and Iran has been very
hostile and toxic, defined by coups, hostage crises, inflammatory
slogans, devastating sanctions. But it hasn’t always been this
way, and the two countries actually had quite a lot of mutual
admiration in the past. The book chronicles that, all the way
back to 1720. Iran is often on the front page of the news in the
US these days, but you will probably be surprised to find out
that it was often on the front page of the US news in the 18th
century as well!John was born in Iran but moved to London at the
age of 1 and to Los Angeles in high school- I wanted to talk to
him about his relationship to Iran and the language growing up,
and what led him to write the book, much of which relied on
primary source material in the Persian language located in
Iran.