WAJAHAT ALI: THE PLAYWRIGHT

Wajahat Ali (playwright) is a Muslim American of Pakistani descent. The Domestic Crusaders is his first full-length play. Born and raised in Fremont, a city located in the Silicon Valley of the San Francisco Bay Area, he has been writing, producing and directing plays, films, and comedy sketches since he was a child, enlisting his friends to be actors and crew. In Fall, 2001, during his undergraduate studies at U.C. Berkeley, he hesitantly began writing The Domestic Crusaders in order to pass a 20 page short story assignment due for a writing class taught by Ishmael Reed, and with his encouragement, transformed the piece into a play which premiered in 2005 at the Thrust Stage of the Berkeley Repertory Theater and San Jose University Theater. In 2009,  The Domestic Crusaders premiered Off-Broadway in New York at the famous Nuyorican Poets Cafe, and broke their box office records during its historic 5 week run.

Ali's The Domestic Crusaders was published by McSweeney's in December 2010. 

Ali’s essays and interviews on contemporary affairs, politics, the media, popular culture and religion frequently appear in the Washington Post, The Guardian, Salon, Slate, McSweeney's, Wall Street Journal Blog,  Huffington Post, CNN.com,  CounterPunch and Chowk, among other on-line sites. His blog, "Goatmilk: An Intellectual Playground" is ranked in the top 7% of all political blogs by blogged.com.

He is the associate editor of Altmuslim.com and contributing editor to the award winning Illume Magazine. His first short story, “Ramadan Blues,” was published in Powwow: Charting the Fault Lines in the American Experience, Short Fiction From Then to Now (Da Capo Press, 2009). His second story, "The Perpoose Story," will be published in the anthology Voices of the Asian American Experience (Winter 2010). His first movie, “Ms. Judgments,” was a finalist for the Link TV Muslim American Film Competition.

Ali is a frequent consultant on Islam and Muslims, post 9-11 Muslim American identity and politics, multicultural art and activism, and New Media Journalism.

He consulted U.C. Berkeley on their 2009 landmark "Islam Today: Youth and New Media" program. The yearlong program, focusing on politics, social networks and arts & culture, was designed to increase public understanding in the U.S. about Islam by looking at how Muslim youth around the world are using "new media" to create new virtual communities, explore their evolving identities, and confront harmful anti-Muslim stereotypes. 

He consulted McSweeney's, a prestigious American publishing company, on their Muslim and Arab American community outreach to promote Dave Eggers' award winning book, Zeitoun. 

He is consulting "Voice of Witness," a non profit book series that documents human rights abuses and issues of contemporary social injustice by using oral history and personal narratives. Their latest book will feature stories on Muslim, Middle Eastern and South Asians facing discrimination after 9-11. 

Wajahat Ali was honored as an “An Influential Muslim American Artist” by the State Department and invited to their 2008 and 2010 Annual Ramadan dinners. He was named a “Muslim Leader of Tomorrow” for his journalism work and invited to participate in the 2009 “Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow” conference in Doha, Qatar. He is the recipient of Muslim Public Affairs Council's prestigious “Emerging Muslim American Artist” recognition of 2009. Wajahat Ali is also an Attorney at Law, practicing in the San Francisco Bay Area. Wajahat Ali is the proud recipient of the 2011 Otto Award for Political Theatre.

Wajahat is currently writing a TV pilot with Dave Eggers for HBO about a Muslim American cop in the Bay Area, California. Wajahat Ali is a researcher and writer for the Center for American Progress focusing on Islamophobia in America.