She was Arab, and she taught American literature. She was a little out of place in her own time. For one thing, she was a female academic; further, she was Arab-American. Finally, she taught largely to Arabs in the Middle East. Shakir (late Arab-American literature, Bentley College) was at the start of the movement that made it all right to be female and Arab, but the idea was so new that she earned Fullbright scholarships not only because she was overqualified and her time was due, but also because she had a way of articulating her experiences to the outside world. Here she writes articulately of her self-discovery as she grew up in Boston, became a well-known Boston academic, a well-traveled Fullbright scholar, and a confident, but realistic, cancer patient. She died in 2012. Annotation ©2014 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)