How have Americans experienced the year since the September 11 attacks? What have the attacks and their aftermath shown us about our own country? What should we Americans be asking and learning about ourselves?

"Between Two Worlds: Arab American Teens After 9/11" (a collaboration of Michigan Radio, the University of Michigan Arts of Citizenship Program, and ACCESS, the Arab Community Center For Economic and Social Services) explores these questions from the viewpoint of a community deeply affected by September 11: the Arab-American community of southeast Michigan. Centered in Dearborn, Michigan and spread throughout the Detroit metropolitan area, this community represents one of the largest concentrations of Arabic people outside the middle East, as well as one of the most vibrant immigrant communities in contemporary America. We wanted to hear Arab-American voices telling us their story-especially the voices of teenagers who are so often the "front line" of immigrant families negotiating between different identities, generations, and cultures.

Three teens from Dearborn told us their stories in their own words and those of their friends and families: Ghufran Al-Shameery, Nirmeen Saleh, and Mike Nigel Isa. (Two pieces are available for broadcast as part of National Public Radio's initiative "Understanding America After 9/11," and all three are on this website.) What they told us was in some ways surprising. We expected to hear much about September 11 and its reverberations through the Arab-American community, as well as about negative stereotypes and racial profiling to which the teens and their peers were subjected. When you listen to their audio diaries, you will indeed hear about that.

But even more, "Between Two Worlds" turns out to be a chapter in the history of the American immigrant experience and the role of young people in navigating that experience for their families. Listening to Nirmeen's little niece switch between Arabic music and the Barney theme song, hearing Ghufran talk about her reasons for wearing the hejab, the traditional Muslim scarf, in America, we are privileged to witness teenagers negotiating between and bridging their worlds. It is a familiar story in some ways, one that has made bagels, salsa, and sushi mainstream American foods. But the stories of these teens also reminds us that each generation had to fight hard to have its voices included on the American air. The voices of these teens will make you smile and take you to an American community of football games and mosques.

• Arab-American Voices
• About the Project
• Michigan's Arab-American Community
• Reflections of the Participants