LITERARY
FESTIVAL‘26
SILK ROAD
SAT / OCT.17
— MERIDIAN ARTS
CENTRE
The Silk Road Literary Festival is a celebration of literature, storytelling, and ideas from North America’s leading Muslim and BIPOC voices. This year, writers, filmmakers, and thinkers come together to explore the power of narrative: who gets to tell our stories, how they shape the worlds we understand, and what it means to witness, remember, and respond.
This year’s Silk Road Literary Festival brings together writers, filmmakers and thinkers for conversations on storytelling, representation, politics and our responsibility to witness. Through fiction, film and critical dialogue, SRLF ’26 explores how stories shape the way we understand ourselves, one another and the world around us.
Featured
Speakers
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Omar El Akkad is an author and journalist. He was born in Egypt, grew up in Qatar, moved to Canada as a teenager and now lives in the United States. The start of his journalism career coincided with the start of the war on terror, and over the following decade he reported from Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay and many other locations around the world. His work earned a National Newspaper Award for Investigative Journalism and the Goff Penny Award for young journalists. His fiction and non-fiction writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Le Monde, Guernica, GQ and many other newspapers and magazines. His debut novel, American War, is an international bestseller and has been translated into thirteen languages. It won the Pacific Northwest Booksellers’ Award, the Oregon Book Award for fiction, the Kobo Emerging Writer Prize and has been nominated for more than ten other awards. It was listed as one of the best books of the year by The New York Times, Washington Post, GQ, NPR, Esquire and was selected by the BBC as one of 100 novels that changed our world. His new novel, What Strange Paradise, was released in July, 2021 and won the Giller Prize, the Pacific Northwest Booksellers’ Award, the Oregon Book Award for fiction, and was shortlisted for the Aspen Words Literary Prize. It was also named a best book of the year by the New York Times, the Washington Post, NPR and several other publications. Omar lives near Portland, Oregon, where is on the faculty of the Pacific University MFA in Writing program.
His journalism experience began in 1996 as an exchange student in northern Germany, writing articles about being an Anishinaabe youth in a foreign country for newspapers back in Canada. He graduated from the journalism program at Toronto Metropolitan University in 2002. He spent most of his journalism career with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a video journalist, web writer, producer, and radio host. In 2014, he received the Anishinabek Nation’s Debwewin Citation for excellence in First Nation Storytelling. His final role with CBC was host of Up North, the afternoon radio program for northern Ontario. He left daily journalism in 2020 to focus on his literary career.
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S. K. Ali* is the author of Saints and Misfits (Simon & Schuster, 2017), a finalist for the American Library Association’s 2018 William C. Morris award. Her debut novel won critical acclaim for its portrayal of an unapologetic Muslim – American teen’s life. Saints and Misfits was featured on several Best Teen Novels of 2017 lists including from Entertainment Weekly, Kirkus Reviews and the New York Public Library. It was also a CBC Canada Reads 2018 longlist title and featured in The Globe and Mail, NBC News, Huffington Post, Salon, Bustle, CBC Radio’s The Next Chapter, The Social, The Morning Show and other North American media.
Sajidah’s second novel, Love From A to Z (Simon & Schuster, 2019), a story about finding love in the time of Islamophobia, was a Goodreads Choice finalist for best YA book, and on several best 2019 lists, including Kirkus’ and Entertainment Weekly’s top ten. Love from A to Z was the first YA title chosen to be part of Today Show’s “Read With Jenna” book club and was named a best teen book of all time by Reader’s Digest and Good Housekeeping. It was featured in The Globe and Mail and The Washington Post and other North American and global media.
Misfit in Love (Simon & Schuster, 2021), the sequel to Saints and Misfits, was a People magazine best book of summer 2021.
Her picture book, The Proudest Blue (Little Brown, 2019), co-authored with Ibtihaj Muhammad, debuted on the New York Times Bestseller list and was featured in the New York Times, NPR, Amazon Editor’s Choice, The Today Show, among other media. Along with We Need Diverse Books co-founder, Aisha Saeed, Sajidah is the co-editor of a Middle Grade anthology called, Once Upon an Eid (Amulet, 2020), winner of the Middle East Book Honor Award and a Kirkus and School Library Journal Best Book of 2020.
Sajidah has six more books on the way, including Love from Mecca to Medina (Simon & Schuster, October 18, 2022), the sequel to Love from A to Z.
S. K. Ali has a degree in Creative Writing and lives in Toronto with her family, which includes a very vocal cat named Yeti and a very quiet cat named Mochi.
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Farah Nabulsi is a Palestinian-British Oscar-nominated and BAFTA®-winning filmmaker and human rights advocate.
She is the daughter of Palestinians who were fortunate enough to make a home in 1970's Britain — unlike the millions who continue to remain stateless in refugee camps.
Born, raised and educated in London, Farah began her career as an institutional equity stockbroker. She ended up with a CFA designation at JP Morgan Chase before moving on to build a children-focused business that she ran for 10 years.
In 2015, Farah started working in the film industry. She founded a production company through which she writes, produces and directs fiction narrative films, exploring topics that matter to her. She also created a digital resource to deconstruct the Israeli military occupation of Palestine in a way never done before.
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Saeed A. Khan is currently in the Department of History and Lecturer in the Department of Near East & Asian Studies at Wayne State University-Detroit, Michigan, where he teaches Islamic and Middle East History, Islamic Civilizations and History of Islamic Political Thought. Mr. Khan is also a Research Fellow at Wayne State University’s Center for the Study of Citizenship. He is also Adjunct Professor in Islamic Studies at the University of Detroit-Mercy and at Rochester College, co-teaching a course on Muslim-Christian Diversity.
With areas of focus including US policy, globalization, Middle East and Islamic Studies, as well as genomics and bioethics, Mr. Khan has been a contributor to several media agencies, such as C-Span, NPR, Voice of America and the National Press Club, as well as newspapers and other outlets, and is also a consultant on Islamic and Middle East affairs for the BBC and the CBC. In addition, he has served as consultant to the US-Arab Economic Forum. Mr. Khan has founded the Center for the Study of Trans-Atlantic Diasporas, a think tank and policy center examining and comparing the condition of ethnic immigrant groups in North America and Europe, consulting the US and UK governments on their respective Muslim communities. Most recently, Mr. Khan has become co-host of the radio show “Detroit Today” on Detroit Public Radio.
SILK ROAD LITERARY FESTIVAL '26 ITINERARY
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SILK ROAD LITERARY FESTIVAL '26 ITINERARY —
SAT/OCT.17
—MERIDIAN ARTS CENTRE
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Discussing Muslims in Fiction and Golden Flight with S.K. Ali
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Muslim Americans and the Changing American Political Landscape with Saeed Khan
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Telling Our Own Stories: Cinema and Palestinian Representation with Farah Nabulsi
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Telling Our Own Stories: Cinema and Palestinian Representation with Farah Nabulsi
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Humanity in Focus: A Conversation on Witnessing and Our Responsibility with Omar El Akkad
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Concert with Parachute Thieves
CHOOSE YOUR FESTIVAL EXPERIENCE
Whether you’re spending the full day with us or coming for one conversation, there’s a ticket option for you.
ALL DAY PASS — $72
Make a day of it. Your All Day Pass gives you access to the full SRLF ’26 experience, including all four featured sessions, our opening program, film screening, activities between sessions, networking opportunities, and the closing concert with Parachute Thieves.
SINGLE SESSION TICKETS — $32
Coming for a particular author or conversation? Single-session tickets are available for each of our four featured programs, so you can build your festival experience around the conversations you don’t want to miss.
Prices are subject to applicable order fees.
We’re thrilled to open the doors of Meridian Arts Centre, one of Toronto’s most beloved cultural landmarks for this year’s Silk Road Literary Festival.
Address
5040 Yonge St, North York, ON M2N 6R8
