Aileen H. Clyde 20th Century Women's Legacy Archive: Iranian oral history project, ACCN 0814

The Iranian oral history project is part of the Everett L. Cooley oral history project, ACCN 0814.

• Lida Andisheh 

  Andisheh talks about her childhood and education in Iran and what brought her to the United States. She briefly attended the National University of Iran for a medical career, but later went to the University of Tehran and received a bachelor’s degree in English literature. She also talks about her relationship with her father and husband and the lack of freedom she had growing up as an Iranian woman. While still in Iran she worked for Bank Sepah and the Imperial Social Services. She came to the United States in 1976 to volunteer with the Red Cross and take her training back to Iran. Andisheh’s family was living in Salt Lake City during this time, and she stayed as a result of the Iranian Revolution. She received her PhD from the University of Utah and raised her family in Salt Lake.

• Shireen Mahdavi 

  Mahdavi talks about her education and career in Iran and what brought her to the United States, as well as her continued education when she arrived. She grew up in a prominent family in Iran and received her bachelor’s degree in social anthropology from the London School of Economics and Political Science. She worked for the Planning and Budget Organization and the Women’s Organization of Iran. She emigrated from Iran to Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1979, because of the political upheaval of the Iranian Revolution, and because her husband was an architecture student at the University of Utah. After she came the United States from London in 1979, she asked for political asylum and has lived and raised her family in Salt Lake City. She received a master’s degree in history from the University of Utah and a PhD in history from London University.