Dear Seraj Friends,
Greetings from sunny Palestine! We are thrilled to introduce to you our new initiative, The Seraj Storytelling Center, Dar Al-Hakayat (دار الحكايات).
Stories are incredibly powerful. Not only do they act as a witness to the truth, they connect us to our ancestors and our heritage. They tell us where we come from and guide us as we move forward. Stories grant humanity and dignity to entire groups of people. And most importantly, stories have the power to heal.
Since the inception of Seraj, we have focused on traditional community libraries. However, we are now evolving to a national library that preserves the oral history of Palestinian communities. Our next library will be a storytelling center that gives people the opportunity to tell, write and record their stories.
The new Storytelling Center will focus on three main areas. The first is the collection and archiving of traditional stories and personal histories. But these will not simply be archived, because our second area of focus will be producing artistic pieces and performances based on the stories, to make them interactive and available to all. And the third component of our center will be training people in how to collect and perform these stories.
We are very excited to share this journey with you. We hope the stories and productions will be available to audiences in both Palestine and America and will encourage a deeper connection between Palestinians and communities around the world.
Look for updates on our progress on our Website, Facebook and Instagram accounts!
Laurie & Estephan Salameh,
Palestine, May 2019 | 
