Mayada Ibrahim, 2023 Peter K. Jansen Memorial Travel Fellow (Arabic)

Image description: Mayada, a black woman with shoulder-length brown afro hair, sits on a wooden chair and smiles at the camera against a backdrop of greenery. She wears a black short-sleeve dress.  

Mayada Ibrahim is a translator, editor, and writer based in Queens, New York. She works in Arabic and English. Her translations have been published by Africa Institute (UAE), Circumference Magazine (US), Archipelago Books (US), Banipal (UK), and Willows House (South Sudan).

As someone whose life is marked by moves across different countries––Saudi Arabia, Sudan, the Emirates, England, Cambodia, Mexico, and the US––Mayada has had a lifelong preoccupation with the way one's sense of the world shifts, and the predicament of responding to that.

Mayada’s path to literary translation began with Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation Publishing, an imprint that published contemporary fiction, nonfiction, and children’s books by SWANA writers, where she worked as the Assistant Editor. She was asked to take a stab at translating a picture book. What initially seemed like a straightforward task soon revealed to Mayada the complexity inherent to literary translation, and she was captivated by it, so she went on to translate as much as she could. She dabbled in poetry and sought out contemporary writing from her native Sudan, which elicited a special joy.

At the outset of the pandemic, Mayada decided to devote more time to literary translation. It was during this pivotal moment in the world of publishing that several works of critical writing were published, which had a deep impact on her, including Violent Phenomena (Tilted Axis) and river in an ocean (trace press), not to mention previously published works such as Kitchen Table Translation (Blue Sketch Press). They helped her develop an understanding of literary translation as more than carrying a piece of literature from one language into the next. Literary translation has the capacity to be feminist, postcolonial, queer. It is a practice that can deepen when tended to, especially collectively.

Mayada is a two-time graduate of the British Centre for Literary Translation (BCLT) Summer School. In 2021, she joined the BIPOC Literary Translators Caucus and has been one of its many active members in New York. She participated in several readings, including the PEN World Voices Festival, PEN Women in Translation Series, and Us&Them. She was also a judge for the 2021 PEN America Translation Award. Her writing on translation has appeared in Modern Poetry in Translation.

Mayada has a translation forthcoming from 128 Lit, a short story by Najlaa Eltom.

Mayada is honored to be a 2023 ALTA Travel Fellow and is looking forward to sharing her work with the ALTA community.