Aida Bardissi is a poet & PhD student of Middle East Studies at New York University.

Her doctoral project examines films of the Nasser era as an inquiry into constructions of national ‘authenticity’ — particularly as it relates to the question(s) of race, temporality, and indigeneity. At large, her work engages with the various civilisational myths surrounding the Egyptian state by addressing its various sites of promulgation: including museum and performance studies, cinema studies, comparative literature, and liberation psychology.

Her forthcoming full-length poetry collection, a nation without an anthem is just a body, will be out in Fall 2025 under Sundress Poetry.

You will likely find her watching The Twilight Zone.