About Us

Sajjeling is an online magazine dedicated to recording and unravelling Arab-Australian stories.

Sajjeling provides a platform for discussion, exploration and the consideration of ideas that affect the Arab-Australian diaspora. We showcase a diversity of opinions and perspectives, and we keep tabs on events and issues impacting our communities. We feature serious and lighthearted pieces on politics, society, culture, cinema, food, and the arts.

Our editorial team is a group of Sydney-based Arab writers. We welcome guest contributions on relevant issues from all Arab writers.

What does ‘Sajjeling’ mean?

The name Sajjeling is inspired by the late Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish’ poem Identity Card, written in 1964. In this piece about Palestinian resistance of colonialism and occupation, Darwish writes, “Record! I am an Arab.”

Throughout the poem, Darwish commands that his identity – his heritage, family, common story, and nation – be written down and recorded.В “Record,” he repeats, “I am an Arab.”

Record in Arabic is sajjel (سجل). And as Arab-Australians brought up speaking both English and Arabic, we sometimes find ourselves using hybrid Arabic-English words. It is common among us to tack the English “ing” form onto the end of Arabic verbs. So, instead of writing, we say we are “iktibing”, or instead of cleaning, we say we are “kanasing”. And, in this space, we are recording. We are sajjeling.

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