Iranian Americans are

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

citizens or nationals who are of Iranian ancestry or who hold

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

ian

citizenship Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection". Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and ...

. Iranian Americans are among the most highly educated people in the United States. They have historically excelled in business, academia, science, the arts, and entertainment. Most Iranian Americans arrived in the United States after 1979, as a result of the

Iranian Revolution The Iranian Revolution ( fa, انقلاب ایران, Enqelâb-e Irân, ), also known as the Islamic Revolution ( fa, انقلاب اسلامی, Enqelâb-e Eslâmī), was a series of events that culminated in the overthrow of the Pahlavi dyna ...

and the fall of the Persian monarchy, with over 40% settling in California, specifically Los Angeles. Unable to return to Iran, they have created many distinct ethnic enclaves, such as the Los Angeles

Tehrangeles Tehrangeles ( fa, تهرانجلس) (or Little Persia) is a portmanteau deriving from the combination of '' Tehran'', the capital of Iran, and '' Los Angeles''. A Persian community developed in Westwood, Los Angeles after the Islamic Revoluti ...

community. The Iranian American community has become successful, with many becoming doctors, engineers, lawyers, and tech entrepreneurs. Based on a 2012 announcement by the National Organization for Civil Registration, an organization of the

Ministry of Interior of Iran The Ministry of Interior ( fa, وزارت کشور, ''Vâzart-e Kâshvar'') of the Islamic Republic of Iran is in charge of performing, supervising and reporting elections, policing, and other responsibilities related to an interior ministry. D ...

, the United States has the highest number of Iranians outside the country. In 2021 the

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Iran The Ministry of Foreign Affairs ( fa, وزارت امور خارجه, Vezārat-e Omūr-e Khārejeh) is an Iranian government ministry headed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who is a member of cabinet. The current Minister of Foreign Affairs ...

published new statistics showing that 1,500,000 Iranians who were born in Iran are living in the U.S. according to the most recent data. However this number only represents Iranian born population who moved to the U.S. at some point and does not include the number of U.S.-born Iranians and other groups with Iranian ancestors.

Terminology

Iranian-American is sometimes used interchangeably with Persian-American, partly due to the fact that, in the

Western world The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to the various nations and states in the regions of Europe, North America, and Oceania.

was known as "Persia." On the

Nowruz Nowruz ( fa, نوروز, ; ), zh, 诺鲁孜节, ug, نەۋروز, ka, ნოვრუზ, ku, Newroz, he, נורוז, kk, Наурыз, ky, Нооруз, mn, Наурыз, ur, نوروز, tg, Наврӯз, tr, Nevruz, tk, Nowruz, ...

of 1935,

Reza Shah Pahlavi , , spouse = Maryam Savadkoohi Tadj ol-Molouk Ayromlu (queen consort)Turan AmirsoleimaniEsmat Dowlatshahi , issue = Princess Hamdamsaltaneh Princess ShamsMohammad Reza Shah Princess Ashraf Prince Ali Reza Prince Gholam Reza Prin ...

asked foreign delegates to use the term Iran, the

endonym An endonym (from Greek: , 'inner' + , 'name'; also known as autonym) is a common, ''native'' name for a geographical place, group of people, individual person, language or dialect, meaning that it is used inside that particular place, group, ...

of the country used since the

Sasanian Empire The Sasanian () or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians (, ) and also referred to by historians as the Neo-Persian Empire, was the last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th-8th centuries AD. Named ...

, in formal correspondence. Since then the use of the word "Iran" has become more common in the Western countries. This also changed the usage of the terms for Iranian nationality, and the common adjective for citizens of Iran changed from "Persian" to "Iranian." In 1959, the government of

Mohammad Reza Pahlavi , title = Shahanshah Aryamehr Bozorg Arteshtaran , image = File:Shah_fullsize.jpg , caption = Shah in 1973 , succession = Shah of Iran , reign = 16 September 1941 – 11 February 1979 , coronation = 26 Octob ...

, Reza Shah Pahlavi's son, announced that both "Persia" and "Iran" could officially be used interchangeably.Yarshater, Ehsa
Persia or Iran, Persian or Farsi
, ''Iranian Studies'', vol. XXII no. 1 (1989) The issue is still debated today. Majd, Hooman, ''The Ayatollah Begs to Differ: The Paradox of Modern Iran'', by Hooman Majd,

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...

, 23 September 2008, , 9780385528429. p
161
/ref> There is a tendency among Iranian-Americans to categorize themselves as "Persian" rather than "Iranian", mainly to dissociate themselves from the negative stereotypes of Iranians in media. Some Iranian-Americans also don't prefer "Iranian" to disassociate themselves with the Islamic Republic of Iran, yet this rationale has been criticized as the term "Iran" was widely used before 1979 as well. The term "Iranian" is regarded as more inclusive than "Persian", as the term "Persian" excludes non-Persian ethnic minorities of Iran. While the majority of Iranian-Americans come from Persian backgrounds, there is a significant number of non-Persian Iranians such as

Azeris Azerbaijanis (; az, Azərbaycanlılar, ), Azeris ( az, Azərilər, ), or Azerbaijani Turks ( az, Azərbaycan Türkləri, ) are a Turkic people living mainly in northwestern Iran and the Republic of Azerbaijan. They are the second-most nume ...

and

Kurds ug:كۇردلار Kurds ( ku, کورد ,Kurd, italic=yes, rtl=yes) or Kurdish people are an Iranian peoples, Iranian ethnic group native to the mountainous region of Kurdistan in Western Asia, which spans southeastern Turkey, northwestern Ir ...

within the Iranian-American community, leading some scholars to believe that the label "Iranian" is more inclusive, since the label "Persian" excludes non-Persian minorities.

History

Early history

One of the first recorded Iranians to visit

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

was Martin the Armenian, an Iranian-Armenian tobacco grower who settled in

Jamestown, Virginia The Jamestown settlement in the Colony of Virginia was the first permanent English settlement in the Americas. It was located on the northeast bank of the James (Powhatan) River about southwest of the center of modern Williamsburg. It was ...

in 1618. Mirza Mohammad Ali, also known as Hajj Sayyah, was an Iranian who came to North America in the 1800s. He was inspired to travel around the world due to the contradiction between the democratic ideals he read about and how his fellow Iranians were treated by their leaders. He began his travels as a 23-year-old looking for knowledge, to experience the lives of others, and to use that knowledge to help with Iran's progress. His stay in the United States lasted 10 years, and he traveled across the country from New York to San Francisco. He met a variety of influential American figures including President

Ulysses S. Grant Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant ; April 27, 1822July 23, 1885) was an American military officer and politician who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1869 to 1877. As Commanding General, he led the Union A ...

, who met with him on several occasions. On 26 May 1875, Hajj Sayyah became the first Iranian to become an American Citizen. He was imprisoned upon his return to Iran for taking a stand against living conditions there. He looked to the United States to protect him but to no avail. During the peak period of worldwide emigration to the United States (1842–1903), only 130 Iranian nationals were known to have immigrated.

First phase of emigration

The first wave of Iranian migration to the United States occurred from the late 1940s to 1977, or 1979. The United States was an attractive destination for students, as American universities offered some of the best programs in engineering and other fields, and were eager to attract students from foreign countries. Iranian students, most of whom had learned English as a second language in Iran, were highly desirable as new students at colleges and universities in the United States. By the mid-1970s, nearly half of all Iranian students who studied abroad did so in the United States. By 1975, the Institute of International Education's annual foreign student census figures listed Iranian students as the largest group of foreign students in the United States, amounting to a total of 9% of all foreign students in the country. As the Iranian economy continued to rise steadily in the 70s, it enabled many more Iranians to travel abroad freely. Consequently, the number of Iranian visitors to the United States also increased considerably, from 35,088, in 1975, to 98,018, in 1977. During the 1977–78 academic year, of about 100,000 Iranian students abroad, 36,220 were enrolled in American institutions of higher learning. During the 1978–79 academic year, on the eve of the revolution, the number of Iranian students enrolled in American institutions rose to 45,340, and in 1979–80, that number reached a peak of 51,310. At that time, according to the

Institute of International Education The Institute of International Education (IIE) is a 501(c) organization which focuses on international student exchange and aid, foreign affairs, and international peace and security. IIE creates programs of study and training for students, educa ...

, more students from Iran were enrolled in American universities than from any other foreign country. The pattern of Iranian migration during this phase usually only involved individuals, not whole families. Due to Iran's increasing demand for educated workers in the years before the revolution, the majority of the Iranian students in America intended to return home after graduation to work, especially those who had received financial aid from the Iranian government or from industry on condition of returning to take jobs upon graduation. Due to the drastic events of the

1979 Revolution The Iranian Revolution ( fa, انقلاب ایران, Enqelâb-e Irân, ), also known as the Islamic Revolution ( fa, انقلاب اسلامی, Enqelâb-e Eslâmī), was a series of events that culminated in the overthrow of the Pahlavi dynas ...

, the students ended up staying in the United States as refugees. These several thousand visitors and students unintentionally became the basis of the cultural, economic, and social networks that would enable large-scale immigration in the years that followed.

Second phase

The second phase of Iranian migration began immediately before and after the

of 1979 and the overthrow of the Shah

, and became significant in the early 1980s. As Ronald H. Bayor writes, "The 1979 Revolution and the 1980–88 war with Iraq transformed Iran's class structure, politically, socially, and economically." The revolution drastically changed the pattern and nature of Iranian emigration to the United States, while the Iran-Iraq War that ensued afterwards was also another factor that forced many of the best-educated and most wealthy families into exile in the United States and other countries. Once basically an issue of brain drain during the Pahlavi period, it was now predominantly an involuntary emigration of a relatively large number of middle- and upper-class families, including the movement of a considerable amount of wealth. During and after the revolution, most students did not return to Iran, and those who did were gradually purged from the newly established

Islamic Republic The term Islamic republic has been used in different ways. Some Muslim religious leaders have used it as the name for a theoretical form of Islamic theocratic government enforcing sharia, or laws compatible with sharia. The term has also been u ...

. Many students who graduated abroad after the revolution also did not return, due to the ruling clergy's repression. As a result, the educated elite who left Iran after the revolution, and the new graduates in the United States who chose not to return home, created a large pool of highly educated and skilled Iranian professionals in the United States. By 2002, an estimated 1.5 to 2.5 million Iranians lived abroad, mainly in North America and Europe, due to the Islamic government's authoritarian practices.Torbat, Akbar E (Spring 2002). "The brain drain from Iran to the United States". ''Middle East Journal'' 56 (2): 272–295. A further notable aspect of the migration in this phase is that members of religious and ethnic minorities were starting to become disproportionally represented among the Iranian American community, most notably Baháʼís, Jews, Armenians, and Assyrians. According to the 1980 US Census, there were 123,000 Americans of Iranian ancestry at that time. Between 1980 and 1990, the number of foreign-born people from Iran in the United States increased by 74 percent. The revolution caused a drastic change in the Iranian culture. Iran was no longer a thriving country. This is part of the reason so many Iranians began to flee to America.

Contemporary period

Max Amini Persian American Stand Up Comedian 2015

The third phase of Iranian immigration started in 1995 and continues to the present. According to the

2000 US Census The United States census of 2000, conducted by the Census Bureau, determined the resident population of the United States on April 1, 2000, to be 281,421,906, an increase of 13.2 percent over the 248,709,873 people enumerated during the 1990 cen ...

, there were 283,225 Iranian-born people in the US. According to the same 2000 US Census, there were 385,488 Americans of Iranian ancestry at that time. The 2011

American Community Survey The American Community Survey (ACS) is a demographics survey program conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau. It regularly gathers information previously contained only in the long form of the decennial census, such as ancestry, citizenship, educati ...

(ACS) estimate found 470,341 Americans with full or partial Iranian ancestry. However, most experts believe that this is a problem of underrepresenting due to the fact that "many community members have been reluctant in identifying themselves as such because of the problems between Iran and the United States in the past two decades." and also because many were ethnic minorities (Jewish, Armenian, and Assyrian Iranians) who instead identify as the ethnic group they are part of rather than as Iranians.Bahareh H. Lampert. ''Voices of New American Women: Visions of Home in the Middle Eastern Diasporic Imagination'' page 50, 2008. Estimates of 1,000,000 and above are given by many Iranian and non-Iranian organizations, media, and scholars. Kenneth Katzman, specialist in Middle Eastern affairs and part of the

Congressional Research Service The Congressional Research Service (CRS) is a public policy research institute of the United States Congress. Operating within the Library of Congress, it works primarily and directly for members of Congress and their committees and staff on a ...

, in December 2015 estimated the number at over 1,000,000. Paul Harvey and Edward Blum of the

University of Colorado The University of Colorado (CU) is a system of public universities in Colorado. It consists of four institutions: University of Colorado Boulder, University of Colorado Colorado Springs, University of Colorado Denver, and the University o ...

and the

University of San Diego The University of San Diego (USD) is a private Roman Catholic research university in San Diego, California. Chartered in July 1949 as the independent San Diego College for Women and San Diego University (comprising the College for Men and Sch ...

in 2012 estimated their number at 1,000,000,Paul Harvey, Edward Blum. ''The Columbia Guide to Religion in American History'' page 368. Columbia University Press, 14 February 2012. as well as

Al-Jazeera Al Jazeera ( ar, الجزيرة, translit-std=DIN, translit=al-jazīrah, , "The Island") is a state-owned Arabic-language international radio and TV broadcaster of Qatar. It is based in Doha and operated by the media conglomerate Al Jazeera ...

. According to the PAAIA (Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans), estimates range from 500,000 to 1,000,000, numbers backed up by Ronald H. Bayor of the

Georgia Institute of Technology The Georgia Institute of Technology, commonly referred to as Georgia Tech or, in the state of Georgia, as Tech or The Institute, is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta, Georgia. Established in 1885, it is part ...

as well.Ronald H. Bayor. ''Multicultural America: An Encyclopedia of the Newest Americans'' ABC-CLIO, 2011 . page 1080 ''

The Atlantic ''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science. It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...

'' stated that there were an estimated 1,500,000 Iranians in the United States in 2012. The Iranian interest section in Washington, D.C., in 2003 claimed to hold passport information for approximately 900,000 Iranians in the US. Today, the United States contains the highest number of Iranians outside of Iran. The Iranian-American community has produced individuals notable in many fields, including medicine, engineering, and business.

Demographics

Although Iranians have lived in the United States in relatively small numbers since the 1930s, a large number of Iranian-Americans immigrated to the United States after the

of 1979. Data on this group is well documented by the

United States Citizenship and Immigration Services U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is an agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that administers the country's naturalization and immigration system. It is a successor to the Immigration and Naturalizati ...

(USCIS). According to the

, there were 385,488 Americans of Iranian ancestry at that time. In the 2011 ACS, the number of Americans of full or partial Iranian ancestry amounted c. 470,341.

Population

Federal data on Iranian Americans in the

2010 United States Census The United States census of 2010 was the twenty-third United States national census. National Census Day, the reference day used for the census, was April 1, 2010. The census was taken via mail-in citizen self-reporting, with enumerators serving ...

was not according to race, but rather ancestry, which is collected by the annual

(ACS). Data on Iranian ancestry from the annual ACS is available on the Census Bureau's

American Factfinder The United States Census Bureau (USCB), officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the U.S. Federal Statistical System, responsible for producing data about the American people and economy. The Census Bureau is part of the ...

website. Racially, on the Census, Iranian Americans have been classified as a

white American White Americans are Americans who identify as and are perceived to be white people. This group constitutes the majority of the people in the United States. As of the 2020 Census, 61.6%, or 204,277,273 people, were white alone. This represented ...

group. Most experts believe that the underrepresented number of Iranian Americans in the ACS is a problem due to the fact that "many community members have been reluctant in identifying themselves as such because of the problems between Iran and the United States in the past two decades." Estimations of 1,000,000 and above are given by many Iranian and non-Iranian organizations, media, and scholars. Kenneth Katzman, specialist in Middle Eastern affairs and part of the

, estimated their number at over 1,000,000 in published December 2015. Historians Paul Harvey and Edward Blum estimate their number at 1,000,000 in 2012, as well as

. According to the PAAIA (Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans), estimates range from 500,000 to 1,000,000, numbers backed by Ronald H. Bayor of the

. ''

'', in 2012, stated that there are an estimated 1,500,000 Iranians in the United States. The Iranian interest section in Washington D.C., in 2003, claimed to hold passport information for approximately 900,000 Iranians in the US. According to research done by the Iranian Studies Group, an independent academic organization at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of th ...

(MIT), Iranian Americans are most likely far more numerous in the United States than census data indicate. The group estimates that the number of Iranian Americans may have topped 691,000 in 2004—more than twice the figure of 338,000 cited in the 2000 U.S. census. Roughly half of the nation's Iranians reside in the state of

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

alone. Other large communities include

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delawa ...

, which have 9.1% of the U.S.'s Iranian population, followed by Washington, D.C./

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean t ...

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth are ...

(8.3%) and

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

(6.7%).Iranian-Americans and the 2010 Census: Did We Shrink?
by Hossein Hosseini. Payvand.com. Approximately 6,000–10,000 Iranian Americans reside in the city of

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...

, while up to 30,000 reside in the

Chicago metropolitan area The Chicago metropolitan area, also colloquially referred to as Chicagoland, is a metropolitan area in the Midwestern United States. Encompassing 10,286 sq mi (28,120 km2), the metropolitan area includes the city of Chicago, its suburbs and hin ...

. Some of this population is Iranian Assyrian.

Kings Point, New York Kings Point is a village located on the Great Neck Peninsula in the Town of North Hempstead in Nassau County, on the North Shore of Long Island, in New York, United States. The population was 5,005 at the 2010 census. History The Village of Ki ...

, a village in

Great Neck Great Neck is a region on Long Island, New York, that covers a peninsula on the North Shore and includes nine villages, among them Great Neck, Great Neck Estates, Great Neck Plaza, Kings Point, and Russell Gardens, and a number of unincorp ...

, New York, is said to have the largest concentration of Iranians in the United States (nearly 30%). However, unlike the population in Los Angeles, the Great Neck population is almost exclusively

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

Nashville, Tennessee Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and ...

has the largest Kurdish population in the United States, with many of them coming from Iran.

Significant Persian population centers

= California

= It is widely believed that most Iranian-Americans in the United States are clustered in the large cities of California, namely

Greater Los Angeles Greater Los Angeles is the second-largest metropolitan region in the United States with a population of 18.5 million in 2021, encompassing five counties in Southern California extending from Ventura County in the west to San Bernardino Co ...

, the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area G ...

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United States ...

Sacramento ) , image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg , mapsize = 250x200px , map_caption = Location within Sacramento ...

, and

Fresno Fresno () is a major city in the San Joaquin Valley of California, United States. It is the county seat of Fresno County and the largest city in the greater Central Valley region. It covers about and had a population of 542,107 in 2020, maki ...

. According to extrapolated U.S. Census data and other independent surveys done by Iranian-Americans themselves in 2009, there were an estimated one million Iranian-Americans living in the U.S., with the largest concentration—about 300,000 people—living in the greater Los Angeles area.''The Wall Street Journal''
Iran's Political Crisis Fuels Expatriates' Fears, Hopes
/ref> For this reason, the L.A. area, with its Iranian American residents, is sometimes referred to as "

", "Irangeles", or "Little Persia" among Iranian-Americans. In 1985, the

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...

estimated 200,000 Iranian Americans were living in California; and by 1991 the estimate jumped to 800,000, however the accuracy of these numbers could be debated due to a lack of data. In 1990, Los Angeles had a larger population of religious minorities than Muslims, who were the religious majority in Iran. Regarding Iranian-Americans of Armenian origin, the 1980 US Census put the number of Armenians living in Los Angeles at 52,400, of whom 71.9% were foreign born: 14.7% in Iran, 14.3% in the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nati ...

, 11.5% in

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to the north and east and Israel to the south, while Cyprus lie ...

, 9.7% in

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula ...

, 11.7% in other

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabian Peninsula, Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Anatolia, Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Pro ...

ern countries (Egypt,

Iraq Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

, etc.), and the rest in other parts of the world.

Beverly Hills Beverly Hills is a city located in Los Angeles County, California. A notable and historic suburb of Greater Los Angeles, it is in a wealthy area immediately southwest of the Hollywood Hills, approximately northwest of downtown Los Angeles. ...

, Irvine, and

Glendale Glendale is the anglicised version of the Gaelic Gleann Dail, which means ''valley of fertile, low-lying arable land''. It may refer to: Places Australia *Glendale, New South Wales ** Stockland Glendale, a shopping centre * Glendale, Queensland, ...

all have large communities of Iranian Americans (much of the Iranian population in Glendale being of Armenian descent); 26% of the total population of Beverly Hills is

Iranian Jewish Persian Jews or Iranian Jews ( fa, یهودیان ایرانی, ''yahudiān-e-Irāni''; he, יהודים פרסים ''Yəhūdīm Parsīm'') are the descendants of Jews who were historically associated with the Persian Empire, whose successor s ...

, making it the city's largest religious community.Universe: Total population more information 2006–2010 American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates
. factfinder2.census.gov''

''
Irvine embraces diversity at the polls
9 November 2008. Iranian Americans have formed

ethnic enclaves In sociology, an ethnic enclave is a geographic area with high ethnic concentration, characteristic cultural identity, and economic activity. The term is usually used to refer to either a residential area or a workspace with a high concentration ...

in many affluent neighborhoods mostly in the

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...

metropolitan area. In

, Iranians were concentrated in Tarzana, West Hills,

Hidden Hills ''Hidden Hills'' is an American sitcom television series that aired on NBC from September 24, 2002 to January 21, 2003, during the 2002 fall line up. Based on the book ''Surviving Suburbia'', the series was created by Peter Segal and Ric Swart ...

, Woodland Hills,

, Calabasas, Brentwood, and

Rancho Palos Verdes Rancho Palos Verdes (Spanish for "Green Sticks Ranch") is a coastal city located in Los Angeles County, California atop the bluffs of the Palos Verdes Peninsula, neighboring other cities in the Palos Verdes Hills, including Palos Verdes Esta ...

. Tarzana has the highest concentration of Iranians in Los Angeles County, according to the U.S. Census in 2000. Second generation Iranians located outside these concentrated cities showed high rates of marrying a non-Iranian and low literacy rates in Persian. In San Diego County,

La Jolla La Jolla ( , ) is a hilly, seaside neighborhood within the city of San Diego, California, United States, occupying of curving coastline along the Pacific Ocean. The population reported in the 2010 census was 46,781. La Jolla is surrounded on ...

is considered a Persian enclave. Westlake village also held a large Iranian population and was the first American city to have an Iranian American mayor Iraj Broomand.

=Texas

= Texas also has a large population of Iranian descent. And like California, Iranians in Texas are concentrated in the larger major cities of the state.

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 ...

has the largest population of Iranians and Iranian expats, with an estimated 70,000 residents (50,000 in 1994), mainly due to the

Texas Medical Center The Texas Medical Center (TMC) is a medical district and neighborhood in south-central Houston, Texas, United States, immediately south of the Museum District and west of Texas State Highway 288. Over 60 medical institutions, largely concentrat ...

and the presence of large energy companies. Houston contains a Persian business district including shops and restaurants that has been dubbed "Little Persia" by the ''

Houston Press The ''Houston Press'' is an online newspaper published in Houston, Texas, United States. It is headquartered in the Midtown area. It was also a weekly print newspaper until November 2017. The publication is supported entirely by advertising ...

''.Cook, Allison. "Touring Little Persia," ''

''. 15 September 1994. p
1
Retrieved on 12 May 2014.Fischer and Abedi, p
269
There are many Iranian ZoroastriansRustomji, p
249
and Baháʼís living there. Some of the more well known residents of the Houston area in the past or present are

Jasmin Moghbeli Jasmin Moghbeli ( fa, یاسمین مقبلی ; born ) is an American U.S. Marine Corps test pilot and NASA astronaut. She is a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Naval Postgraduate School and Naval Test Pilot School. , she ...

, Susan Roshan, Shawn Daivari, Farinaz Koushanfar, and Kavon Hakimzadeh (captain of the USS Harry Truman Naval aircraft carrier).

Ibrahim Yazdi Ebrahim Yazdi ( fa, ابراهیم یزدی; 26 September 1931 – 27 August 2017) was an Iranian politician, pharmacist, and diplomat who served as deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs in the interim government of Mehdi Bazarg ...

was a graduate of

Baylor College of Medicine Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) is a medical school and research center in Houston, Texas, within the Texas Medical Center, the world's largest medical center. BCM is composed of four academic components: the School of Medicine, the Graduate S ...

and Kamal Kharazi also is an alumnus of

University of Houston The University of Houston (UH) is a Public university, public research university in Houston, Texas. Founded in 1927, UH is a member of the University of Houston System and the List of universities in Texas by enrollment, university in Texas ...

Hushang Ansary Hushang Ansary ( fa, هوشنگ انصاری, born 1927) is an Iranian-American former diplomat, businessman, and philanthropist. He served for eighteen years in the Iranian government prior to the Iranian Revolution including as Minister of Econo ...

, an active philanthropist, has been a "founding benefactor" of the

Houston Museum of Fine Arts The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH), is an art museum located in the Houston Museum District of Houston, Texas. With the recent completion of an eight-year campus redevelopment project, including the opening of the Nancy and Rich Kinder Build ...

. The George Bush Presidential Library has a gallery named after him. Iranians in Houston particularly came under the spotlight when Iranian student and activist Gelareh Bagherzadeh was murdered in Houston in 2012. The perpetrator,

Ali Irsan Ali Mahmood Awad Irsan ( ar, علي محمود عوض عرسان; born December 27, 1957
"

honor killing An honor killing (American English), honour killing (Commonwealth English), or shame killing is the murder of an individual, either an outsider or a member of a family, by someone seeking to protect what they see as the dignity and honor of ...

in retaliation against Bagherzadeh's encouragement of Irsan's daughter to leave Islam and marry a Christian man. The other notable Iranian in Texas that gained national attention in recent years was

UT Austin The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

's Omid Kokabee who was imprisoned in Iran for political reasons. The Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area is estimated to have over 30,000 Iranian-Americans. Iran's first astronaut

Anousheh Ansari Anousheh Ansari ( fa, انوشه انصاری ; née Raissyan; born September 12, 1966) is an Iranian American engineer and co-founder and chairwoman of Prodea Systems. Her previous business accomplishments include serving as co-founder and CEO o ...

for many years was a resident of

Plano, Texas Plano ( ) is a city in Collin County and Denton County, Texas, United States. It had a population of 285,494 at the 2020 census. It is a principal city of the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. History European settlers came to the area near ...

, a suburb of Dallas-Fort Worth. Dallas' Iranian community was large and influential enough to host US Secretary of State

Mike Pompeo Michael Richard Pompeo (; born December 30, 1963) is an American politician, diplomat, and businessman who served under President Donald Trump as director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from 2017 to 2018 and as the 70th United State ...

for a private visit in April 2019. And San Antonio and Austin each are said to have 3000-5000 Iranian American residents each, who are mostly attracted to large academic centers of excellence such as

South Texas Medical Center The South Texas Medical Center (STMC) or Bexar County Hospital District consists of of medical-related facilities on the northwest side of San Antonio, Texas, United States. STMC, which directly serves 38 counties, consists of forty-five medi ...

and

or the climate of the

Texas Hill Country The Texas Hill Country is a geographic region of Central and South Texas, forming the southeast part of the Edwards Plateau. Given its location, climate, terrain, and vegetation, the Hill Country can be considered the border between the Americ ...

area that is not un-similar to the southern Iran

Zagros Mountains The Zagros Mountains ( ar, جبال زاغروس, translit=Jibal Zaghrus; fa, کوه‌های زاگرس, Kuh hā-ye Zāgros; ku, چیاکانی زاگرۆس, translit=Çiyakani Zagros; Turkish: ''Zagros Dağları''; Luri: ''Kuh hā-ye Zāgr ...

region. The largest concentration of

Mandaeans Mandaeans ( ar, المندائيون ), also known as Mandaean Sabians ( ) or simply as Sabians ( ), are an ethnoreligious group who are followers of Mandaeism. They believe that John the Baptist was the final and most important prophet. Th ...

from

Khuzestan Khuzestan Province (also spelled Xuzestan; fa, استان خوزستان ''Ostān-e Xūzestān'') is one of the 31 provinces of Iran. It is in the southwest of the country, bordering Iraq and the Persian Gulf. Its capital is Ahvaz and it cover ...

outside the middle east are settled in the San Antonio area. The Shah of Iran was also last hospitalized at San Antonio's Wilford Hall Ambulatory Surgical Center in

Lackland Air Force Base Lackland Air Force Base is a United States Air Force (USAF) base located in Bexar County, Texas. The base is under the jurisdiction of the 802d Mission Support Group, Air Education and Training Command (AETC) and an enclave of the city of S ...

during his last days. This is the same base that trained many pilots of Iran's Royal Air Force before the 1979 revolution. File:4shanbeh jashn.jpg, Public party during

Chaharshanbe Suri Chaharshanbeh Suri or Charshanba Suri ( fa, چهارشنبه‌سوری, Čahāršanbe suri; ), is an Iranian festival of the fire dance celebrated on the eve of the last Wednesday of the year. It is the first festivity of the Nowruz Celebrat ...

in San Antonio. File:Rooznameh Dallas.jpg, ''Shahrvand'' newsletter has been published in Dallas for over 20 years. File:Chelokababi san antonio.JPG, A popular Persian restaurant in southern Texas File:Kavon Hakimzadeh (1).jpg, Kavon Hakimzadeh the captain of the USS Harry Truman is a Texan by birth.

Religion

Many Iranian Americans are non-Muslim due to the religious composition of those fleeing the

, which included a disproportionate share of Iran's religious minorities, as well as subsequent ex-Muslim asylum seekers and other conversions away from Islam. Many Iranian Americans identify as

irreligious Irreligion or nonreligion is the absence or rejection of religion, or indifference to it. Irreligion takes many forms, ranging from the casual and unaware to full-fledged philosophies such as atheism and agnosticism, secular humanism and anti ...

Shiite Shīʿa Islam or Shīʿīsm is the second-largest branch of Islam. It holds that the Islamic prophet Muhammad designated ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib as his successor (''khalīfa'') and the Imam (spiritual and political leader) after him, most ...

, but a full one-fifth are

Christians Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρ� ...

Jews Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

, Baháʼís, or Zoroastrians. Additionally, there are also some Iranian

, but they are very small in number. According to Pew Research, about 22% of those who left Islam in the United States are Iranian Americans. A 2012 national telephone survey of a sample of 400 Iranian-Americans, commissioned by the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans and conducted by Zogby Research Services, asked the respondents what their religions were. The responses broke down as follows:

Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...

31%,

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

/ realist/

humanist Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential and agency of human beings. It considers human beings the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry. The meaning of the term "human ...

11%,

agnostic Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficien ...

8%, Baháʼí 7%,

5%,

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

5%,

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: * Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD * Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a let ...

2%,

Zoroastrian Zoroastrianism is an Iranian religion and one of the world's oldest organized faiths, based on the teachings of the Iranian-speaking prophet Zoroaster. It has a dualistic cosmology of good and evil within the framework of a monotheisti ...

2%, "Other" 15%, and "No response" 15%. The survey had a cooperation rate of 31.2%. The

margin of error The margin of error is a statistic expressing the amount of random sampling error in the results of a survey. The larger the margin of error, the less confidence one should have that a poll result would reflect the result of a census of the e ...

for the results was +/- 5 percentage points, with higher margins of error for sub-groups. Notably, the number of Muslims decreased from 42% in 2008 to 31% in 2012. According to

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...

's Robert D. Putnam, the average Iranian is slightly less religious than the average American. In the book ''Social Movements in 20th Century Iran: Culture, Ideology, and Mobilizing Frameworks'', author Stephen C. Poulson adds that Western ideas are making Iranians

. There are religious and

ethnolinguistic Ethnolinguistics (sometimes called cultural linguistics) is an area of anthropological linguistics that studies the relationship between a language and the nonlinguistic cultural behavior of the people who speak that language. __NOTOC__ Examples ...

differences among the Muslim, Jewish, Baháʼí, Zoroastrian, Christian, Armenian,

Azerbaijani Azerbaijani may refer to: * Something of, or related to Azerbaijan * Azerbaijanis * Azerbaijani language See also * Azerbaijan (disambiguation) * Azeri (disambiguation) * Azerbaijani cuisine * Culture of Azerbaijan The culture of Azerbaijan ...

, Kurdish, and

Assyrian Assyrian may refer to: * Assyrian people, the indigenous ethnic group of Mesopotamia. * Assyria, a major Mesopotamian kingdom and empire. ** Early Assyrian Period ** Old Assyrian Period ** Middle Assyrian Empire ** Neo-Assyrian Empire * Assyri ...

groups. Calculating the percentage of

Christian Christians () are people who follow or adhere to Christianity, a monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. The words ''Christ'' and ''Christian'' derive from the Koine Greek title ''Christós'' (Χρι� ...

Iranian-Americans is difficult because most Iranian Christians (especially those raised in the faith) are of Armenian or

origin; and, apart from identifying as Iranian, a number amongst them also strongly self-identifies as Armenian or Assyrian, rather than as (or apart from) Iranian.

Ethnicity

The majority of Iranian-Americans are ethnic

Persians The Persians are an Iranian ethnic group who comprise over half of the population of Iran. They share a common cultural system and are native speakers of the Persian language as well as of the languages that are closely related to Persian. ...

, with sizeable ethnic minorities being

Iranian Azerbaijanis Iranian Azerbaijanis (; az, ایران آذربایجانلیلاری, italics=no ), also known as Iranian Azeris, Iranian Turks, Persian Turks or Persian Azerbaijanis, are Iranians of Azerbaijani ethnicity who may speak the Azerbaijani langu ...

Armenians Armenians ( hy, հայեր, ''hayer'' ) are an ethnic group native to the Armenian highlands of Western Asia. Armenians constitute the main population of Armenia and the ''de facto'' independent Artsakh. There is a wide-ranging diaspora ...

, Iranian Jews,

, Assyrians,

, Turkmen, Baloch,

Arabs The Arabs (singular: Arab; singular ar, عَرَبِيٌّ, DIN 31635: , , plural ar, عَرَب, DIN 31635: , Arabic pronunciation: ), also known as the Arab people, are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in Western Asia, ...

, among others. According to Hakimzadeh and Dixon in 2006, members of religious and ethnic minorities such as Baháʼís, Jews, Armenians, and Assyrians were disproportionately represented amongst the early exiles of the 1978–1979 revolution.

Citizenship

According to

DHS The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior or home ministries of other countries. Its stated missions involve anti-ter ...

, in 2015, 13,114 people born in Iran were issued

green card A green card, known officially as a permanent resident card, is an identity document which shows that a person has permanent residency in the United States. ("The term 'lawfully admitted for permanent residence' means the status of having been ...

s, while 13,298 were issued one in 2016. In 2015, 10,344 Iranians became naturalized, with a further 9,507 in 2016. Nearly all Iranians who reside in the United States are either

citizens Citizenship is a "relationship between an individual and a state to which the individual owes allegiance and in turn is entitled to its protection". Each state determines the conditions under which it will recognize persons as its citizens, and ...

(81%) or

permanent residents Permanent residency is a person's legal resident status in a country or territory of which such person is not a citizen but where they have the right to reside on a permanent basis. This is usually for a permanent period; a person with such ...

(15%) of the United States (2008 survey). Iranian-Americans regard their

culture Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups ...

and heritage as an important component of their day-to-day life and their overall identity within the United States.PAAIA Releases 2011 National Survey of Iranian Americans
Payvand.com (7 December 2011).

Integration

Four benchmarks are traditionally used to measure assimilation: language proficiency, intermarriage, spatial concentration, and socio-economic status. Per these criteria, one can determine with a significant degree of confidence that the Iranian-American community has made significant strides in successfully assimilating to a new culture and way of living. According to a survey commissioned by the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans (PAAIA) in 2008, only 21 percent of Iranian-Americans reported interacting mostly with other Iranian Americans outside of their workplace, demonstrating that most of them have successfully integrated into United States society. The intermarriage rate is very high among Iranian Americans. It has been estimated that nearly 50 percent of Iranian-Americans who married between 1995 and 2007 married non-Iranian Americans. Research has furthermore indicated that Iranian-Americans who are Muslim are more open to intermarry than those who are members of religious or ethnic minorities, such as Jews and Armenians. Compared to men, Iranian women are less likely to mix or intermarry outside their group, which, according to the PAAIA, is likely because, as a group, they are more likely to adhere to traditional Iranian values, including making marriages that are approved by their families and are within Iranian cultural norms. Regarding language proficiency in the United States among its immigrant groups, the first generation principally speaks their native language, the second generation speaks both English and their parents' language, and the third generation typically speaks only English, while maintaining a knowledge of some isolated words and phrases from their ancestral tongue. The Iranian American community follows this pattern.

Community Outreach

Camp Ayandeh, sponsored annually by the Iranian Alliances Across Borders (IAAB), has attracted children of the

Iranian diaspora Iranian diaspora refers to Iranian people or those who are of Iranian ancestry living outside Iran.fall of the Shah.

Education

According to Bayor, from the very beginning, Iranian immigrants differed from other arrivals in their high educational and professional achievements. According to

Census 2000 The United States census of 2000, conducted by the Census Bureau, determined the resident population of the United States on April 1, 2000, to be 281,421,906, an increase of 13.2 percent over the 248,709,873 people enumerated during the 1990 ce ...

, 50.9 percent of Iranian immigrants have attained a bachelor's degree or higher, compared to a 28.0 percent national average. According to the latest census data available, more than one in four Iranian-Americans holds a master's or doctoral degree, the highest rate among 67 ethnic groups studied. A 1990

University of California, Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the Californ ...

study showed that by virtue of education and occupation, native-born and Armenian-Americans of

Iranian Iranian may refer to: * Iran, a sovereign state * Iranian peoples, the speakers of the Iranian languages. The term Iranic peoples is also used for this term to distinguish the pan ethnic term from Iranian, used for the people of Iran * Iranian lan ...

origin "tend to have the highest socioeconomic status... while those from Turkey have the lowest", although Turkish Armenians boast the highest rate of self-employment. In 1988, a ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' article claimed that Middle Eastern Armenians, which includes Armenians from Iran, preferred to settle in

Glendale, California Glendale is a city in the San Fernando Valley and Verdugo Mountains regions of Los Angeles County, California, United States. At the 2020 U.S. Census the population was 196,543, up from 191,719 at the 2010 census, making it the fourth-larges ...

, while Armenian immigrants from the Soviet Union were attracted to Hollywood, Los Angeles. A study regarding Americans of Armenian descent showed that Armenians from Iran (Iranian-Armenians) are known for quick integration into American society: for example, only 31% of Armenian Americans born in Iran claim not to speak English well, while those Armenians from other nations were shown to have less success at integrating.

Occupations and income

The

Small Business Administration The United States Small Business Administration (SBA) is an independent agency of the United States government that provides support to entrepreneurs and small businesses. The mission of the Small Business Administration is "to maintain and stre ...

(SBA) conducted a study that found Iranian immigrants among the top 20 immigrant groups with the highest rate of business ownership, contributing substantially to the U.S. economy. According to the report, there were 33,570 active and contributing Iranian American business owners in the U.S., with a 21.5% business ownership rate. The study also found that the total net business income generated by Iranian Americans was $2.56 billion. Almost one in three Iranian-American households have annual incomes of more than $100,000 (compared to one in five for the overall U.S. population). Ali Mostasahri, a founding member of the Iranian Studies Group, offers a reason for the relative success of Iranian-Americans compared to other immigrants. He believes that, unlike many other immigrants who left their home countries because of economic hardships, Iranians left due to social or religious reasons like the 1979 revolution. About 50 percent of all working Iranian Americans are in professional and managerial occupations, a percentage greater than any other group in the United States (Bayor, 2011).

Physicians

The earliest Iranian people in the U.S. were mostly young trainees who worked as medical interns or residents. Some established themselves to continue practice beyond the residency stage. Their motives to extend their stay in the United States were more for professional than economic reasons. Researchers from Johns Hopkins University in 1974 reported, in the ''Journal of the American Medical Association'', that, in 1971, the number of Iranian physicians in the U.S. was 1,625. The authors further studied the causes for immigration by sending questionnaire to all Iranian MDs in the United States. According to the 660 respondents, the main reasons for migration were mandatory two-years' military service, low salaries as compared to the United States, expensive housing, and socio-political reasons. In 2013, another report was published, in the ''Archive of Iranian Medicine'' (AIM), saying that, post-revolution, the number of Iranian medical school graduates in the United States had grown to 5,045. Those who migrated to the U.S. after the 1979 revolution were mostly experienced physicians who came with their families and an intent to stay permanently. , there are 5,050 Iranian medical school graduates in the United States. Prior to the revolution, the 1,626 physicians migrated to the United States were 15% of all Iranian medical school graduates, while the 5,045 medical graduates who migrated post-Islamic Revolution represent only 5% of total Iranian medical graduates. This is not indicative of the entire United States, merely of the areas in which most of the Iranian-American population is concentrated.

Politics

Though Iranian-Americans have historically excelled in business, academia, and the sciences, they have traditionally shied away from participating in American politics or other civic activities. Iranian-Americans do not appear to engage in American politics, as demonstrated by survey results from large cities showing only 10 percent of them voted in the 2004 election. In Los Angeles, Iranian Americans paid for a billboard to inform thousands of travelers on the 405 freeway of how the Iranian regime had murdered ten thousand political prisoners. An August 2008 Zogby International poll, commissioned by the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans, found that approximately one-half of Iranian Americans identified themselves as registered Democrats, in contrast to one in eight as Republicans and one in four as independents (2008). A 2019 Zogby International survey, commissioned by PAAIA, found that in the

2016 presidential election This national electoral calendar for 2016 lists the national/ federal elections held in 2016 in all sovereign states and their dependent territories. By-elections are excluded, though national referendums are included. January *7 January: Kiri ...

, 56% of Iranian Americans respondents voted for

Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States sen ...

, the democratic candidate. The survey also states that 69% of Iranian American respondents planned to vote for the democratic candidate in the 2020 election. The same 2008 PAAIA poll indicates that more than half of Iranian Americans cite domestic U.S. issues, including issues that are not unique to Iranian Americans, as the most important to them. In contrast, one quarter of Iranian Americans cite foreign policy issues involving Iran–U.S. relations and less than one-in-ten cite the internal affairs of Iran as being of greatest importance to them. More recently, the 2019 Zogby International survey, commissioned by the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans, found that one-half of Iranian American respondents consider foreign policy most important when voting. This is a significant increase from the one quarter of Iranian Americans that reported foreign policy issues, such as the Iran-U.S. relationship, as important in 2008. Similarly, the 2019 survey also suggested that 75% of Iranian American respondents perceived the

Trump Administration Donald Trump's tenure as the List of presidents of the United States, 45th president of the United States began with Inauguration of Donald Trump, his inauguration on January 20, 2017, and ended on January 20, 2021. Trump, a Republican Party ...

's Iranian foreign policy negatively. In 2017, the Trump administration put strict travel restrictions on travel to the United States from several countries, including Iran. The survey indicates that this

travel ban A travel ban is one of a variety of mobility restrictions imposed by governments. Bans can be universal or selective. The restrictions can be geographic, imposed by either the originating or destination jurisdiction. They can also be based on indiv ...

instituted by the Trump administration in 2017, received opposition from 76% of respondents. In contrast, only 16% of respondents supported the ban. The survey states that 70% of respondents have been personally affected by the travel ban, or had family and friends affected by the ban. From 1980 to 2004, more than one out of every four Iranian immigrants was a refugee or asylee. The PAAIA/Zogby poll cites that almost three-quarters of Iranian-Americans believe the promotion of

human rights Human rights are moral principles or normsJames Nickel, with assistance from Thomas Pogge, M.B.E. Smith, and Leif Wenar, 13 December 2013, Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyHuman Rights Retrieved 14 August 2014 for certain standards of hu ...

and democracy in Iran is the most important issue relating to Iran–U.S. relations. About the same percentage believe diplomacy is the foreign policy approach towards Iran that would be in the best interest of the United States. 84% support establishing a U.S. Interest Section in Iran. Nearly all Iranian Americans surveyed oppose any U.S. military attack against Iran.

Ties to Iran

According to a survey conducted in 2009, more than six in ten Iranian Americans have immediate family members in

, and almost three in ten communicate with their families or friends in Iran at least several times a week. An additional four in ten communicate with their families or friends in Iran at least several times a month. This study indicates an unusually close relationship between Iranian-Americans and

ians. In the updated 2019 PAAIA survey, 15% of Iranian American respondents reported contacting with friends and family in Iran daily, while 26% of respondents communicated with relatives in Iran several times a week. Additionally, 26% of Iranian American respondents contacted with family and friends in Iran several times a month, and 14% communicated with relatives in Iran several times a year. The survey also indicated that 74% of Iranian American respondents preferred contacting their relatives in Iran via phone calls, but communication over mobile communications apps and internet services had increased to 69% and 66% respectively. As of 2013, U.S. laws require

U.S. person The term United States person or US person is used in various contexts in US laws and regulations with different meanings. It can refer to natural persons or other entities. Data collection and intelligence The term "US person" is used in the c ...

s to obtain a license from the U.S.

Office of Foreign Assets Control The Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) is a financial intelligence and enforcement agency of the U.S. Treasury Department. It administers and enforces economic and trade sanctions in support of U.S. national security and foreign policy o ...

(OFAC) to engage in transactions related to the sale of their personal property in Iran. Similarly, US persons will need a license from OFAC to open a bank account or transfer money to Iran.

Travel to Iran

The U.S. government does not have diplomatic or consular relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran and therefore cannot provide protection or routine consular services to U.S. citizens in Iran. The

Swiss government The Federal Council (german: Bundesrat; french: Conseil fédéral; it, Consiglio federale; rm, Cussegl federal) is the executive body of the federal government of the Swiss Confederation and serves as the collective head of state and governme ...

acting Acting is an activity in which a story is told by means of its enactment by an actor or actress who adopts a character—in theatre, television, film, radio, or any other medium that makes use of the mimetic mode. Acting involves a broad r ...

through its embassy in Tehran, serves as

protecting power A protecting power is a country that represents another sovereign state in a country where it lacks its own diplomatic representation. It is common for protecting powers to be appointed when two countries break off diplomatic relations with e ...

for U.S. interests in Iran. The Iranian government does not recognize dual citizenship and will not allow the Swiss to provide protective services for U.S. citizens who are also Iranian nationals. The Iranian authorities make the determination of a dual national's Iranian citizenship without regard to personal wishes. In 2016, the U.S.

Department of State The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other na ...

warned U.S. citizens of the risks of travel to Iran. In some instances, foreigners, in particular dual nationals of Iran and Western countries including the United States, have been detained or prevented from leaving Iran.

Accomplishments

In Los Angeles, Persians have become the largest ethnic group in many Los Angeles' wealthiest enclaves including Bel Air, Beverly Hills, Tarzana, Encino, and Woodland Hills. The Iranian Revolution resulted in many Iranians fleeing to America in the late 1970s, where, forty years later, Iranian immigrants have become a major force in Silicon Valley as investors, executives, and creators. Iranians have been founders or senior executives at

eBay eBay Inc. ( ) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that facilitates consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales through its website. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995 and became ...

Oracle An oracle is a person or agency considered to provide wise and insightful counsel or prophetic predictions, most notably including precognition of the future, inspired by deities. As such, it is a form of divination. Description The word ...

Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...

Dropbox Dropbox is a file hosting service operated by the American company Dropbox, Inc., headquartered in San Francisco, California, U.S. that offers cloud storage, file synchronization, personal cloud, and client software. Dropbox was founded in 2007 ...

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...

Uber Uber Technologies, Inc. (Uber), based in San Francisco, provides mobility as a service, ride-hailing (allowing users to book a car and driver to transport them in a way similar to a taxi), food delivery ( Uber Eats and Postmates), pa ...

Expedia Expedia Inc. is an online travel agency owned by Expedia Group, an American online travel shopping company based in Seattle. The website and mobile app can be used to book airline tickets, hotel reservations, car rentals, cruise ships, a ...

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

, and other major corporations. After surveying

Fortune 500 The ''Fortune'' 500 is an annual list compiled and published by ''Fortune (magazine), Fortune'' magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States Joint-stock company#Closely held corporations and publicly traded corporations, corporations by ...

companies, researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology discovered that 50 Iranian-Americans held senior leadership positions at companies with more than $200 million in asset value. Iranians have the highest percentage of master's degrees than any other ethnic group in the United States. Iranians have also played a large role in the American education system with over 500 Iranian-American professors teaching at top-ranked U.S. universities which include Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Harvard University; Yale University; Princeton University;

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant un ...

;

; and

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is conside ...

. Iranian philanthropists constructed the Freedom Sculpture in the

Century City Century City is a 176-acre (71.2 ha) neighborhood and business district in Los Angeles, California. Located on the Westside to the south of Santa Monica Boulevard around 10 miles (16 km) west of Downtown Los Angeles, Century City is one of ...

neighborhood, in honor of the Persian artifact

Cyrus Cylinder The Cyrus Cylinder is an ancient clay cylinder, now broken into several pieces, on which is written a declaration in Akkadian cuneiform script in the name of Persia's Achaemenid king Cyrus the Great. Kuhrt (2007), p. 70, 72 It dates from the 6th ...

Representation

Television

Early Iranian diaspora television has been credited with helping form the local community in the United States. As a result of the Iranian Revolution, the first Iranian American television was formed, and with its formation there were existing political factions that were carried over. The dominate voice in television during this time was from the

royalist A royalist supports a particular monarch as head of state for a particular kingdom, or of a particular dynastic claim. In the abstract, this position is royalism. It is distinct from monarchism, which advocates a monarchical system of gov ...

-support. It was argued by scholar Hamid Naficy, this was not due to political sponsorship, but rather due to market support. Up until 1992, most all Iranian American television programming was in the Farsi language with exceptions to Assyrian and Armenian languages (this included for Iranian-Kurdish and

Azeri Azerbaijanis (; az, Azərbaycanlılar, ), Azeris ( az, Azərilər, ), or Azerbaijani Turks ( az, Azərbaycan Türkləri, ) are a Turkic people living mainly in northwestern Iran and the Republic of Azerbaijan. They are the second-most nume ...

-specific shows in Farsi). Most all programming was non religious, and this was reflecting the population of more minority religions of Los Angeles. There are no reliable statistics on viewership because "Middle Eastern" and Iranian wasn't defined by rating services (such as

Nielsen Holdings Nielsen Holdings plc is an American information, data and market measurement firm. Nielsen operates in over 100 countries and employs approximately 44,000 people worldwide. The company was listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and use ...

), however the Los Angeles Times estimated by 1991 the Iranian American population was roughly 800,000 which would indicate the opening of a new share of the television viewing market. The

Long Beach Long Beach is a city in Los Angeles County, California. It is the 42nd-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 466,742 as of 2020. A charter city, Long Beach is the seventh-most populous city in California. Incorporat ...

-based independent television station, KSCI-TV dubbed themselves the "international station" and claimed to offer the most diverse ethnic television programming in the early 1980s, including the majority of Iranian American television during this time. Starting on March 15, 1981, the first Iranian diaspora television broadcast show IRTV (acronym for "Iranian television") was created by Ali Limonadi in Los Angeles. Other early Iranian American television programs included Nadar Rafii's Midnight Show; Parviz Sayyad's Parsian TV (on KSCI-TV); Hamid Shabkhiz's Iran; and Manuchehr Bibian's (also known as Manouchehr Bibiyan) Jaam-e-Jam TV channel. Other notables in Iranian American television programs in the 1980s included Shohreh Aqdashlu's ''Sima va Nava-ye Iran TV''; Parviz Kardan's ''Shahr-e Farang TV''; and Hushang Towzi's multiple television series. In 2013,

BravoTV Bravo is an American basic cable television network, launched on December 8, 1980. It is owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. The channel originally fo ...

launched ''

Shahs of Sunset ''Shahs of Sunset'' is an American reality television series that aired on Bravo. The series debuted on March 11, 2012 and ended August 29, 2021.Jethro NededogBravo Renews 'Shahs of Sunset' for Second Season ''The Hollywood Reporter'', April 17, ...

'' which followed a group of six Iranian American friends in Los Angeles who try to juggle their active social lives and careers while also balancing the demands of their families and traditions; the show was accused of racism and relaying on stereotypes in a petition.

Film

Iranian Americans have been the focus of film documentaries, including ''The Iranian Americans'' (2012; directed by Andrew Goldberg); and ''Immigration Stories: Iranian Americans of Silicon Valley'' (2021; directed by Nima Naimi, Alireza Sanayei, Julian Gigola). Critical response in the

HuffPost ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...

of ''The Iranian Americans'' (2012) PBS documentary included a lack of representation for "interracial marriage". Fictional films with Iranian American themes include the satire '' Jimmy Vestvood: Amerikan Hero'' (2014; directed by Jonathan Kesselman), and '' Shirin in Love'' (2014; directed by

Ramin Niami Ramin Niami ( fa, رامین نیامی) is an Iranian film director, producer, actor and writer. In 1989, he was editor of ''The Houseguest'', a film directed by Franz Harland. During his career, he has participated in more than twenty documenta ...

). The fictional drama ''

Surviving Paradise ''Surviving Paradise'' may refer to: * ''Surviving Paradise'' (2000 film) – an Iranian-American family drama film * '' Surviving Paradise: A Family Tale'' – a 2022 British nature documentary about animals in the Kalahari Desert * ''Surviving ...

'' (2001), is the first English-language Iranian film with theatrical release in the United States; the storyline is about two Iranian refugees in Los Angeles.

Education

The Center for Iranian Diaspora Studies at

San Francisco State University San Francisco State University (commonly referred to as San Francisco State, SF State and SFSU) is a public research university in San Francisco. As part of the 23-campus California State University system, the university offers 118 different ...

, directed and chaired by

Persis Karim Persis Maryam Karim (born 1962) is an American poet, essayist, editor, and educator. She serves as the Neda Nobari Distinguished Chair and director of the Center for Iranian Diaspora Studies at San Francisco State University (SFSU) since 2017. Her ...

, was founded in 2017 and was the first program specifically focused on Iranian diaspora (which includes Iranian Americans). The center offers grants, fellowships, and scholarships, as well as scholarly lecture series, research, and creative performances.

Discrimination

According to the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans, nearly half of Iranian-Americans surveyed in 2008 by

Zogby International John J. Zogby (born September 3, 1948) is an American public opinion pollster, author, and public speaker. He is founder of the Zogby International poll, and he serves as a senior partner at John Zogby Strategies, a full-service marketing and p ...

have experienced or personally know Iranian Americans who have experienced discrimination due to their ethnicity, religion, or country of origin. The most common types of discrimination reported are

airport security Airport security includes the techniques and methods used in an attempt to protect passengers, staff, aircraft, and airport property from malicious harm, crime, terrorism, and other threats. Aviation security is a combination of measures and hum ...

check,

social discrimination Discrimination is the act of making unjustified distinctions between people based on the groups, classes, or other categories to which they belong or are perceived to belong. People may be discriminated on the basis of race, gender, age, reli ...

racial profiling Racial profiling or ethnic profiling is the act of suspecting, targeting or discriminating against a person on the basis of their ethnicity, religion or nationality, rather than on individual suspicion or available evidence. Racial profiling involv ...

, employment or business discrimination and discrimination at the hands of immigration officials. Iranians have been confused as Arabs by the media, government, and public. Iranians are known for their great pride in the Persian culture and language and according to the Orange County Register, "nothing annoys Iranian-Americans more than being mistaken for Arabs." In 2009,

Martin Kramer Martin Seth Kramer (Hebrew: מרטין קרמר; born September 9, 1954, Washington, D.C.) is an American-Israeli scholar of the Middle East at Tel Aviv University and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. His focus is on the history an ...

, a

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

professor, warned about the dangers of allowing Iranian Americans to get too close to power during the 2009

American Israel Public Affairs Committee The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC ) is a lobbying group that advocates pro-Israel policies to the legislative and executive branches of the United States. One of several pro-Israel lobbying organizations in the United Stat ...

(AIPAC) conference: In 2009,

Merrill Lynch Merrill (officially Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated), previously branded Merrill Lynch, is an American investment management and wealth management division of Bank of America. Along with BofA Securities, the investment ba ...

& Co. agreed to pay $1.55 million to resolve a U.S. government lawsuit accusing the bank of discriminating against an Iranian American employee. The government accused the firm of refusing to promote and later firing this employee on the basis of his national origin and religion. On 8 September 2015, 22-year-old Iranian American Shayan Mazroei was stabbed to death by

white supremacist White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White s ...

Craig Tanber. Mazroei, who resided in

Laguna Niguel Laguna Niguel () is a city in Orange County, California, United States. The name Laguna Niguel is derived from the words "Laguna" (Spanish for "lagoon") and "Niguili" (the name of a Native American village once located near Aliso Creek). As of ...

, was a successful businessman operating his own car dealership in Santa Ana. On the night of 8 September 2015, Mazroei began discussing his mother visiting Iran to his girlfriend in a restaurant until Elizabeth Anne Thornburg spat on Mazroei shouting racial slurs. Tanber, who would later be sentenced to life in prison, then proceeded to stab Mazroei resulting in his death. In 2017 in the

Kansas City The Kansas City metropolitan area is a bi-state metropolitan area anchored by Kansas City, Missouri. Its 14 counties straddle the border between the U.S. states of Missouri (9 counties) and Kansas (5 counties). With and a population of more th ...

suburb of Olathe, Adam Purinton shot and killed two Indians thinking that they were of Iranian descent. While murdering them Puriton yelled "Get out of my country." In 2018, while on national television, having a discussion about taking a DNA test, Senator

Lindsey Graham Lindsey Olin Graham (born July 9, 1955) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the senior United States senator from South Carolina, a seat he has held since 2003. A member of the Republican Party, Graham chaired the Senate Committee on ...

remarked that it would be "terrible" if he discovered he had Iranian heritage. Graham's statement outraged many high-profile

Iranian-Americans Iranian Americans are United States citizens or nationals who are of Iranian ancestry or who hold Iranian citizenship. Iranian Americans are among the most highly educated people in the United States. They have historically excelled in busine ...

, including

Omid Kordestani Omid R. Kordestani ( fa, امید کردستانی; born 1963) is an Iranian-American businessman who was the Executive Chairman at Twitter from October 2015 to June 2020 and a board member of the company until October 2022. He was a Senior Vic ...

(chairman of

Ali Partovi Ali Partovi ( fa, علی پرتووی; born 1972) is an Iranian-American entrepreneur and angel investor. He is best known as a co-founder of Code.org (which he founded with his twin brother Hadi), iLike, LinkExchange, an early advisor at Dropbo ...

and

Hadi Partovi Hadi or Hady ( ar, هادي) is an Arabic masculine given name and surname. Al-Hadi is one of the 99 names of God in Islam meaning ''guide'' (from the Arabic triconsonantal root ; also present in hidayah). Given name Hadi * Hadi Saei (born 1976), ...

(CEOs of Code.org), Pejman Nozad, and

British Iranian Iranians in the United Kingdom consist of people of Iranian nationality who have settled in the United Kingdom, as well as British residents and citizens of Iranian heritage. Iranians in the United Kingdom are referred to by hyphenated terms suc ...

Christiane Amanpour Christiane Maria Heideh AmanpourStated on ''Finding Your Roots'', 22 January 2019 (; fa, کریستیان امان‌پور, Kristiane Amānpur; born 12 January 1958) is a British-Iranian journalist and television host. Amanpour is the Chief ...

. In 2020, the United States Border Patrol instituted a large scale detention of Iranian Americans at the Canadian border without probable cause. While returning to the U.S. from Canada, Americans of Iranian heritage were detained by border officers. Over 60 Americans of Iranian descent were detained and interrogated at the Canadian border. The incident took place during a time of escalated tensions between Iran and the U.S.

Notable people

Business and technology

Iranian-Americans are among the most educated and successful communities in the U.S., according to a report by the Iranian Studies group at

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

. Iranian-Americans have founded, or hold senior leadership positions at, many major US companies, including Fortune 500 companies such as GE,

Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. It is the world's largest semiconductor chip manufacturer by revenue, and is one of the developers of the x86 ser ...

Citigroup Citigroup Inc. or Citi ( stylized as citi) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services corporation headquartered in New York City. The company was formed by the merger of banking giant Citicorp and financial conglomera ...

Verizon Verizon Communications Inc., commonly known as Verizon, is an American multinational telecommunications conglomerate and a corporate component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is headquartered at 1095 Avenue of the Americas ...

Motorola Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent public companies, Motorola ...

, and

AT&T AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile ...

Pierre Omidyar Pierre Morad Omidyar (born Parviz Morad Omidyar, June 21, 1967) is a French-born Iranian-American billionaire. A technology entrepreneur, software engineer, and philanthropist, he is the founder of eBay, where he served as chairman from 199 ...

, founder/CEO of

is of Iranian origin, as is the founder of

Bratz Bratz is an American fashion doll and media franchise created by former Mattel employee Carter Bryant for MGA Entertainment which debuted in 2001. The four original 10-inch (25 cm) dolls were released on May 21, 2001 — Yasmin, Cloe, Jade ...

Isaac Larian Isaac Larian (born March 28, 1954) is an Iranian-born American billionaire businessman, founder and the chief executive officer (CEO) of MGA Entertainment, the world's largest privately owned toy company.Anousheh Ansari Anousheh Ansari ( fa, انوشه انصاری ; née Raissyan; born September 12, 1966) is an Iranian American engineer and co-founder and chairwoman of Prodea Systems. Her previous business accomplishments include serving as co-founder and CEO o ...

, co-founder of the Ansari X Prize, became the first female tourist in space. Ansari is also the co-founder and former CEO of Prodea Systems, Inc., and Telecom Technologies, Inc. Other well known Iranian-American entrepreneurs include designer Bijan Pakzad, entrepreneur Sam Nazarian, business executive Hamid Akhavan, former CEO of Unify GmbH & Co. KG (formerly Siemens Enterprise Communications),

and former Senior Vice President of

, CEO of

Salar Kamangar, Sina Tamaddon of Apple Inc., and Shahram Dabiri Lead Producer for the massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) ''World of Warcraft'' from 1999 to 2007. Dara Khosrowshahi became CEO of

in August 2005 and then in August 2017, Khosrowshahi became the CEO of

, succeeding founder Travis Kalanick.

Philanthropy

Many Iranian-Americans are active philanthropists and leaders in improving their community. In 2006, the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center was the recipient of a $10 million donation from an Iranian-American couple based in

, Texas. The University of Southern California was the recipient of a $17 million gift from an Iranian-American, as was

which received a $10 million gift from an Iranian-American couple. Chicago's Swedish Covenant Hospital received $4 million; Portland State University, $8 million; and UC Irvine, $30 million.

Academia

Well known Iranian-Americans in science include Firouz Naderi, a director at NASA; Ali Javan, inventor of the first gas laser; Maryam Mirzakhani, the first female winner of the Fields Medal; Nima Arkani-Hamed, a leading theoretical physicist; cancer biologist Mina Bissell, Mina J. Bissell; Gholam A. Peyman, the inventor of LASIK; Lotfi Asker Zadeh; Vartan Gregorian; Cumrun Vafa; Babak Hassibi; Nouriel Roubini; Ali Hajimiri; Pardis Sabeti; Vahid Tarokh; Ehsan Afshari; George Bournoutian; Payam Heydari; and Rashid Massumi, M.D., a pioneer in the fields of electrophysiology and cardiology. Prominent Iranian-Americans in American higher education include Rahmat Shoureshi, researcher, professor, and provost of New York Institute of Technology (NYIT) and Nariman Farvardin, president of Stevens Institute of Technology.

Media

Well known American media personalities of Iranian descent include

of ABC News and CNN, born in England; Daron Malakian, member of the rock band System of a Down; Susie Gharib, of ''Nightly Business Report''; Asieh Namdar; Roya Hakakian; Yara Shahidi; and Rudi Bakhtiar. There are several Iranian American actors, comedians and filmmakers, including the Academy Award nominee and Emmy Award winner Shohreh Aghdashloo, the award-winning director, producer and screenwriters Amir Cyrus Ahanchian and Cyrus Nowrasteh, actresses Tala Ashe, Catherine Bell (actress), Catherine Bell, Sarah Shahi, Nadia Bjorlin, Nasim Pedrad, Desiree Akhavan, Sheila Vand, Necar Zadegan, Medalion Rahimi, and Bahar Soomekh, actors Adrian Pasdar, Shaun Toub, Arian Moayed, Navid Negahban Reza Sixo Safai, Shahaub Roudbari and Aria Shahghasemi, musicians Sarah Fard (Savoir Faire) and Rostam Batmanglij, comedians Max Amini, Maz Jobrani and Tehran Von Ghasri, filmmakers Bavand Karim and Kamshad Kooshan, producers Bob Yari and Farhad Safinia, author and performer Shahram Shiva, and artist and filmmaker Daryush Shokof. There are also notable American YouTube personalities of Iranian descent, including JonTron.

Sports

Professional tennis player Andre Agassi, NFL football players T. J. Houshmandzadeh, David Bakhtiari and Shar Pourdanesh, professional wrestlers Shawn Daivari and The Iron Sheik, professional mixed martial artist Amir Sadollah, professional soccer players Sobhan Tadjalli, Alecko Eskandarian and Steven Beitashour and professional soccer coach Afshin Ghotbi.

Politics

The son of the late Shah of Iran, Reza Pahlavi, Crown Prince of Iran, Reza Pahlavi, as well as several high-ranking officials in the Shah's administration, such as

and Jamshid Amouzegar live or have lived in the United States. Goli Ameri is the Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, as well as the former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Educational and Cultural Affairs from 2008 to 2009, during which she was the highest-ranking Iranian-American public official in the United States. Drug policy expert Kevin Sabet is Iranian-American and the only person to serve as an appointee in the drug czar's office of George W. Bush and Barack Obama.

elected its first Iranian-born Mayor, Jimmy Delshad, in 2007. Bob Yousefian served as the mayor of

from 2004 to 2005. In November 2011, Anna Kaplan, Anna M. Kaplan was elected Councilwoman in the North Hempstead, New York, Town of North Hempstead, New York, becoming the first Iranian-American to be elected to a major municipal office in New York State. Cyrus Amir-Mokri, who was appointed as the US Treasury, Treasury Department Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions by President Obama, is the highest ranking Iranian-American official in government as of 2012. In November 2012, Cyrus Habib of Washington state and Adrin Nazarian of California became the first Iranian-Americans elected to state legislatures. Habib is now the Lieutenant Governor of Washington and the first Iranian-American elected to any statewide office. Champaign County (Ohio) elected Fereidoun Shokouhi to the public office of Champaign County Engineer in 1995. He served until his retirement in 2012. Following the 2020 United States House of Representatives elections, Oklahoma Rep. Stephanie Bice became the first Iranian American elected to Congress. Azadeh Shahshahani is a human rights attorney based in Atlanta and is a former president of the National Lawyers Guild.

References

Sources

* * * Bozorgmehr, Mehdi., Sabagh, Georges (1988). ''High Status Immigrants: A Statistical Profile of Iranians in the United States'', Iranian Studies. *

External links

2009, ''New York Times''
Iran Census Report (2003): Strength in Numbers
– The Relative Concentration of Iranian Americans Across the United States
Fact-sheet on the Iranian-American Community (ISG MIT)Migration Information Source
– Spotlight on the Iranian Foreign Born
Interest Section of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Washington D.C.
– Consular affairs; videos {{Iranian citizens abroad American people of Iranian descent, * Iranian American, Middle Eastern American

Terminology

History

Early history

First phase of emigration

Second phase

Contemporary period

Demographics

Population

Significant Persian population centers

= California

=Texas

Religion

Ethnicity

Citizenship

Integration

Community Outreach

Education

Occupations and income

Physicians

Politics

Ties to Iran

Travel to Iran

Accomplishments

Representation

Television

Film

Education

Discrimination

Notable people

Business and technology

Philanthropy

Academia

Media

Sports

Politics

See also

References

Sources

Further reading

External links