Serene Husseini Shahid ( ar, سيرين حُسيني شهيد, French: Sirine Husseini Shahid; 1920–2008) was born in

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

as a member of the influential

Husayni Husayni ( ar, الحسيني also spelled Husseini) is the name of a prominent Palestinian Arab clan formerly based in Jerusalem, which claims descent from Husayn ibn Ali (the son of Ali). The Husaynis follow the Hanafi school of Sunni Isla ...

family. Her father was

Jamal al-Husayni Jamal al-Husayni (1894-1982) ( ar, جمال الحُسيني), was born in Jerusalem and was a member of the highly influential and respected Husayni family. Husayni served as Secretary to the Executive Committee of the Palestine Arab Congress ...

(himself a second cousin of the then Grand Mufti of Jerusalem

Amin al-Husseini Mohammed Amin al-Husseini ( ar, محمد أمين الحسيني 1897 – 4 July 1974) was a Palestinian Arab nationalist and Muslim leader in Mandatory Palestine. Al-Husseini was the scion of the al-Husayni family of Jerusalemite Arab notab ...

), her maternal grandfather was

Mayor of Jerusalem The Mayor of the City of Jerusalem is head of the executive branch of the political system in Jerusalem. The mayor's office administers all city services, public property, most public agencies, and enforces all city and state laws within Jerusa ...

Faidi al-Alami, and her maternal uncle was Musa al-Alami. She was educated at the Ramallah Friends School in Ramallah, later at the American University of Beirut. After 1967 she became involved in starting "cottage industries" among the Palestinian refugees. She worked on embroidery projects for Palestinian women, conducting embroidery workshops on weekdays. She, together with

Huguette Caland Huguette Caland (Arabic: أوغيت الخوري; née El Khoury; 19 January 1931 – 23 September 2019) was a Lebanese painter, sculptor and fashion designer known for her erotic abstract paintings and body landscapes. Based out of Los Angeles, ...

, helped found the Association for the Development of Palestinian Camps, a.k.a. "Inaash" (founded 1969) in Lebanon, an association devoted to preserving Traditional Palestinian Embroidery and helping women and children in

Palestinian Refugee Camps Camps are set up by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) in Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip to accommodate Palestinian refugees registered with UNRWA, who fled or were expelled during the 1948 Palestinian ...

in Lebanon. At the same time she has written about

Palestinian costumes Palestinian traditional costumes are the types of clothing historically and sometimes still presently worn by Palestinians. Foreign travelers to Palestine in the 19th and early 20th centuries often commented on the rich variety of the costumes w ...

and embroidery and helped arrange exhibitions, including one in the

Museum of Mankind Ethnography at the British Museum describes how ethnography has developed at the British Museum. Within the Department of Natural History and Curiosities The ethnographical collection was originally linked to the Department of Natural History a ...

in the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

in 199

She has also donated items to th
Palestine Costume Archive
She married

Munib Shahid Munib Shahid (1908-1973) was Chairman of Hematology and Oncology at the Faculty of Medicine of the American University of Beirut. He built the hematology laboratory at the Faculty of Medicine, a development that increased research output significan ...

, son of a noble family of the

Baháʼí Faith The Baháʼí Faith is a religion founded in the 19th century that teaches the essential worth of all religions and the unity of all people. Established by Baháʼu'lláh in the 19th century, it initially developed in Iran and parts of the ...

, in 1944 and they settled down in Beirut. Her daughter

Leila Shahid Leila Shahid (born in Beirut in 1949) is a Palestinian diplomat. She was the first woman ambassador of Palestine, serving the PLO in Ireland in 1989, in The Netherlands in 1990, then serving the PA in France where she had taken office in Paris in ...

is Palestinian envoy to

European Commission The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body ...

. Her other two daughters, Maya and Zeina, design and promote Palestinian Embroideries for Inaash. Her autobiography, ''Jerusalem Memories'', was published in 2000, and was critically acclaimed as "breaking new groun

It has been translated into several languages.

Bibliography

*Weir, Shelagh and Shahid, Serene: ''Palestinian embroidery : cross-stitch patterns from the traditional costumes of the village women of Palestine''. London:

publications, c1988. *Shahid, Serene Hussein (Editor: Jean Said Makdisi), (Introduction -

Edward W. Said Edward Wadie Said (; , ; 1 November 1935 – 24 September 2003) was a Palestinian-American professor of literature at Columbia University, a public intellectual, and a founder of the academic field of postcolonial studies.Robert Young, ''White ...

):
Jerusalem Memories
', Naufal,

Beirut Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint o ...

, 2000. First Edition.
Jerusalem Passages
(excerpts from Jerusalem Memories), Spring 2000, Issue 8,

Jerusalem Quarterly The Institute for Palestine Studies (IPS) is the oldest independent nonprofit public service research institute in the Arab world. It was established and incorporated in Beirut, Lebanon, in 1963 and has since served as a model for other such ins ...

References

1920 births 2008 deaths People from Jerusalem Palestinian clothing Palestinian women Al-Husayni family Palestinian non-fiction writers 20th-century Palestinian people Embroiderers {{Palestine-writer-stub

Bibliography

See also

References