Jalal Al-e-Ahmad

Jalal Al-e-Ahmad (Persian: جلال آل احمد‎‎; December 2, 1923 – September 9, 1969) was a prominent Iranian writer, thinker, and social and political critic. He coined the term Gharbzadegi - variously translated in English as "westernstruck", "westoxification", and "Occidentosis".

Personal life

Jalal was born into a religious family in Tehran. His father was an Islamic cleric originally from the small village of Owrazan in Taleghan mountains. After elementary school Al-e-Ahmad was sent to earn a living in the Tehran bazaar, but also attended Marvi Madreseh for a religious education, and without his father's permission, night classes at the Dar ul-Fonun. He became "acquainted with the speech and words of Ahmad Kasravi" and was unable to commit to the clerical career his father and brother had hoped he would take, describing it as "a snare in the shape of a cloak and an aba."

In 1946 he earned an M.A. in Persian literature from Tehran Teachers College and became a teacher, at the same time making a sharp break with his religious family that left him "completely on his own resources." He pursued academic studies further and enrolled in a doctoral program of Persian literature at Tehran University but quit before he had defended his dissertation in 1951. In 1950, he married Simin Daneshvar, a well-known Persian novelist. Jalal and Simin were infertile, a topic that was reflected in some of Jalal's works.