From left: Elaine and Mokhtar Mokhtefi. (Photo provided by Ms. Mokhtefi.)Lifelong anticolonial activist makes significant estate bequest to CNES
The Elaine and Mokhtar Mokhtefi Endowment at CNES will support fellowships and scholarships for students from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) who study the history and cultures of the region at UCLA.
By Peggy McInerny, Director of Communications
UCLA International Institute, July 22, 2024 – Elaine Mokhtefi, a lifelong activist in the anticolonial movement who worked for Algeria’s independence, has made a substantial bequest to the UCLA Center for Near Eastern Studies (CNES).
Proceeds from her estate will create the Elaine and Mokhtar Mokhtefi Endowment at CNES, which will support fellowships and scholarships for students from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) who study the history and cultures of the region at UCLA.
The gift will also support an annual lecture series or conference on the history, cultures and politics of the MENA region, with preference given to topics that pertain to Algeria.
”I believe CNES is a great fit for the endowment and will be an excellent forum for promoting greater academic attention to contemporary Algeria,” said Mokhtefi.
“The UCLA International Institute is deeply grateful to Ms. Mokhtefi for her generous gift, which will enable the center to support talented students from the MENA region. I would like to thank CNES Director Ali Behdad for helping us learn about Ms. Mokhtefi’s story, which is truly inspiring, and for making this gift possible,” said Cindy Fan, UCLA vice provost for international studies and global engagement.
Born in New York City, Mokhtefi has been an anti-racist and anticolonial activist since the early 1950s. She has lived for extended periods in France, Algeria and New York City. She spent the years 1962-1974 in Algeria, where she worked as a journalist and a functionary in Algeria’s first post-independence government.
Her deep engagement with the National Liberation Front and the Algerian provisional government led to friendships with leading anticolonial thinkers, activists and national liberation leaders throughout the developing world, including Franz Fanon and Tran Hoai Nam. She also helped facilitate travel to Algeria for U.S. civil rights and black power activist Stokely Carmichael and assisted the Black Panther Party to set up its international headquarters in Algeria.
“The Center for Near Eastern Studies is thrilled that Elaine Mokhtefi, who has deep knowledge and lived experience of decolonization and independence movements in MENA, Africa and beyond, has chosen CNES as the home for her gift,” said Behdad, John Charles Hillis Professor of Literature in the department of English.
“It is our honor to continue her and her husband’s fascinating legacy by supporting students from the region to UCLA,” he continued.
“MENA students add first-hand experience and cultural insights to undergraduate course discussions and graduate seminars on the region, giving U.S. students a broader understanding of the Middle East and North Africa, while academic debates and emerging scholarship of the Middle East and North Africa benefit from their culturally sensitive research,” Behdad noted.
Both Elaine and her husband Mokhtar, who died in 2015, have published personal memoirs. Mokhtar’s work “J’etais francais-musulman” was published posthumously in Algeria in 2016. An English translation by Elaine, “I Was a French Muslim: Memories of an Algerian Freedom Fighter,” was published by Other Press in the United States in 2021. In addition to his memoir, Mokhtar Mokhtefi authored several books on various aspects of world history for young readers.
Elaine’s own memoir, “Algiers, Third World Capital: Freedom Fighters, Revolutionaries, Black Panthers,” was published by Verso in 2018, and in her own translation in both France and Algeria in 2019.
In 1994, the couple moved to New York City, where Elaine has become an accomplished portrait painter. She has remained an activist in New York, participating in climate, anti-war and pro-Palestinian protests.
Published: Monday, July 22, 2024