While we're hard at work preparing for season 3 of This Being Human, we thought we'd share some of our favourite interviews from the past season. Ali Hassan is a stand-up comic, actor, and host of both CanadaReads and the CBC Radio show Laugh Out Loud. He talks about Canadian fame, being forced by his children to face difficult questions about his identity, and why he came to think of himself as a "cultural Muslim."

While we're hard at work preparing for season 3 of This Being Human, we thought we'd share some of our favourite interviews from the past season. Malak Mattar (b. 1999) is an artist from the Gaza Strip. She paints expressionist faces, figures and semi-abstract designs. Malak started painting at the age of thirteen. While she was trapped inside during a 51-day day military assault on Gaza, she began painting with supplies from her school to help deal with her emotions. 

While we're hard at work preparing for season 3 of This Being Human, we thought we'd share some of our favourite interviews from the past season. Enjoy the first of three best-of episodes — NASA Systems Engineer, Farah Alibay.

Farah Alibay speaks more like a philosopher than an engineer. She works at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where she helps operate the Perseverance Rover, which searches for evidence of ancient life on Mars. 

Leah V made her name as a Black, Muslim, plus-size model. She has worked on major campaigns for companies like Dove and Fitbit, while also being outspoken around issues she sees in the industry. Now, she’s also a sci-fi author. She recently released her debut novel, The Union, a dystopian thriller that turns contemporary notions around race and body size upside down. She talks to AR about her love of sci-fi, her inspiring career, and about having difficult conversations.

Shanaaz Majiet is a disability rights advocate. Struck by a bullet at 17 years of age, she eventually returned to her studies, then went on to become National Advocacy manager for South Africa’s leading disability rights and inclusion organization, Disabled People South Africa. She is now a leading public policy thinker and city government troubleshooter in South Africa and her work is recognized around the world. 

Mariam Ghani is an artist, writer, and filmmaker. Her work looks at places, spaces and moments where social, political and cultural structures take on visible forms, and spans multiple disciplines.

Charles Kettaneh and Nicolas Fayad are the founders of EAST Architecture Studio, an architectural design and research collective based in Beirut. They have worked on various projects ranging from master planning to interior design with a focus on sustainability, adaptive reuse, and history.  

Anida Yoeu Ali’s art mixes humour, public confrontation, and science fiction to explore issues of identity. As a Muslim Khmer woman, Anida is a minority whether she’s in her native Cambodia or in the United States, where her family relocated to escape the regime of Pol Pot. She talks about her work across disciplines, from absurdist poetry to public performances such as the Buddhist Bug, where she meets the public, dressed as a large, orange worm-like creature.

Soumik Datta is an award-winning musician, composer and television presenter. He plays the 19 stringed sarod and connects his Indian classical roots with colourful electronica and musical styles from around the world.

Malak Mattar (b. 1999) is an artist from the Gaza Strip. She paints expressionist faces, figures and semi-abstract designs. Malak started painting at the age of thirteen. While she was trapped inside during a 51-day day military assault on Gaza, she began painting with supplies from her school to help deal with her emotions. She has since made hundreds of paintings.

Yazz Ahmed is a British-Bahraini Trumpet and Flugelhorn player. Through her music, Yazz Ahmed seeks to blur the lines between jazz and electronic sound design, bringing together the sounds of her mixed heritage in what has been described as "psychedelic Arabic jazz, intoxicating and compelling."

Born in Wales with Yemeni and Bangladeshi heritage, Karimah Hassan has an expressive, bold aesthetic and is heralded for "taking stories of community gatekeepers full circle, from the canvas to the streets." Karimah creates live paintings at performance events across London and New York to highlight the importance of communities in the city.

Uzma Jalaluddin is a writer, high school teacher, and published author of her debut novel Ayesha At Last and her latest bestselling novel that has been optioned for film by Amazon Studios, Hana Khan Carries On. 

Uzma talks about making sure that Muslim women are represented through her storytelling, the journey from publishing her debut novel in 2018 to having her work optioned for film, and finding inspiration in classics like Pride and Prejudice and You’ve Got Mail. 

Ali Hassan is a stand-up comic, actor, and host of both CanadaReads and the CBC Radio show Laugh Out Loud. He talks about Canadian fame, being forced by his children to face difficult questions about his identity, and why he came to think of himself as a "cultural Muslim."

His upcoming memoir is called Is There Bacon In Heaven?

Under the name Aerosol Arabic, Mohammed Ali was a pioneer in blending street art with Arabic script and imagery. He has made murals, installations, videos and theatrical productions around the world, from his native Birmingham, UK, to the US, Australia, and even the Vatican. He talks about developing his unique style and why he believes graffiti is both an ancient art and an innate part of humanity. 

With her band Alsarah and the Nubatones, Alsarah brings a modern sensibility to the music she grew up with in Sudan.

She talks about developing her unique sound, the music she carried with her when she left home, and how the public library played a crucial role in her artistic awakening.

Elamin Abdelmahmoud’s new book Son of Elsewhere is about struggling to find a place between two worlds: his birthplace of Sudan and his home in Canada. He talks to AR about what it was like to show up in an Ontario town as an African pre-teen who spoke no English; how WWE wrestling gave him an entrypoint to Canadian society; and why he wants his daughter to grow up with the burden of having roots "elsewhere."

Elamin Abdelmahmoud is a culture writer for BuzzFeed News and hosts the CBC podcast Pop Chat. His new book is called Son of Elsewhere.

Gulshan Khan talks about her path from social advocacy to becoming an acclaimed photojournalist. She also discusses her ongoing project documenting Muslim culture in South Africa, and how apartheid, which ended in her childhood, continues to affect her country.

Mark Gonzales is a futurist, but much of his work involves looking to the past. He believes the key to a better society is not just about the latest technology, but also about things like ancestral wisdom and sharing meals. The key to much of his approach is what he refers to as “empathy technology.”

Mark talks about what empathy technology is, how he overcame trauma in his own life, and why he remains hopeful about the future, despite some of the challenges society is currently facing.

Faria Róisín spent 18 years working on her debut novel, Like a Bird, since dreaming about it as a child. She talks to AR about art, migration, the “new Muslim Renaissance” and how writing helped her deal with childhood trauma.

Yasir Khan has covered wars, revolutions, and has chased camels through the Australian Outback. As a journalist and documentary filmmaker, he has worked for outlets including CBC, CNN, Al Jazeera and Euronews, and is currently Editor-in-Chief of Thomson Reuters Foundation. He talks about lessons from his career, including how he avoided becoming the “Muslim correspondent,” and how empathy may have literally saved his life.

Aïda Muluneh's photographs are almost like paintings, featuring women in majestic outfits and facepaint, set against vivid, stylized backdrops. She talks about developing her artistic voice, the role of spirituality in her work, her series on Islam in Ethiopia, and what she thinks Westerners get wrong about African art.

Aïda Muluneh is the founder of the Addis Foto Fest in Ethiopia and the company Desta for Africa Creative Consulting.

Farah Alibay speaks more like a philosopher than an engineer. She works at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, where she helps operate the Perseverance Rover, which searches for evidence of ancient life on Mars. She talks about how her job has changed her views of Earth, her rise through a male-dominated field, and why she thinks the prospect of extraterrestrial life raises major questions around how we understand humanity. 

Zarqa Nawaz is going through a bit of a rebirth. It’s been roughly a decade since the end of her hit show Little Mosque on the Prairie. Recently, Zarqa got into stand-up comedy, she’s about to star in the web series ZARQA, and she is on the verge of releasing her first novel, Jameela Green Ruins Everything, a dark comedy about American intervention in the Middle East. 

Zarqa talks about using comedy to address uncomfortable or taboo topics, from dating and divorce in Muslim culture, to the rise of ISIS. She also discusses how she has dealt with backlash from her community and what it’s like to step out from behind the camera.

Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy is one of the directors of the Disney+ series Ms. Marvel. We revisit our 2021 interview, where she talks about her earlier career, exposing social injustices in unflinching documentaries like Saving Face and A Girl in the River. It’s a journey that took her from a childhood in Karachi, Pakistan, to the offices of The New York Times, to winning two Academy Awards.

Continuing our best-of episodes, we revisit Salim-Sulaiman's 2021 This Being Human interview. Salim and Sulaiman Merchant are among India's most respected composers, having scored more than 100 films including Kurbaan, Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi, Fashion, Band Baaja Baaraat, Aaja Nachleand Heroine, around 20 TV shows and composed several records incorporating cinematic, folk, electronica and Sufi influences to their music.

Tasneem Alsultan is a photographer whose work has captured major changes in Saudi culture. She has worked with The New York Times, National Geographic and others. But she also documents the more ordinary aspects of life.