About us
Al Jaliah is an independent cultural initiative launched by Gustavo Racy and Yara Osman, aiming to revive the legacy of Arabic-language publishing in Brazil by rekindling the magazine Al Jaliah, which was founded by Sami Joaquim Racy in São Paulo in 1922 and led by him until 1927.
Today, Al Jaliah seeks to foster dialogue between the diaspora and the so-called "Arab world" by publishing intellectual and artistic works in Arabic, Portuguese, and English. Committed to independence and intellectual freedom, the magazine strives to provide critical content that challenges dominant narratives. It also welcomes everyone who shares this vision and invites them to join this cultural journey rich in challenges and possibilities.
Who makes Al Jaliah?
Gustavo Racy
Born in São Paulo in 1988, Gustavo Racy graduated in philosophy and social sciences. He defended his doctorate in 2018 at the University of Antwerp, studying the relationships between visual culture and the consolidation of industrial capitalism in the 19th century. Gustavo is currently doing a postdoctoral internship in social sciences at UNIFESP, studying the relationships between image and colonialism in the 16th and 17th centuries. He is the author of numerous articles in national and international journals. In addition to being an academic, Gustavo was a founding partner of sobinfluencia dições, translating titles by authors such as Guy Debord, Louise Michel, Neel Doff and Jules Falquet and organizing and translating the collection “Walter Benjamin está Morto”. In 2022, he began to outline the idea of a return of Al Jaliah, which he began to implement together with Yara Osman in 2024. At the magazine, he works as director, curator, editor and translator, as well as an occasional Al Jaliah designer.
Yara Osman
A photographer, pianist, and translator, Yara holds a degree in dentistry and was born in Latakia, Syria, in 1989. She moved to Brazil in 2016 and, since 2017, has been giving lectures on refuge and human rights, specifically aimed at public school teachers in São Paulo. She has participated in several musical and artistic projects, including the International Biennial of Contemporary Art in Curitiba, the SP-Arte exhibition in São Paulo, and the Arab-Brazilian band Tananir. She also founded the cultural initiative Gurbah through which she promoted Syrian culture in São Paulo and Florianópolis. Since 2021, she has been working in translation, including of cinema and literary projects. This experience led her to collaborate with the Arab-Brazilian News Agency and undertake numerous other translations. Within Al Jaliah, Yara shares with Gustavo Racy the roles of management, curation, editing, translation, communication, and design.