Race
Being "mixed"
"LEILA Maybe I’ll go to Italy.
CONNOR Why would you go to Italy?
LEILA Cause it’s closer. And I’m half Italian" (78)."
"ADAM That’s why I’m only going out with white girls.
LEILA You are?
ADAM It’s my new rule.
LEILA I’m white, too...you know...not that I like you like that...but uh...
ADAM No you’re not" (65).
Leila is half Lebanese and half Italian, and throughout the play she struggles to understand her identity. Since the attacks on 9/11, people seem way more focused on her identity as an Arab-American. She has to learn to navigate a world where people primarily see her Arabness.
Islamophobia
"CONNOR Have you ever been to Leila’s house?
JOSH No way dude, her Dad scares the shit out of me.
CONNOR Wait why?
JOSH He’slike, part of the Taliban.
CONNOR I don’t think that’strue, dude" (24).
"CONNOR Can we not tell anyone about this?...It’s just...Josh is gonna say some dumb shit about how you’re recruiting me for Al Qaeda or something and I don’t wanna deal with it" (81-82)
Throughout the show, Islamophobia is shown in many forms. Some characters are more blatant about it through their use of racial slurs and racist comments. Islamophobia appears more subtlely in other characters, such as Connor. While Connor defends Leila and her family against some racist comments, ultimately he is worried about how other people would perceive him being in a relationship with her.
Fitting-in
"ADAM The best thing we can do right now is keep our head down and not bring attention to ourselves. If we’ve got to be different, we can at least make sure they don’t see us as a threat" (66)
"She stands in front of the mirror, staring at her reflection. She sees war and terrorism and the enemy they see starring back at her. She sees her nose and it represents all of these things and more. She sees the white skin surrounding her nose and how easy it would be to blend in without it... She slams her head into the mirror, breaking her nose" (73).
Like many teenagers, the characters in this play are doing their best to fit in with the popular crowd. They try to like popular music, wear fashionable styles, and own the best brand of things. For the Arab American characters, there is another level of pressure to fit in. Adam does this by embracing Black culture and covering his curly hair with a hat. Leila obsesses over her Arab nose and makes a drunken decision to break it in order to fit in better.
Acceptance
"ADAM Come on, Leila. You can try to change all you want, but they’re never gonna look at you and see themselves. They’ll always have a small part of them that sees you as a Towelhead or a Camel Jockey or a Terrorist. You’ll always be off-white" (66).
"Leila realizes that Adam was right" (82).
Leila wants to be accepted by her white friends and desires things to be like they were before the attacks on 9/11. At the end of the show, Leila comes to accept that she will never be perceived as she was before. She accepts that world will not see her as white.