Maya Khan is an award winning writer and essayist who has written for some of the top publications in the English language including the Financial Times, The Independent, the New York Times, and many others. Maya Khan was born in Pakistan and raised in Scotland. She has worked as a journalist in Pakistan and is now based in New York City. Ms. Khan’s articles have won awards from the Guardian newspaper and the Financial Times. She has also written articles for Vanity Fair, the New Yorker, Slate, and CNN among others.
Maya Khan’s international upbringing, combined with her experience as a working woman and a public writer means that the writer has a broad range of nationalities, but she has repeatedly stated that her roots are Scottish and Pakistani. Her upbringing and professional background put her firmly into the demographic category of being a British national who lives in a multicultural society. This means that her articles reflect a strand of thought that is widely considered to be racist by sections of her readership. Despite this, Maya Khan has repeatedly stated on her blog that her parent’s nationality and her ethnicity play no role in how she identifies and view her national and cultural identity as an individual.
It is important to acknowledge the fact that race and ethnicity are integral to a writer’s personal identity. However, when it comes to professionally writing about topics that a mainstream reader may not consider to be racist in nature, it becomes increasingly problematic for authors who do not consider themselves to be such to claim that their writing is motivated by any core notions of their nationality, culture or ethnicity. It is also important to note that in this case, Ms. Khan’s ethnicity and heritage play no part in how she identifies as a person, just her profession. Being open about your heritage and being proud of your heritage does not make you a racist.