Wandering between two worlds.. . With nowhere yet to rest my head Like these, on earth I wait forlorn. Matthew Arnold, 'Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse', 1855 This book is the story of English, the language of the 'enemies', the United States of America, a.k.a. 'the Great Satan', and its closest ally, the United Kingdom, in post-revolutionary Iran or what has become known as the 'Islamic Republic' of Iran (IRI) following the 1979 Iranian Revolution. It is primarily based on the data I collected through a year of fieldwork (2007-2008) in Tehran. The preface intends to provide an account of the internal and external circumstances of the country at the time of my fieldwork as well as the fieldwork dilemmas I encountered while collecting data in the field. When I left New York City for Tehran in late August 2007 for the purpose of data collection, there was hardly any trace left anywhere in the country of the principles of 'freedom of expression', 'tolerance', 'respect for diversity' and having a 'dialogue among civilizations'-values that had been advocated, at least at the discourse level, by the previous reformist president, Mohammad Khatami and his administration, during the reform phase (1997-2005) of the IRI in the country. In fact, since August 2005, with the ascendancy of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to the presidency, it seemed that such liberal values have faded away and been replaced by profoundly anti-Western and ideopolitical sentiments, and the aspiration for 'the revival of the early revolutionary values', which meant, among many things, combating the 'Western cultural invasion'. The intensity of antagonism towards the West-the United States, in particular-seemed to be like that of the early years of the 1979 Revolution. The country's politicians were constantly concerned about the invisible traces of a 'velvet/soft revolution' within the nation, which was said to be supported by 'external forces', having their Preface xv Preface xvii of this project from the very beginning, and Sarah Williams, Production Manager and her team for help with the editing and production of this book. And lastly, I owe a monumental debt to my family, to my parents, in particular, who were instrumental in my education and intellectual growth. I am equally thankful to my husband, Dr Habib Borjian, whose inspiration and constructive feedback were indispensable to the project from its very outset. His scholarly input can be seen throughout this manuscript.