Marisa Mazria-Katz is a writer born and raised in Los Angeles. She moved to New York in 1994 to study at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts film school. After graduating with honors and two awards (Warner Brothers Award, directing award from NYU’s First Run Film Festival), she worked on the DreamWorks’ television show Spin City. Her subsequent films screened at the Leeds International Film Festival and the Sedona Film Festival. In 2001, she relocated to London where she worked on documentaries for the UK’s Channel 4. In 2003 she moved to the Middle East to obtain a Masters in Middle East History. She graduated Magna Cum Laude in 2005. Since then she has contributed to numerous publications and television channels on the topics of the Middle East and North Africa as well as politics, culture and travel.