Maysaa Shuja al-Deen has been writing for Al-Monitor since June 2014. She is a Yemeni journalist who writes for Jadaliyya, Weghat Nazar and several Yemeni newspapers. A master’s degree student in the department of Arab and Islamic civilizations at the American University in Cairo, she has recently finished shooting a documentary about unity and the Southern Movement in Yemen.

Al-Monitor:  Why did you decide to become a journalist?

Deen:  I used to read a lot, literature in particular. I have always had a tendency toward writing since I was at school. So, on the one hand, journalism was an occupation that has to do with writing. On the other, it gives me the opportunity to talk to people and work in the public domain. It was an open world, unlike typical occupations where I have to sit behind a desk. As a young woman majoring at university, I saw in journalism a means to feed my imagination with the ideas contributing to the change and reform of everything around me.

Al-Monitor:  Did you have female role models to look up to when you were first starting out? Who?