Everyone has a New York Narrative.
Welcome to New York Narratives. We’re a walking tour company and storytelling project uncovering the stories of New York City—of its people, spaces, histories, and futures. We highlight underrepresented, hidden, and erased local community stories to advance new perspectives on the city. Join us for a tour, collaborate with us, and discover something new.
Tour Highlight: Malcolm X’s Harlem
Our Malcolm X’s Harlem tour, led by NYN founder Asad Dandia, is one of the most popular tours at New York Narratives. On the tour, we “witness” the Autobiography as we walk the streets of Harlem, allowing Malcolm X to be our “tour guide” along the way. In the video, Asad is reading Malcolm’s powerful and poignant final words from the book in front of Masjid (Mosque) Malcolm Shabazz (the Former Temple No. 7) on Lenox Avenue/Malcolm X Boulevard and 116th Street.
Current Tours
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Remembering Little Syria: The First Arab Americans
The former "Syrian Colony" on the lower west side of Manhattan just south of the World Trade Center was home to the first Arabic-speaking community in the United States. Today, few vestiges of it remain, but this tour aims to bring that world to life once more.
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Malcolm X's Harlem: Walking the Autobiography
On this tour, Malcolm X is our “tour guide” as we walk through the streets of Harlem imagining ourselves in his world while reading the Autobiography of Malcolm X on key sites that are referenced in the book. We aim to bring Malcolm's story to life through this experience.
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The Forgotten Immigrant "Lower West Side"
This tour celebrates what was once a unique, multi-ethnic neighborhood that no longer exists. Often unofficially called the “Lower West Side,” it is now the World Trade Center. But once, 27 immigrant nationalities called it home. This tour uncovers that past.
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Wall Street from the Margins: Rebels, Activists, and Workers
This tour explores the 400-year history of Wall Street through the eyes of those at its margins, traversing through sites connected to slave rebellions, indigenous resistance, immigrant labor, and social activism.
Tour Reflection: Muslim Harlem
“One point of particular interest to me after taking this tour is how the relationship between the different neighborhoods within Harlem, the various ethnic groups that inhabit them, and their shared Muslim identity all played out within a three-dimensional space; it’s one thing to get to learn about these things in a classroom, which is fulfilling in itself, but getting to walk around these spaces made me realize things I otherwise might not have. Bengali Harlem was situated squarely inside Spanish Harlem, which explained the numerous interracial marriages between Muslim Bengali men and Latina or Black women.”
— Fordham University student reflection upon taking NYN’s Muslim Harlem tour with their “History of Islam in the US” class (Spring 2024)
Future Tours
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The Empire Strikes Back: War and Freedom in Colonial New York
When one thinks of Independence and the Revolutionary War, one might think Boston or Philadelphia. But it was in New York where the British Empire made its last stand, declaring the city as its capital and striking back against the Patriots. This tour will walk us through that critical period, recentering New York as the Revolution’s most crucial city.
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A Tale of Two Cities
The New York City of the Five Boroughs that exists today is the result of a major effort to combine neighboring cities and townships into one, known as the Great Consolidation. For some in Brooklyn, however, Consolidation was called the Great Mistake. This tour will transport us to the epic era when Brooklyn and Manhattan were rival cities competing for influence and power before they agreed to join forces, birthing Greater New York.
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Synagogues and Socialism: The Jewish Lower East Side
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Policing Gotham: A People's History of the NYPD
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Muslim Harlem: The Black Mecca
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Muslim Bed-Stuy: The Black Medina
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The Greats of Greenwich Village: Poets, Writers, and Critics
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Immigrant Williamsburg: Capital, Creativity, and Chaos
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Current External Tours
The following are tours that Asad leads externally outside of his capacity as New York Narratives founder.
As a tour guide at the Museum of the City of New York, NYN founder Asad leads private tours at two of the Museum’s core galleries: New York At Its Core, which covers 400 years of New York City history, spanning from its origins as a Dutch settlement in 1609 up to its triumphs and challenges as a world city in the present day. The other core gallery is Activist New York, which showcases over three centuries of activism in the city, covering countless issues spanning from religious freedom to civil rights to gender justice.
Asad was also an advisor on the City of Faith gallery that ran from November 2022 to October 2023, in which his own community organizing work was featured! To book Asad as a guide for your organization, please write to adandia@mcny.org and he will be happy to connect you to the Group Experiences department to organize an experience with you.
Future External Tours
The Islamic art collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art contains over 15,000 objects encompassing 14 centuries from the Muslim world. It can be hard to know where to start! Asad is currently in talks with the curatorial team to develop thematic and custom-tailored tours that he can deliver independently to guests seeking to explore the Met’s Islamic art galleries. Stay tuned!
