I always come back
to the work my grandfather did.
It lets me break
down
and it clears my
head
to gasp for grace.
I must give back, I must be here.
Said his heart, to his ear,
Said the whistle of the train,
climbing the mound of his back,
climbing west, into the Himalayas.
I always circle back,
climbing west,
climbing west.
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family. Show all posts
Thursday, December 12, 2013
Sunday, December 2, 2012
An Infidel Thanksgiving
For Thanksgiving this year, my entire maternal family in the US came over to my house. Despite our history of bickering, there was pretty much zero drama. My mother had recently returned from Bangladesh, fulfilling the sense of duty among the America-dwelling siblings to look after their parents. This duty, often a challenge because my grandparents generally reside on the other side of the world and when they visit, everyone has to share the responsibility of hosting them, is often the polarizing factor among my aunts and uncles.
At the beginning of break, before seeing most of my family, I'd seen the movie Infidel. In the movie, a pretty typical second generation Muslim man, Solly, finds out he is anything but and was only adopted by Muslim parents, though born to Jewish ones. Solly becomes obsessed with meeting his birth father, who is dying in a Jewish rest home, guarded by an Orthodox Rabbi who believes seeing his Muslim son will be too taxing on the father. The movie mainly deals with the casual anti-Semitic attitude of a lot of immigrant Muslims who did not grow up in environments conducive to learning how to be tolerant of people of vastly different backgrounds, never mind live harmoniously with them. By the way, this movie is a comedy and I highly recommend it.
The various nuclear families in my extended family and even the individuals within them vary in terms of religious observance. I was happy to see this aspect of Muslim life portrayed in Infidel, too. The imam in the movie is even portrayed as supportive of LGBTQ Muslims. Yet, the main character has very stereotypical views towards Jews.
The attitude of many Muslims towards Jews comes from narrow-minded or overly simplistic interpretations of the Quran, which mentions Jews both in the context of the history of Abrahamic faiths and in the context of the Prophet's interaction with them. Perhaps because they are foreign, though they play neutral, benevolent, and malicious roles in the Quran, the worst roles and actions are ususlly the ones that become most popular in retellings.
On Thanksgiving, among my cousins, we try to uphold the tradition of naming what we are most thankful for before eating. The first person to go was my 9 year old cousin. He said, "I am thankful that I'm a Muslim." Normally, we would have been happy to hear that, even though some of us are a little estranged from Islam and the feeling of thankfulness toward the faith that is an essential aspect of it. However, we had earlier heard of the younger kids say something along the lines of Muslims being better than all other people. Though we had not reprimanded whoever said it at the time, we, perhaps partly in our guilt of our own lack of thankfulness but mostly due to our anxiety about growing up Muslim in America with immigrant parents, brought it up now and failed to be supportive of our little cousin.
When you are not confident of your personal grasp of something, it is difficult to be supportive of someone to the extent that you can constructively disagree about that thing. The same goes for interfaith relations. However, within groups, there exists differences, creating instability in its group identity. In majority groups, this is usually not a point of insecurity and may not translate to normative measures.
However, in minority groups, who are often pushed to present a monolithic image of themselves to outsiders, this instability can either cause conflict within the group or cause conflict with another group as a way of identifying the group through the negation of the other. The latter is portrayed, I believe, in Infidel and is prevalent in my little cousin's experience with parents and Sunday school teachers who are immigrants with limited understanding or investment in American society, without which, there is very little imperative to understand and appreciate the common threads between many religions and people from many walks of life. The movie suggests that such a mentality can persist if people do not learn tolerance. The former-- the effect of tolerance of outside groups among the members of a minority group that is internally diverse, was probably the source of our failure to be supportive older cousins.
Still, we shouldn't let this stuff get to us. The base assumption of either option is that we have to present a monolithic image of our group. The assumption is that people would t understand and would believe us all to be radicals if our cousin were to express his beliefs around non-Muslims or non-immigrant Muslims. They might. But we also assume non-Muslims and people who are different from our family as our default audience in the performance of out identities, even within the safety of our home. Sure, the environment of post-9/11 America, particularly the existence of policies such as The Patriot Act, have set us up to perform this way. And sure, our lives might be easier in some aspects if we perform for those in power. But repeated and perpetual performance, like the Muslim prayer performed 5 times daily or the Sufi performance of dhikr, transforms the performer into a servant. If we practiced the perspective of our faith more often, we would be assured there is always a higher power and that we need not bow to or feel threstened by anyone lesser than God.
At the beginning of break, before seeing most of my family, I'd seen the movie Infidel. In the movie, a pretty typical second generation Muslim man, Solly, finds out he is anything but and was only adopted by Muslim parents, though born to Jewish ones. Solly becomes obsessed with meeting his birth father, who is dying in a Jewish rest home, guarded by an Orthodox Rabbi who believes seeing his Muslim son will be too taxing on the father. The movie mainly deals with the casual anti-Semitic attitude of a lot of immigrant Muslims who did not grow up in environments conducive to learning how to be tolerant of people of vastly different backgrounds, never mind live harmoniously with them. By the way, this movie is a comedy and I highly recommend it.
The various nuclear families in my extended family and even the individuals within them vary in terms of religious observance. I was happy to see this aspect of Muslim life portrayed in Infidel, too. The imam in the movie is even portrayed as supportive of LGBTQ Muslims. Yet, the main character has very stereotypical views towards Jews.
The attitude of many Muslims towards Jews comes from narrow-minded or overly simplistic interpretations of the Quran, which mentions Jews both in the context of the history of Abrahamic faiths and in the context of the Prophet's interaction with them. Perhaps because they are foreign, though they play neutral, benevolent, and malicious roles in the Quran, the worst roles and actions are ususlly the ones that become most popular in retellings.
On Thanksgiving, among my cousins, we try to uphold the tradition of naming what we are most thankful for before eating. The first person to go was my 9 year old cousin. He said, "I am thankful that I'm a Muslim." Normally, we would have been happy to hear that, even though some of us are a little estranged from Islam and the feeling of thankfulness toward the faith that is an essential aspect of it. However, we had earlier heard of the younger kids say something along the lines of Muslims being better than all other people. Though we had not reprimanded whoever said it at the time, we, perhaps partly in our guilt of our own lack of thankfulness but mostly due to our anxiety about growing up Muslim in America with immigrant parents, brought it up now and failed to be supportive of our little cousin.
When you are not confident of your personal grasp of something, it is difficult to be supportive of someone to the extent that you can constructively disagree about that thing. The same goes for interfaith relations. However, within groups, there exists differences, creating instability in its group identity. In majority groups, this is usually not a point of insecurity and may not translate to normative measures.
However, in minority groups, who are often pushed to present a monolithic image of themselves to outsiders, this instability can either cause conflict within the group or cause conflict with another group as a way of identifying the group through the negation of the other. The latter is portrayed, I believe, in Infidel and is prevalent in my little cousin's experience with parents and Sunday school teachers who are immigrants with limited understanding or investment in American society, without which, there is very little imperative to understand and appreciate the common threads between many religions and people from many walks of life. The movie suggests that such a mentality can persist if people do not learn tolerance. The former-- the effect of tolerance of outside groups among the members of a minority group that is internally diverse, was probably the source of our failure to be supportive older cousins.
Still, we shouldn't let this stuff get to us. The base assumption of either option is that we have to present a monolithic image of our group. The assumption is that people would t understand and would believe us all to be radicals if our cousin were to express his beliefs around non-Muslims or non-immigrant Muslims. They might. But we also assume non-Muslims and people who are different from our family as our default audience in the performance of out identities, even within the safety of our home. Sure, the environment of post-9/11 America, particularly the existence of policies such as The Patriot Act, have set us up to perform this way. And sure, our lives might be easier in some aspects if we perform for those in power. But repeated and perpetual performance, like the Muslim prayer performed 5 times daily or the Sufi performance of dhikr, transforms the performer into a servant. If we practiced the perspective of our faith more often, we would be assured there is always a higher power and that we need not bow to or feel threstened by anyone lesser than God.
Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Against Eltahawy's Criticism of Religious Sublimation
My favorite part of this video is towards the end, when Leila Ahmed criticizes Mona Eltahawy's interpretation of Alifa Rifaat's story, "Distant View of a Minaret." There are several reasons its my favorite part. First, it got me to read the story for myself, which wasn't hard because it is also linked in the Foreign Policy article, for myself. Second, in my first post about this article, my strongest criticism of it was Eltahawy's criticism of religious sublimation, which is what is happening in her reading of the story, by "claiming to have God firmly on their side."
Before I tell you my final reason for liking Ahmed's criticism, I have to tell you me second favorite part of this video. My second part of this video is how much respect these two women have for each other and that the Melissa Harris-Perry show did nothing to play that down. This makes me feel like I don't have to worry about Eltahawy burning bridges for those who want to follow in her footsteps. I loved that both she and Ahmed met and talked to Alifa Rifaat. I love this network of Muslim feminist thinkers and the exchange of feminist thought. Beautifully done. And I love that Mona made a splash and brought these pieces together for anyone who is willing to see beyond the Islamophobic and anti-Islamophobia static.
Now, my final reason for liking Ahmed's criticism, brought on by Eltahawy's bringing this issue to the forefront, is that this is the part of the discussion I want to take part in.
Reminiscent of Marxist, "opium of the masses" idea, that religion allows us an escapist option in the face of oppression or that it can be turned to instead of reform is a common criticism of religion itself, not society, which the umbrella under which gender criticism usually falls. I don't like Eltahawy's blurring of the line between religion and society but the truth is, Islam has been used to justify and normalize misogyny. Yet, for the women who marry the men under oppressive regimes and are, in turn, oppressed themselves, is religious sublimation so bad? It saves a woman from a life of finding meaning only through her duty to her uncaring husband. Isn't that feminism? Alternatives, which should be available, include divorce, marrying out of the culture or not marrying, all of which value the self over the society and can both free a woman of the pitfalls of misogyny and introduce a whole set of new problems (that will likely include a foreign version of misogyny) or not marrying men
And then there's the idea that God is a patriarchal man. I don't believe that to be true. But there are probably many religious women that do believe that and by believing that there's a good model for a patriarchal man, continue to believe in patriarchy. While feminists tear down patriarchy for its flaw, these women seem to believe in a higher standard for it. What's wrong with that? Where that higher standard (which should be considered a moderate from of feminism) is left unexpressed is where my only criticism of what Eltahawy blankets over can be found. If that seems un-feminist of me, I think you need to expand your definition of the term.
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Bengali Lessons
I is ami, rhyming with yummy.
You is thumi, rhyming with Rumi.
In Bengali, there are object pronouns.
As tu turns into te in Spanish,
thumi turns into thomakay,
which kind of sounds like stomachache.
Bhalo, in Bengali, means good.
It means satisfactory, proper, right,
well, nice.
Basha, in Bengali, means house or home
or where you're from.
My father uses the variation bari, when he speaks Bengali,
because up north in Rajshahi they speak Proper Bengali.
Rajshahi is officially
amar bari.
My ammu uses basha
because it's easier
on her southern dialect.
And by south, I mean Bhola,
which is a place
where I was born.
When we put the words together
for good
and
for home
we get the word for love: bhalobasha.
Bhalobasha is the noun and the root
that, when conjugated for ami,
is bhalobashi.
When we put the words together
(for good
and
for home)
Ami thomakay bhalobashi.
You is thumi, rhyming with Rumi.
In Bengali, there are object pronouns.
As tu turns into te in Spanish,
thumi turns into thomakay,
which kind of sounds like stomachache.
Bhalo, in Bengali, means good.
It means satisfactory, proper, right,
well, nice.
Basha, in Bengali, means house or home
or where you're from.
My father uses the variation bari, when he speaks Bengali,
because up north in Rajshahi they speak Proper Bengali.
Rajshahi is officially
amar bari.
My ammu uses basha
because it's easier
on her southern dialect.
And by south, I mean Bhola,
which is a place
where I was born.
When we put the words together
for good
and
for home
we get the word for love: bhalobasha.
Bhalobasha is the noun and the root
that, when conjugated for ami,
is bhalobashi.
When we put the words together
(for good
and
for home)
Ami thomakay bhalobashi.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
What does it mean to be a Muslim feminist?
In a previous post, I referenced a "theory" that the perceived Islamic patriarchy as it stands today was largely a relic of colonialism. The Emel Magazine article's author goes on to say that whether or not this is true, simple finger-pointing to the West does not absolve the fact of what is, which, specific to this article, is the denunciation of early Islamic female scholarship. The post-colonial theory is used to explain why few, including Islamic scholars, are aware of the female scholarship revivified in Dr. Akram Nadwi's canon.
In Islam, and particularly in certain schools of thought, the examples of people, both Muslim and non-Muslim, living around the time of the Prophet(SAW) strongly influence religious interpretation and practice. So, though the Quran directly invokes that all believers-- men, women, children and everyone in between, are both literate, requiring that they can read and understand the Quran, and seek knowledge in the wider world, if there is no prevalent example of this among the early believers, it is believed by many to be a lesser aspect of Islamic practice. If there are only examples among the men and not among everyone else, it is believed to be an aspect of practice prescribed primarily, if not exclusively, to men.
Before Islam, the women of the Arabian peninsula could be treated as like chattel as were livestock. Not all women were treated this way-- as can be understood from the example of the prophet's first wife, Khadija, who was a successful and respected businesswoman, but there was nothing that prevented it. Islamic jurisprudence, called Sharia, drastically changed this, primarily by giving women the right to literacy, divorce and the inheritance of property. This was more than one thousand years before western countries began to conceptualize rights equivalent to those Islam brought to women. However, the post-colonialist theory is that, even before this, Western domination of Islamic countries brought with it the domination of Muslim women by Muslim men.
I am extremely interested in how this happened. Social change, especially that which entitles previously disempowered groups, is usually adopted gradually and embraced far after enacted legal reform. But how can such a long held reform been so pervasively swept away? Though the author of "The Lost Female Scholars of Islam" discourages finger-pointing for the sake of moving beyond such, I believe the fact that enough female scholarship to fill 40 volumes can have been lost under imperialism and colonialism demonstrates not only the sheer extent of cultural domination that happened but also a certain readiness to return to old habits.
As a teenager, I came across feminist discourse on the internet. This was before the prevalence of radical feminism and what I encountered, specifically the fact that the ERA is yet to be enacted, is what has been classified as first wave feminism. I was shocked by it and immediately identified myself as a feminist. Next, I found second wave feminism and the discussion of gender in college classrooms. What interested me the most about second wave feminism was the call to female scholarship for the purpose of social change. Knowledge, before then, had been so gendered for me that I usually assumed that most things I read were written by men and, in fact, didn't think anything of it. My encounter with second wave feminism changed that. Finally, I came upon belle hooks and the idea that American feminism is about white, middle class women.
This was the most difficult feminism for me to understand, and is probably so for most people who are socialized with the dominant white, middle class American culture. When American feminists rose up against the oppression of women in Islam, I felt distanced from both feminism and the treatment of women in Islam. I tried to read works by Islamic feminists. They usually called for feminist interpretations of the Quran. However, the imposition of American feminism (western, white, middle class feminism) upon the Quran did not feel right to me. It wasn't something I could bring home to my mom, who is both very religious and believes in women's rights. However, there are Islamic feminists, who by the American definition are third wave or multicultural feminists, and the tradition of female scholarship in Islam and its contribution to Islamic thought provides a framework from which Islamic feminism can be understood as an inherent part of Islam and more widely accepted by Muslims.Though second wavers may not necessarily concede to Islamic feminism, it's not really any of their business to do so.
In Islam, and particularly in certain schools of thought, the examples of people, both Muslim and non-Muslim, living around the time of the Prophet(SAW) strongly influence religious interpretation and practice. So, though the Quran directly invokes that all believers-- men, women, children and everyone in between, are both literate, requiring that they can read and understand the Quran, and seek knowledge in the wider world, if there is no prevalent example of this among the early believers, it is believed by many to be a lesser aspect of Islamic practice. If there are only examples among the men and not among everyone else, it is believed to be an aspect of practice prescribed primarily, if not exclusively, to men.
Before Islam, the women of the Arabian peninsula could be treated as like chattel as were livestock. Not all women were treated this way-- as can be understood from the example of the prophet's first wife, Khadija, who was a successful and respected businesswoman, but there was nothing that prevented it. Islamic jurisprudence, called Sharia, drastically changed this, primarily by giving women the right to literacy, divorce and the inheritance of property. This was more than one thousand years before western countries began to conceptualize rights equivalent to those Islam brought to women. However, the post-colonialist theory is that, even before this, Western domination of Islamic countries brought with it the domination of Muslim women by Muslim men.
I am extremely interested in how this happened. Social change, especially that which entitles previously disempowered groups, is usually adopted gradually and embraced far after enacted legal reform. But how can such a long held reform been so pervasively swept away? Though the author of "The Lost Female Scholars of Islam" discourages finger-pointing for the sake of moving beyond such, I believe the fact that enough female scholarship to fill 40 volumes can have been lost under imperialism and colonialism demonstrates not only the sheer extent of cultural domination that happened but also a certain readiness to return to old habits.
As a teenager, I came across feminist discourse on the internet. This was before the prevalence of radical feminism and what I encountered, specifically the fact that the ERA is yet to be enacted, is what has been classified as first wave feminism. I was shocked by it and immediately identified myself as a feminist. Next, I found second wave feminism and the discussion of gender in college classrooms. What interested me the most about second wave feminism was the call to female scholarship for the purpose of social change. Knowledge, before then, had been so gendered for me that I usually assumed that most things I read were written by men and, in fact, didn't think anything of it. My encounter with second wave feminism changed that. Finally, I came upon belle hooks and the idea that American feminism is about white, middle class women.
This was the most difficult feminism for me to understand, and is probably so for most people who are socialized with the dominant white, middle class American culture. When American feminists rose up against the oppression of women in Islam, I felt distanced from both feminism and the treatment of women in Islam. I tried to read works by Islamic feminists. They usually called for feminist interpretations of the Quran. However, the imposition of American feminism (western, white, middle class feminism) upon the Quran did not feel right to me. It wasn't something I could bring home to my mom, who is both very religious and believes in women's rights. However, there are Islamic feminists, who by the American definition are third wave or multicultural feminists, and the tradition of female scholarship in Islam and its contribution to Islamic thought provides a framework from which Islamic feminism can be understood as an inherent part of Islam and more widely accepted by Muslims.Though second wavers may not necessarily concede to Islamic feminism, it's not really any of their business to do so.
Monday, September 5, 2011
Am I a Social Schizophreniac?
When academics say that growing up with a mixed cultural background
is like having schizophrenia, I always thought the statement was a
little dramatic. Over the past few years, I've begun to see their
point.
I was raised as a Bengali, by immigrant parents. My mom, like many moms, strongly believed in socializing my sister and I. Until very recently, there was nothing that mortified my mother like a socially inappropriate blunder made by one of her children. Given that my mother is also kinda prude, I'm going to blame British imperialism for this one.
The thing is, my mom isn't exactly an anglophile. In fact, she has no respect for the British. She sums up her feelings about them by reminding me that, when they engaged in hand to hand combat with Hindus, they dipped their bayonets in cow fat and when the adversary was Muslim, pig fat. It wasn't enough to colonize or kill Indians, the British wanted to spiritually taint them for standing up for themselves. It is one thing to subject people to your rule and entirely another to poison them spiritually.
So, I was socialized with a British value of socialization, and the rest of my home socialization is largely reflective of Bengali social practices, right? Wrong. I have always known Bengali social practice is highly influenced by Islamic social practice and the Islamic Empire (two separate sets of ideals) but I am still learning the extent to which colonialism had its hand in the mix. For example, there is a theory that the custom of female leadership and scholarship in Islam may have been lost in interactions with the Western world.
Until recently, I was able to maintain my Bengali socialization at home while socializing myself to school and work environments with simultaneous adeptness. By the time I visited Bangladesh and realized how Americanized I am, I had solidified my doubts over the value of my mother's social values in my own life. (Though my family was hardly lower middle class at it's social "peak," another value to which my mother ascribed, that may have also come from India's days as England's crown jewel, as Jane Austen can tell you, was a reverence for the upper class.) However, I had also already gone away to college and realized that in my sheltered childhood, I had, ironically, failed to become American enough.
Though my mother's value of proper social behavior instilled in me a heightened awareness of social norms and a desire to shirk them, if need be, as quietly as possible, this happened at such a young age that socialization and social values are so deep for me that it's difficult for me to recognize anything more than a vague conception of them without very deep contemplation. When they are in flux, I am divided between existential crisis and maintenance of my social status quo on top of being divided between the conflicting social values I encounter. On the other hand, only the instability I experience in it has lead me to realize that appropriate socialization is an integral part of me that allows me function normally.
So I suppose a lack of appropriate socialization, then, is a mental illness? I really need to read me some more Michel Foucault, apparently.
I was raised as a Bengali, by immigrant parents. My mom, like many moms, strongly believed in socializing my sister and I. Until very recently, there was nothing that mortified my mother like a socially inappropriate blunder made by one of her children. Given that my mother is also kinda prude, I'm going to blame British imperialism for this one.
The thing is, my mom isn't exactly an anglophile. In fact, she has no respect for the British. She sums up her feelings about them by reminding me that, when they engaged in hand to hand combat with Hindus, they dipped their bayonets in cow fat and when the adversary was Muslim, pig fat. It wasn't enough to colonize or kill Indians, the British wanted to spiritually taint them for standing up for themselves. It is one thing to subject people to your rule and entirely another to poison them spiritually.
So, I was socialized with a British value of socialization, and the rest of my home socialization is largely reflective of Bengali social practices, right? Wrong. I have always known Bengali social practice is highly influenced by Islamic social practice and the Islamic Empire (two separate sets of ideals) but I am still learning the extent to which colonialism had its hand in the mix. For example, there is a theory that the custom of female leadership and scholarship in Islam may have been lost in interactions with the Western world.
Until recently, I was able to maintain my Bengali socialization at home while socializing myself to school and work environments with simultaneous adeptness. By the time I visited Bangladesh and realized how Americanized I am, I had solidified my doubts over the value of my mother's social values in my own life. (Though my family was hardly lower middle class at it's social "peak," another value to which my mother ascribed, that may have also come from India's days as England's crown jewel, as Jane Austen can tell you, was a reverence for the upper class.) However, I had also already gone away to college and realized that in my sheltered childhood, I had, ironically, failed to become American enough.
Though my mother's value of proper social behavior instilled in me a heightened awareness of social norms and a desire to shirk them, if need be, as quietly as possible, this happened at such a young age that socialization and social values are so deep for me that it's difficult for me to recognize anything more than a vague conception of them without very deep contemplation. When they are in flux, I am divided between existential crisis and maintenance of my social status quo on top of being divided between the conflicting social values I encounter. On the other hand, only the instability I experience in it has lead me to realize that appropriate socialization is an integral part of me that allows me function normally.
So I suppose a lack of appropriate socialization, then, is a mental illness? I really need to read me some more Michel Foucault, apparently.
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Radical Heritage
In Bangladesh, it's considered patriotic to be radically political. If you don't have any passionate political opinions, it's because you don't care about your country. If anyone's tried to kill you because of your provocative ideas, you are considered a hero in general consensus for having made people think. This basically being Humayun Azad's life story and him being my relative, no wonder my mom is wary of my literary and political leanings.
Though my literary aspirations are in vernacular English and my political aspirations are in American local government, I am after all, a Bengali educated in English and raised in America.
Azad wrote the Bengali equivalent of The Second Sex, was an anti-military, anti-religion satirist and wrote both adult and young adult fiction in addition to political criticism. He also wrote on and studied Bengali language linguistics. The political bent in his fiction is to be expected because Bangladeshis well know, as everyone should, that language is political. His form, therefore, suits his function, which is always a selling a point for me. Though I don't necessarily see eye to eye with him across the board, I have to admit that the man was a badass.
Bengali language is seeped in literary tradition well beyond Tagore (who Azad claimed to be a misogynist/chauvinist) and Arundhati Roy. Merely exposure to the language, apparently, can cause literariness, such as with immigrant Jhumpa Lahiri (and, I suspect, Rohinton Mistry although I'm not 100% positive on his first language). I'm just scratching the surface here. If I mention Bharati Mukherjee, I'm probably crossing into the realm of writers most people have never heard of, if I haven't been there for awhile already. I just wanted to add another person, Humayan Azad, to my readership's consciousness. If you had doubts about my writing capacity before, now you can rest assured that it's in my blood.
Though my literary aspirations are in vernacular English and my political aspirations are in American local government, I am after all, a Bengali educated in English and raised in America.
Azad wrote the Bengali equivalent of The Second Sex, was an anti-military, anti-religion satirist and wrote both adult and young adult fiction in addition to political criticism. He also wrote on and studied Bengali language linguistics. The political bent in his fiction is to be expected because Bangladeshis well know, as everyone should, that language is political. His form, therefore, suits his function, which is always a selling a point for me. Though I don't necessarily see eye to eye with him across the board, I have to admit that the man was a badass.
Bengali language is seeped in literary tradition well beyond Tagore (who Azad claimed to be a misogynist/chauvinist) and Arundhati Roy. Merely exposure to the language, apparently, can cause literariness, such as with immigrant Jhumpa Lahiri (and, I suspect, Rohinton Mistry although I'm not 100% positive on his first language). I'm just scratching the surface here. If I mention Bharati Mukherjee, I'm probably crossing into the realm of writers most people have never heard of, if I haven't been there for awhile already. I just wanted to add another person, Humayan Azad, to my readership's consciousness. If you had doubts about my writing capacity before, now you can rest assured that it's in my blood.
Saturday, August 6, 2011
A broken home
This summer I've been in Chicago and, though it's the seventh day of Ramadan, I have yet to visit a mosque. When I first went to college, I realized I had unsettling apprehensions about visiting a mosque to which my parents do not belong. I realized I didn't know how to belong to Islam or the Islamic community as an individual dissociated from my family. I was afraid, for awhile, that I wanted so badly to dissociate from my family that unconsciously, I was attempting to dissociate from everything I associated with my family. For a long time after leaving home, I designated my religious practice to times and spaces I shared with my family.
The weird thing is, I have long been disillusioned by the Islamic community to which my family belonged. I say belong in the past tense because that community has become so fractured that it's hard to say if it exists anymore to the point that my family, being Bengali, can belong to it. What broke my heart about that community was the very racist/nationalist sentiments within it that turned Muslim brothers and sisters against one another. What broke my heart about that community is that it treated its members like they did not belong.
At first, I didn't understand why the people of my community could not look past their differences and realize their common ideal was one of peaceful surrender. Their conflicts tended to flare up over the appointment of the Board of directors and that of the Imam, the religious leader of the mosque. The race of the Imam, the language in which he should give Khutba and the power he should have in the community were all viciously argued over, at times resulting in physical confrontations between grown men.
Where was this thirst for power, a thirst so maddening that it involved petty racism and blind hatred-- where was is coming from? Many of the members of my mosque were distinguished members of local society outside the mosque. They are doctors, lawyers, engineers, pharmacists, city-council members, hospital board members, volunteers, soccer moms, interfaith leaders, and hardworking, exemplary citizens. Some of them are the downtrodden, clinging to Islam and Allah for some serenity in this life. All of them, outside of the mosque community, as respectable people.
Despite that, as Muslims and minorities, they are of a disempowered group. They work so hard to show to outsiders that they are okay and that they belong here, that they care about America as much as they care about their own well-being, that they are optimistic and level-headed. However, a part of them knows that outsiders do not perceive them as such. A part of them knows that it is impossible to overcome the racial casting endowed them by the majority culture and it is enough to be utterly disempowering.
This is a narrative of domestic violence where the domicile is the mosque and the members of the family are the people who worship in that community. Unlike in domestic violence narratives, it is apparantly easier to begin a new and separate mosque than it is to begin a new home without the abusing members of your family. But I believe, to a certain extent, the emotional scar of a fractured family is the same in both cases. It always hurts to know you cannot trust those with whom you have a deep bond-- those people that you supposedly should be able to trust unquestionably.
Many of the families in the community, like my family, are also fractured. The parts reflect the whole on every level. The American Muslim is a fractured identity, broken from inside and out. What I didn't understand at the beginning of college was that, this American Muslim identity is mine.
Knowing the larger social context, knowing that like Indigenous America, immigrant America, gay America, Black America, female America, rural America, urban America, conservative America, liberal America-- Muslim America is fractured by the America part, the part that includes all of these people fighting to belong to one America-- one huge dysfunctional family, finally makes me feel at home, sometimes, in my own skin. We are each a kaleidoscope, reflecting every color, though in a different way. We are each a mother, father, brother, and sister all in one. And this is the American identity that is mine.
I have finally begun to feel comfortable with my religious beliefs and have even begun, though slowly, to practice them in my own right.
The weird thing is, I have long been disillusioned by the Islamic community to which my family belonged. I say belong in the past tense because that community has become so fractured that it's hard to say if it exists anymore to the point that my family, being Bengali, can belong to it. What broke my heart about that community was the very racist/nationalist sentiments within it that turned Muslim brothers and sisters against one another. What broke my heart about that community is that it treated its members like they did not belong.
At first, I didn't understand why the people of my community could not look past their differences and realize their common ideal was one of peaceful surrender. Their conflicts tended to flare up over the appointment of the Board of directors and that of the Imam, the religious leader of the mosque. The race of the Imam, the language in which he should give Khutba and the power he should have in the community were all viciously argued over, at times resulting in physical confrontations between grown men.
Where was this thirst for power, a thirst so maddening that it involved petty racism and blind hatred-- where was is coming from? Many of the members of my mosque were distinguished members of local society outside the mosque. They are doctors, lawyers, engineers, pharmacists, city-council members, hospital board members, volunteers, soccer moms, interfaith leaders, and hardworking, exemplary citizens. Some of them are the downtrodden, clinging to Islam and Allah for some serenity in this life. All of them, outside of the mosque community, as respectable people.
Despite that, as Muslims and minorities, they are of a disempowered group. They work so hard to show to outsiders that they are okay and that they belong here, that they care about America as much as they care about their own well-being, that they are optimistic and level-headed. However, a part of them knows that outsiders do not perceive them as such. A part of them knows that it is impossible to overcome the racial casting endowed them by the majority culture and it is enough to be utterly disempowering.
This is a narrative of domestic violence where the domicile is the mosque and the members of the family are the people who worship in that community. Unlike in domestic violence narratives, it is apparantly easier to begin a new and separate mosque than it is to begin a new home without the abusing members of your family. But I believe, to a certain extent, the emotional scar of a fractured family is the same in both cases. It always hurts to know you cannot trust those with whom you have a deep bond-- those people that you supposedly should be able to trust unquestionably.
Many of the families in the community, like my family, are also fractured. The parts reflect the whole on every level. The American Muslim is a fractured identity, broken from inside and out. What I didn't understand at the beginning of college was that, this American Muslim identity is mine.
Knowing the larger social context, knowing that like Indigenous America, immigrant America, gay America, Black America, female America, rural America, urban America, conservative America, liberal America-- Muslim America is fractured by the America part, the part that includes all of these people fighting to belong to one America-- one huge dysfunctional family, finally makes me feel at home, sometimes, in my own skin. We are each a kaleidoscope, reflecting every color, though in a different way. We are each a mother, father, brother, and sister all in one. And this is the American identity that is mine.
I have finally begun to feel comfortable with my religious beliefs and have even begun, though slowly, to practice them in my own right.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Grapefruit
At first, I thought I was about to gain some street cred for my love of grapefruit soda. Instead, I found out 50 cent made the same mistake as my dad did when my dad was fresh off the boat. Hilarious. Ansari is awesome.
Friday, June 24, 2011
A Coming Out Story
If you haven't heard about the stereotypical career of the South Asian, it may be because you are not the stereotypical child of the stereotypical South Asian immigrant parents who believe the only way for a South Asian to be successful in America is to fit quietly into the stereotypes of the South Asian doctor, professor, or engineer. Or, as my father explains, any career that is so highly skilled that they have no choice but to hire you.
Though none of this was explained to me, my parents frowned on their straight-A child's childhood dream to become a teacher. If you're smart enough, you go to medical school. And if you don't go to medical school, you aren't smart enough.
In my first semester of college, I realized I was far more interested in social justice than I was in medicine. In fact, through personal experience, I decided the honor of the medical field has been severely crippled by pharmaceutical companies and other forays indulging in capitalism and vowed I would never make a three figure salary off a nation struggling for health care access.
When I revealed to my parents that I'd found my calling, they quickly informed me that politicians are corrupt and my interests would lead me down a shameful road ending nowhere better than where I started. Disheartened, by not only the naivete they perceived me to possess, I did not dare mention that my increasing awareness of myself as a post-9/11 Muslim American woman was only a shaky first step. Where I sought support and advice, I was met with devastated expectations, adamant rejection, and confused anger.
Instead, I dropped out and took a semester off to gather my courage. When I returned to college, my first semester English class-- Global Lit, redirected me to my knack for cultural analysis and my love for literature. My teachers in high school tried in vain to foster those things in me but I had dutifully pursued science instead. This time I decided to follow my instincts.
In the meantime, my father became more and more frustrated with the lack of career direction in my choice of major. As it becomes more and more clear to me what I want to do, I am realizing I knew all along but was afraid to claim that knowledge of myself in fear of disappointing my parents. I wandered semi-aimlessly in a place I didn't quite belong. I started to believe that what they'd said was true, that my failure to pursue medicine meant I wasn't smart enough or strong enough to succeed--that I would never make them happy. Unfortunately, my belief in myself maintained its sway in my shaping. A negativity crept into me, buried itself there and has grown and seeped into parts of me I once believed to be infallible.
Again, this blog is a quest to adhere to the best of my beliefs. Here is another: Do NOT accept negativity. Reject it as harshly as it would reject you. Though this may stand in contradiction with my previous post, I do not believe it is entirely a matter of having the right to define yourself. It is more a matter of being good to yourself when you decide what defines you.
Though none of this was explained to me, my parents frowned on their straight-A child's childhood dream to become a teacher. If you're smart enough, you go to medical school. And if you don't go to medical school, you aren't smart enough.
In my first semester of college, I realized I was far more interested in social justice than I was in medicine. In fact, through personal experience, I decided the honor of the medical field has been severely crippled by pharmaceutical companies and other forays indulging in capitalism and vowed I would never make a three figure salary off a nation struggling for health care access.
When I revealed to my parents that I'd found my calling, they quickly informed me that politicians are corrupt and my interests would lead me down a shameful road ending nowhere better than where I started. Disheartened, by not only the naivete they perceived me to possess, I did not dare mention that my increasing awareness of myself as a post-9/11 Muslim American woman was only a shaky first step. Where I sought support and advice, I was met with devastated expectations, adamant rejection, and confused anger.
Instead, I dropped out and took a semester off to gather my courage. When I returned to college, my first semester English class-- Global Lit, redirected me to my knack for cultural analysis and my love for literature. My teachers in high school tried in vain to foster those things in me but I had dutifully pursued science instead. This time I decided to follow my instincts.
In the meantime, my father became more and more frustrated with the lack of career direction in my choice of major. As it becomes more and more clear to me what I want to do, I am realizing I knew all along but was afraid to claim that knowledge of myself in fear of disappointing my parents. I wandered semi-aimlessly in a place I didn't quite belong. I started to believe that what they'd said was true, that my failure to pursue medicine meant I wasn't smart enough or strong enough to succeed--that I would never make them happy. Unfortunately, my belief in myself maintained its sway in my shaping. A negativity crept into me, buried itself there and has grown and seeped into parts of me I once believed to be infallible.
Again, this blog is a quest to adhere to the best of my beliefs. Here is another: Do NOT accept negativity. Reject it as harshly as it would reject you. Though this may stand in contradiction with my previous post, I do not believe it is entirely a matter of having the right to define yourself. It is more a matter of being good to yourself when you decide what defines you.
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