Swinging Door

"When we become truly ourselves, we just become a swinging door and we are purely independent of and at the same time dependent upon everything."

My mother has always told me I say too much, by which she means she would appreciate if more of what is in my head stayed inside my head. I have only followed her advice when I have done or seen things which have been outlined to require grave consequences if revealed, and in regard to those instances, I feel like I oppressed my soul for having taken part in something that must be hidden. Listen, I know that I wouldn't feel that way if those things hadn't been outlined as such, but they were and I do. So here's everything else.

If you don't do drugs, you will learn other ways to step back and look at your own life. You realize that's what you wanted in the first place, when you still had control. You will remember you always knew how to tear yourself away, if necessary, to open your laden arms and stop time to take stock-- what exactly are you carrying? Do you need all that? The questions have changed, and I'm getting better at making the assessment, but this act remains essential to maintaining sanity. It does matter what you step back into, too.

I need a close look, so I'm up late tonight. It's only 1:22AM in California. Still late for me these days, but I don't have to work tomorrow or the next day, I'm not tired because I didn't work yesterday or the day before. I don't have to worry about falling asleep late and missing the dawn prayer because I'm on my period, so excused this week. I'm not studying for a certification exam and I'm not in school or recovering from being in school. I haven't been in love in about 18 months. And my life has taken shape recently (read: I got my shit together) in a way that I had once imagined over twelve years ago and then completely forgotten about. Oh, and the world seems to be going to shit and I have never felt more calm about it. In other words, the universe has aligned and conditions for reflection are perfect. And I'm going to do that publicly because, don't you want to know how I did it all?

Awh, internal laudatory chorus. Stawpppp. It wasn't narcissism. I swear.

We've come a long way since the two whitest kids at my school asked me if I was related to Osama Bin Laden and if I believed in god, respectively. The other day, the whitest person at work asked me what the Muslim community thinks about ______. Chicken? Printer cartridges? Toilet Paper? I'm not actually sure. I faded out for a second and for that paranoid second, I wondered if he was asking me for A Reason and reassured myself-- this is not something I need to hide. Whatever he asked, I recovered in time to read him the first sentence of this paragraph, minus the bit about white kids. I think he got my point because he went on to express a bunch of sympathy for the disenfranchised (while maintaining a fiscal conservative stance). At least the one time that a non-Muslim POC bullied me, he had the awareness, in 2002, as a pre-teen, to put a towel on his head and imitate a muezzin. If I hadn't been terrified, I might have been impressed.

I've lost track of details. Are things worse now than they were fourteen years ago? I think so. But I can't say I've been trying to keep track of everything. It takes a considerable amount of work to go from literary studies (academic analysis of written cultural artifacts) to maintaining and building data systems. (That's a horrible description of it. My profession is not good at descriptions of our work. I apologize. I work on distributed databases. Sometimes I say, hey, it's still a matter of understanding the organization of information. Or, like, you know, the basic human experience of understanding.) First, I had to change from being a person who engages through only observation, however creatively or intelligently I did so, to a person who takes initiative and moves both ideas and resources. I also needed both an art degree and a science degree. I also fell in love and broke my heart a bunch of times. I swallowed my pride. I treated depression with unsanctioned drugs. I moved halfway across the country, and then entirely across the country. I pursued esoteric religion.

So I can't fully tell you how I ended up back on the path I meant to take when I was fifteen, the person I wanted to be before I realized how complicated global politics was going to make my life. You can't contain my whole life. You don't need to. No one can. But there are some parts that are critical for us to share.

I do still occasionally catch the news. Sometimes it can't be helped. I don't exactly avoid it, but I also don't feel constantly threatened. I do care. I pray for the dead. I pray for the living. I give what I can to people who have lost their homes, their families, their livelihood. I hope to do more of that. I work because I can and it's okay that some people can't do as much.

But I don't have all the defensive arguments down. I refuse to. I understand why they're important to some people. But I need more than that, deeper and wider. Yet, I already have everything I need.

I'm not who I'm not. I'm not even who I am. Identity, or what I project, where I feel I belong or who I show alliance with or however you want to define it, is only a small part of the self. I think most people only use a small part of the self. And when you have very little, you are likely to hold what you have very tightly. And probably spend all your money on it. But that's not the point of self. The point is to let it go.



the quote at the beginning is from a zen member of my family

Meditation on Sharhnush Parsipur's Touba

Today, I have been mentally disconnected from the world around me, wandering in the book, Touba and the Meaning of Night. I finished it last night and I need to move on because I have plenty of reading I plan on getting done in the next few weeks. But in my usual approach to finishing a really good book, I want to dwell on it. I can't read anything else while I'm at work so here I am. To do this constructively, and because the themes of this book a very relevant to this blog, here's a quick analysis.
The book is pretty out there. Employing what critics are calling magical realism,which I love, the book is a blend Islamic mysticism and a critique of history and gender politics. At times I felt that the author was heavy handed by offering definitions yet her definitions were so good, I can't say I minded. I felt like I was being told a story by an elder, wisdom emanating from the actions of every character.

Alert: spoilers ahead. If you dare, keep reading.

Let's start with the Islamic mysticism. The main first ambition expressed by Touba, the main character, is her desire to find god and bear a messiah. She is inspired after her father teaches her the Quran, who is inspired to do so when the thought that the earth is round makes him realize that women are capable of thinking. Throughout the novel, when there is a change in the path of Touba's life, she recalls this ambition and wonders how her marriages, her children, her society, her property prevent her from following it. In the end, however, it is Layla, the embodiment of femininity, who enlightens Touba and unites her with the Touba Tree, the Sufi symbol for spiritual perfection, unity with God, and death.

The society that had successfully prevented her was itself in political and cultural upheaval. The political upheaval, despite Touba's marriage into the Qajar dynasty, always seemed distant in the book. The absence of politically people involved are not felt except in the case of Mr. Khiabani and Ismael, Touba's and her daughter Moone's prime male interests. These interests, through no fault of their own, turn Touba and her daughter towards mysticism. Nonetheless, the book begins with a story of a European man whipping Touba's father in the face for wandering, deep in mystic thought, into the path of his horse. The idea of historical progress, which is implemented by those in power, at first embarrass Touba, but in due course become irrelevant after she also questions, admires, and rejects them on the basis of disconnected principles. Touba's greatest difficulty is in dealing with modernization and, for which she consults her spiritual leader, fluctuating social norms.

On Touba's first visit to her spiritual leader, he sends her home because her mind is preoccupied with those she must care for: her family, including four young children and a mentally disturbed aunt. Her family soon doubles after they get home and Touba is asked to take in refugees from Azerbaijan and only to be broken when her husband takes a second wife. Two false images of gender equality are presented: the sexual agency of the court women, allowed them due to wealth and power, and the financial agency of Touba's daughter, afforded her through modernization. Both are false in giving neither woman what she wants, though the second, unlike the first, is less harmful in its falsehood. But what Touba wants most is to be united with God and each duty in her life seems to be an obstacle. After yet another generation of adopted family finally finds their own direction in life, Touba finals turns within herself and asks herself why she has never achieved her only goal.

That's as far as I can spoil it for you. Now I'll give you my conclusion: This is a work of dharmic feminism, a journey in search of the divine feminine. I don't know Farsi, but in Bengali, the word for religion doesn't translate to "faith." This is something I first glimpsed in a lecture by Ingrid Matteson, a professor on the Spirituality of Muslim Women at Hartford Seminary. I just put two and two together. The word for religion, dharmo, is very close the Hindu concept of "duty." Sufism is, in fact, highly influenced by the dharmic religions. Because Touba's end goal is to raise herself to union with God, and because her duties include contending with the social and political forces around her, she expresses embedded feminism.

I heavily related to this book because, even in different social and political environments, this is the Islam I grew up with. Persian culture is appreciated by many Bengalis, as is Buddhist and Hindu culture.. Though my family is Sunni and Iran is largely Shi'a, there are also members of my family who are Sufis, like Touba. My maternal grandfather, despite his Arabian influenced Islam, read palms, which I can't see jibing with Wahabism. My parents, in deference to my grandfather's dated reference, seek Arabian influence and these days that results in pretty straight-laced views. How has Wahabism developed over the span of my grandfathers' lives, my mother's life, my life? Could it have been less influential when my grandfather developed his religious views?  These are relevant questions I wouldn't have thought to ask without having read this book.**

Of course, in America, Islam is something still different. Sufism is/should be different. I am an immigrant but I doubt I will instill in my children half the dharmic values I have and I don't have that many compared to my parents (though there are some I want to cultivate). At times, in America, you need something else. Are there Puritan, Protestant, Catholic, Jewish values that can be expressed in Islam? Considering the common root of the religions, that answer should be easy! But has it emerged? Eboo Patel says there is a cornerstone in the value of service and I agree. Mohja Kahf points out American Islam's roots in slavery and the Civil Rights movement and the American value of egalitarian love and that has to be a part of it, too. Also, it has to seriously engage in feminism. What else? I think there's more. I believe this is my generation's duty.

Now, time to get my laundry and clean my room.



**I have vague answers because I know a rough religio-political history of Islam,  via Reza Aslan's No God But God and G. Willow Wilson's Butterfly Mosque.

Shades of Grey and Brown

Fifty Shades of Grey recently hit the library bookshelves. I've had some interesting conversations with housewives and overheard interesting conversations among the ladies in the office. They're more or less unabashed, although I didn't spot anyone talking about it with or around too many men. It basically reminds me of the scene in Madmen when the ladies pass around a copy of Lady Chatterley. I don't think it's anything all that new and I don't think I'll be reading it, either.

But something good has come out of this for me, nonetheless. While trying to explain why I would not be reading it to a fellow lover of literature, I said that, right now, there are other ways that I'm more interested in developing my imagination.

And then it hit me. Ever since I was in the middle of my B.A., I have been conflicted about what I should be reading. I wasn't even sure what I wanted to read. There were a lot of people telling me what I, as a student of literature, should read. On the grounds of studying literature and yet studying post-colonial literature, which is anti-literature, in the classical sense, as much as movements in modernism are, and yet feeling as though there was something missing, all I knew was the my love for reading was in shambles and if it were to die, a part of me I loved would die with it. But the question I needed to ask myself was: What part of my imagination do I need/want to develop?

When I was in middle school, a well-meaning school librarian suggested I read a fiction book by a Muslim author with Muslim characters in a Muslim country. I don't even remember what book. Flustered, I told her I didn't want to. Between Harry Potter books, I was more interested in the Alice series by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor. I was interested in anything written by Avi or Rodman Philbrick. I remember liking a series of fairy tales re-written as novels from the point of view of a different character. Growing up sheltered, I wanted to know about the culture beyond my house, a culture I desperately wanted to take part in or at least relate to.

Even then, I knew I wasn't interested in mainstream culture-- I was self-aware enough to know I was different and geeky and be able to appreciate that about myself. But I remember being afraid of being shaped wrongly by the book she suggested. I was afraid it would change me in a way I had no control over. I was afraid it would hit uncomfortably close to home. I was also afraid it would miss and make me feel too different, an unreachable other. Even as I started reading global, post-colonial literature in college, I was a apprehensive about reading anything by Indian, Bengali, or Muslim writers.

As I became more exposed to writing closer to my experience, started reading and enjoying a few books, even becoming overwhelmed by volume of literature I could still read about it, it became less important for me to be able to completely relate to a work by a Muslim or from a Muslim country. It made me realize that there were a lot of people like me, but not exactly like me and that this is a good thing. Even though there's still a part of me that's afraid that if I read one more book about being from the Indian subcontinent, being an immigrant, being Muslim, on top of which, being feminist, I'm going to alienate myself, now I think that it's something I need to develop more of an imagination for.

In a way, this focus it does limit me. I don't read very much mainstream literature and I'm not that interested in much of the literary canon and because of these reasons, it's not enough for me to meet someone who loves to read to feel an immediate connection with them-- like it was in middle school. But I do still connect with people who love literary fiction of most varieties. I also recently discovered my love for sci-fi. The biggest difference is that I now relate most to people developing shades of grey within their imagination of Muslim, immigrant, female, religious, subcontinental experiences because as someone of these experiences and an American on top of that, to do otherwise would require me to believe these descriptors are limits upon myself and believe they should be for other people, too.

Iconoclasm vs. A Muslim American Brand

Earlier today, while leafing through a fashion magazine at work, I entertained a complex fantasy involving Jay Z and Beyonce endorsing public libraries and whether or not I would wear a hijab to the ceremony/celebrations (to which I would obviously be invited) they would have in honor of their endorsement. Thursdays are slow days.

Reflected in that fantasy are 3 things I've been thinking about recently:

1. Icons. Pop icons, public figures, product campaigns/packaging, idols, art.

2. Family/community vs. individualism.

3. The meaning of hijab and the circumstances, yes circumstances, under which it's better to wear one than not wear one. 

The first is because, in The Butterfly Mosque G. Willow Wilson mentions the Islamic recommendation against and in some cases even prohibition of icons. This comes from a long history of refusing to worship idols, through which the worshiper may associate partners with god or earthly manifestations of god and divide god's oneness. Wilson, though, is a graphic novelist whose work depicts human and animal figures which, though not forbidden to Muslims as is the depiction of the Prophet, is certainly not recommended. Islamic art, rather than being iconic, is meant to be decorative and using a graphic novel as decoration is tantamount to using any other book as such. Wilson goes on to say that American culture, by contrast, is icon centric.

Wilson also mentions the Egyptian distaste for living alone in the ground of it being waste of resources. Economies of scale aside, the Times article, "The Freedom and Perils of Living Alone," , implies living alone diminishes the ability to anticipate the needs of others, working in direct contrast with the values of collective society (and, I would argue, representative democracy) such as the society heavily family centric, borderline tribal society of Egypt.

Hijab is another post...kind of.

Anyway, I am going into library science because I'm interested in community building and, as I've witnessed by working the circulation desk at the busiest public library in RCLS (a library partnership/conglomeration covering Orange, Rockland, Ulster, and Sullivan counties), public libraries have a lot of potential as a major community hubs. I am going into it with the awareness that the computer/internet access provided by most libraries has been criticized for merely providing the underprivileged communities with the feeling of belonging in larger society without providing them the skills necessary to contribute to and create that society.

I believe that no one should be preyed upon as consumers under the guise of inclusion. They should also be able to create and contribute to the creation of their own/chosen brands, like what Jay Z is to black culture.They should be able to make and choose their own icons, aesthetics, etc and feel their participation in the brand benefits someone they trust.

While a brand may anticipate the needs of it's consumers, it also sells what is ultimately its own conception of society's needs to society and makes a profit that society does not necessarily benefit from. Jay Z says, "I'm not a businessman, I'm a business, man." As a public figure, he sells himself as a brand. In consumer culture, if hip-hop is the religion, Jay Z is god. If not forever, at least until the next god. Jay Z doesn't define himself by participating in consumer culture like normal people do. He defines himself as culture to be consumed. Anything he does becomes a part of his brand. However, creating a brand that saves your people the degradation of investing in brand values that may directly contradict their own (ie: Tommy Hilfiger's racism) is definitely community empowerment.



So, as a 21st century Muslim, I have to ask: can Muslims have a public figure like Jay Z? Is it Islamic to create a Muslim brand that neither exoticizes, stereotypes, nor exploits Islam or Muslims (or anyone or anything else) while uplifting Muslims Americans? Since brands, rather than tribal communities (more easily maintained in more homogeneous societies), are the American vehicles of unification and identity, not to mention that of globalization, can they take the place of the family/community as something that empowers Muslims? Is the identifier "muslim american" one that truly brings people together as both Muslims and Americans without a brand? Or are culture generating brands too akin to idol worship? Would it be okay if the brand didn't center around a celebrity?

The easy answer is that Islam IS a brand, so to speak, and under all circumstances should be the main principle of unification and identity for all Muslims. The easy answer is not necessarily a wrong answer.

But what I'm more concerned with and what we lose by going with the easy answer are the cultural aspects-- things found in magazines, things like recipes, family traditions, the finer aspects of grooming, beauty standards, relationship advice, interior design, etc.  I would like to see something providing Muslim Americans (many of whom are immigrants) a connection/consciousness with the tribulations of their parents while simultaneously imagining their future as Americans (like hip-hop that samples jazz and blues). While we're at it, immigrant Muslims also sorely need to connect with black Muslims and converts need to understand the difference between cultural and religious practice. 

I believe that the admonition concerning icons exist to make brand awareness necessary rather than to prohibit the making of icons altogether. I know there are magazines out there for Muslim Americans and there are Muslim American brands but I want to see more that are self aware yet vigorous enough to gain recognition from mainstream America, especially in the wake of the flop that was TLC's reality TV show or the impending, Colbert "threat down" bearing "The Shahs of Sunset" disaster.

Who's making your future?: An introduction to mine.

“There is no such thing as unmanipulated writing, filming, or broadcasting. The question is therefore not whether the media are manipulated, but who manipulates them. A revolutionary plan should not require the manipulators to disappear: on the contrary, it must make everyone a manipulator." -Hans Enzensberger (Rust Belt Visions: The 2011 Allied Media Conference)

It is a commonly held notion that the world around us isn't good enough. Maybe with the exception of people who belong to the elite class of luxury and excess, most of us look around us and see things that need to be improved. Most of us are willing to work towards improvement, if only for a good night of sleep following a hard day's work. We don't want our effort to line the pockets of the elite or further the damage already surrounding us.

For change to happen, we need resources. Knowing that one of the problems we face is a shortage of resources, some of us choose to directly address this need. I respect that effort, especially because to do it honestly it requires skillful navigation between the corporate creation of scarcity and actual need.

Apparent in my penchant for literature, rooted, perhaps, in the immigrant tradition, I want to address our need for resources by helping both people seeking to provide resources and the people in need of them think about what they really need and to best provide and/or obtain it, and I want to do it by addressing our escapist tendencies.

Next, though you might not immediately see how this comes next, a good story caters to the escapism of entertainment and a really good story teaches you something important at the same time. Though I have spent years of my life with my nose, nay my entire head, in some book, I know that most people escape into music, television shows, movies, video games, or, the biggest one of all: the internet. And though I was an English major, I know that most if not all media contains a message. The message is usually simple: consume more media from this source/follow this message.

BUT the original conception of the internet was not one prompting us to consume but to create. It was not to create another platform for corporate manipulation but to give us access to creating information. Dave Winer from Wired.com equates internet access with having access to your own personal printing press. And the more digitized media becomes, the future we can take that. Why not your own radio or TV station? Video game? Record company? Art gallery? Why not? It seems like the ultimate escapism until you realize the internet is a place where change can happen. In fact, it is happening but the change is being enacted by corporations and that needs to change.

The next question is that of creating media with messages in good faith. In other words, creating media in the context of creating a better world, not just one into which we can escape, as has been its historical corporate function. This is probably the hardest part. While I was English major, dissecting the worlds created in literature-- even though literary fiction is often a prompt to dissect the intentions of the world around us, facing the intentionality in the world around us is an incredibly difficult task. Before using literary analysis, which tries to pinpoint the techniques used by the author to create the message of the book, I never really thought of books as being authored, forget the process by which they are. The way I learned to read as an English major and the way I read before were entirely different and the difference nearly ruined the pleasure of reading for me.

But there are people who face intentionality at its worst everyday. People who face racism or sexism, for example, and know they should be judged as an individual rather than through prejudice. Especially when prejudice is encountered everywhere, it becomes apparent as being constructed with the intention to justify the mistreatment of others. People who struggle against it can tell you how important it is to know the historical context of both the force they reckon with and of their struggle as it proceeds.

For example, when part of a struggle against prejudice, such as the revolutionary movement of hip-hop, is commercialized and made into "pop," it's context (the Civil Rights Movement) disappears. So how do you create media in good faith? You make sure it is connected with the context of it's intention. Don't trust anything without context.

But simply providing context is not enough. Judith Butler, on addressing the lack of centrality/representation/leadership in feminism states that gender, to remain relevant and to avoid coercion, must function as platform for the interpretation of gender. For feminists, gender is a conversation starter, not a lecture. Gender is a context but without the opportunity to continually edit the contained content, it morphs into the polar opposite of what feminists (and humans in general) need it to be. Given, the next step is to empower people to contribute to the creation of information and media.

So, my goal is to help people become aware of information manipulation (giving them context) while giving them the skills to dismantle the sway of the current methods of manipulation as content contributors. This will not only help people become more aware of commercially created "need" but hopefully also help us find our actual context within which we can assess our actual needs. Believe it or not, you can learn all the necessary skills to do what I want to do at a good Library and Information Science program. So that's where I'm headed next.

All American Muslim

Disclaimer: I have not seen a single episode of this show because I don't have cable and because, even when I did, TLC was a little sensational for me.

That said, I have a few comments. I've been reading a lot about this show. I've seen article in the NYT, Jezebel, and several Muslim American Publications. Most of them are scornful, either of religion, reality TV, or the portrayal of Muslims.

One thing I don't like is that many people are reacting to this portrayal of Muslims and Islam as if it is the way all Muslims interpret Islam. For example, there was a recent episode in which a member of the cast apparently re-instituted her headscarf in hopes of getting closer to god and thereby, overcoming infertility. Hijab is not the only way for a woman to get closer to god. I don't think I have to mention that infertility is not the only reason a woman would want to be closer to god, but there, I did just in case anyone thinks Islam advocates that. Hijab is a complex question. And before it can be answered, we have to think about why hijab in particular might be thought to bring a woman closer to god.

However, what I do like is that the show is almost a caricature of Western portrayals of Islam. Though most of the criticism on this point come from Muslim Americans, others will eventually also realize that this TV show is all about the Western portrayal of Islam and is an example of that itself.

So, while I now have to worry that if I resume wearing hijab, everyone will believe it is because I want to get pregnant or because I believe it is the only way to get closer to god, I can also point those beliefs out to be the result of the often laughable portrayals of Islam by Western media.

Listen up, mankind.

In feminism (if your eyes just glazed over, you are a chauvinist and you don't deserve to read what I have to say), a point that is often made to justify the discourse is that man is often equated with the universal standard, prototypical humanoid, which leaves women to be "other" because she is "not a man" and is therefore "deficient." Some claim that defining women this way is even tantamount to their non-existence.

That is one way to look at it. Another way to look at it as that using the word "man" to refers to all people is actually more harmful to men. How can you see yourself as an individual, rather than a generalization/stereotype if the word that refers to your group refers to all groups put together, as well? If everyone were divided into 1, 2, 3, and 4 and the set [1, 2, 3, 4] is called 1, it is problematic to state 2, 3, and 4 are not represented in the group's name yet fail to recognize that 1 has lost it's identity to that of the group. In this alternative way of thinking, women are both included and distinguished within the group whereas as men are inclusive and undistinguished. What can be perceived as the dominance of men can also be perceived as a hindrance to the perception of individuality just as easily as the projection of any other stereotype or bias.

I think the problem posed here is more of a problem with a desire to be indistinguishable, a mere face in the crowd. Any feminist can agree that different is not the same as deficient, so how is that leap in reasoning made? Historically, there unfortunately seems to be an answer to that question, but logically, I don't think there is. Women don't want to be treated differently than men even though they are different and men are different from them, too. And there are people who are more different or different in other ways. And I'm not just talking about sex and gender. But no, different is bad. Let's all be the same. Let's all be like heterosexual men. Commercialized identity, ftw!

But with more college educated folks who know it's wrong to think different is bad, it's cool to be different. But the problem is, most college educated folks aren't "different." They're normal and the more "normal" you are, the harder you have to try to be "different." The better you fit into the dominant culture, the more likely it is that you are impossibly indistinguishable, the more likely it is that you cultivate eccentric, local, obscure, and even distasteful tastes and habits and pointedly disregard anything adopted by "the masses." If the masses do it, they will only do it ironically. This is the result of claiming reclamation for distinctiveness that is mistaken for being downtrodden and denying it to what could be viewed as privilege but turns out not to be so. I'm not saying feminism is at fault. But it is certainly exemplary, particularly in its "western" form, in contributing to the problem.

Brown Girl In Bright Colors

The other day I was extremely frustrated with studying for the GRE and I drew this picture. It made me feel 1000 percent better than I felt before I started. I drew it off a picture Will took of me at Montauk in Spring 2009. It was done in paintbrush, freeware that is about equivalent to Microsoft Paint, using the pen and paint bucket tools.

I really like how this turned out. In some ways, it reminds me of comic book drawing. The colors, the lack of texture in the hair. I also like how the use of different colors instead of gradations of one color turned out. The face appears three dimensional despite color variation being replaced by light variation and a lack of other indications of depth. The light pattern is maintained, and that is enough to maintain the illusion of 3D. Although, I did use brighter colors for brighter areas, generally.

I also like that it looks kind of ugly at first glance. Almost witch-like with all the green in the skin. But some people do have greens in their skin color and it's beautiful. 

Me, the writer

This the story of a developing writer I refer to as me.

In kindergarten and first grade, my school had a book binding program which spurred the story teller in me to write dozens of little stories for novelty of having them published alone. I can only remember one of those stories, in which I teach my younger sister, who in the story is afraid, how to run. In second grade, I had a poem published in one of those anthologies that publish kids' poems to get parents to buy the publication. I remember reading every poem in the book and only finding two or three I thought were as good as mine. In third grade, I wrote poems that first resulted in my teacher's accusation that I was a budding plagiarist but eventually lead to her admiration. She was really into Christmas-- we had a 12 ft tree in the classroom, and she kept the poem I wrote about it. She had me read it to the class and when, at the end they sat there in silence, she exclaimedd it was the silence of admiration. I half believed her but vowed never to share my poetry with my peers again.

My grandfather visited from Bangladesh when I was in third grade. My grandfather was a lawyer and is gifted, as good lawyers are, with his words. He had a special gift for story telling and has always taken his time to tell me stories he's read. He told me stories from 1001 Nights, Shakespeare, and the Quran, among others. This influenced me greatly as both an aficionado of stories and as a writer. 

In fourth grade, perhaps in an effort to show off to my classmates in a way they could more easily appreciate, I switched to mainly academic writing. I wrote academically with ease and can only remember having a problem with it in ninth grade, which I attributed to my teacher's insanity. However, I later realized that my ninth grade English teacher had taught me deeper literary analysis than I'd ever experienced before and was just having trouble fitting my newly complicated thoughts into the old 3-5 paragraph essay format. I got that figured out pretty soon, though and could bang out a 5 paragraph essays in 45 mins from only having read the book/story/poem/play by my senior year. Regents preparation had given me the formula to do that and SAT essay practice had given me a vocabulary so sharp it impressed even very well-read teachers.

Writing continued to be easy for me until my first semester as an English major and second semester as a writing tutor. I began to struggle with it because I began to lose touch with the formula I had come to depend on. I saw too many possibilities and didn't know how to choose from among them the one best suited to my purpose. I don't know how my fellow tutors dealt with the exposure to such a wide array of equally viable writing styles.

Meanwhile, I was taking increasingly difficult and more writing intensive classes. I needed time to figure it out. I needed time to write papers 30 different ways or at least think through 30 different ways to approach my argumentation. I didn't have that kind of time and I sort of floundered. In fact, I regressed. In my need for experimentation, I ditched half my vocabulary and dipped from near eloquence to an incoherent mess. It didn't help that I was studying post-colonial and vernacular literature as an American immigrant minority from a previously colonized country. It doesn't help that I was unable to verbalize my thoughts and feelings to the people I thought I loved and trusted for fear of their utter disappointment. In fact, my writing was only clear when I clearly understood my own identity, which was rare. Such radical introspection doesn't always make for good grades, especially when you're struggling with the conventions that earn you your grades. It was, as they say, a recipe for disaster.

I promised I'm not saying this to create an infinite loop, but the story continues from the beginning of this blog.

Don't Ask Me About 9/11.

"Islam is the religion of peace," has been the slogan on the lips of every Muslim American confronted by non-Muslims over the subject of Islam, terrorism, and 9/11. I know everyone is tired of talking about 9/11 but I have an important point to make, so hear me out. The utility of the saying is in its implication that those employing violence are not Muslim. Yes, the word Islam means "peaceful surrender" but does that make Islam the religion of peace, theoretically or otherwise? While Islam does not preach violence in the name of Islam, it also does not preach non-violence thereof. In fact, though judiciousness is a prerequisite, violence is commanded as a means of self preservation. In this context, saying, "Islam is a religion of peace," is just an inadequate defense to an unjust, racist accusation.

The intended audience of 9/11, was, in fact, supposed to include American Muslims for the same reason that Muslims feel compelled to disavow violence. It was a message to all Muslims, especially young Muslims, encouraging them out of lives of "humiliation" and into violent jihad against The West. Long story short, al-Qaeda protests the feeling that Muslims need to say, "Islam is a religion of peace," and would rather have us blow everyone, including ourselves, to pieces. However, the purveyors of al-Qaeda's message and those who openly received it, are just as oppressive as the circumstances they reject, if not more so, and towards their own people. This makes sense, since there is no hope, positivity, or compassion in their message, not to mention that it injudiciously condones violence. Summarily, though it took about ten years, al-Qaeda's message has been definitively rejected by Muslims around the world. Surprisingly, American (read: George Bush's) anti-Islam and European anti-multiculturalism's (which are really the same thing) "you're either with us or against us" sentiment has been much closer to al-Qaeda's message than anything any God fearing, sanity appreciating Muslim believes. (1)

In America, how do us American Muslims reconcile al-Qaeda's message and the American anti-Islam sentiment, both of which draw a black and white picture of east and west, specifically Islam and the west with our undeniably Muslim and irrefutably American lives? To do so by retreating into either Islam or western life styles would only prove the distinction correct, not to mention prove that we are cowards. But what happens when people say things like, "Islam is the religion of peace," which is nearly as misleading as saying it is the religion of violence, to answer the question, "Are you with us or against us?"

To that question, which is rarely asked directly, I see no way to choose either option. The gut response from me comes in the form of more questions. Questions like: Who are you and what army is "us"? Do you know how many Muslims there are in America? How many died in WTC? Did you know there were Muslims in America before 9/11 brought it to your attention? Did you know there were Muslims at all before 9/11? Do you have any Muslim friends? Were you with or against Timothy McVeigh? Did your ancestors own slaves? Did your ancestors drive Native Americans off their land? Do you believe in witches? What the HELL do you think gives YOU the right to ask ME that question?

Maybe that's a little passive-aggressive. It would probably be best to simply say, "You have no right to ask me that question." Either that or just walk away.

It's not a matter of making sure your hands are clean before you point your finger, it's just the fact that you are pointing a finger. I have no qualms with honest questions about Islam. If you want to talk about religion, I'd be more than happy to participate. Muslim Americans, myself included, have chosen to take up the responsibility of creating forums for people who want to know more about Islam. But if you approach me randomly and it has anything to do with violence (or patriarchy) I don't have sit around and have you patronize me.

Back when no one knew why 9/11 happened, it would have been perfectly acceptable for a Muslim to say, "Listen, I have no idea what's happening either and honestly, I'm pretty scared, too. All I know is that this has nothing to do with my faith," and answer any questions about Islam with anything other than, "Islam is a religion of peace," said to absolve the guilt put there by the accuser/"questioner." But now that everyone with any modicum of responsibility should know better, it is absolutely unacceptable to demean a Muslim American and make them feel guilty or responsible about anything 9/11 related by even asking them about it. If you do, al-Qaeda's message could be seen as reasonable and the world we live in is a terrible place.

Finally, though I know she might never see this, I'd like to thank my co-worker Christina for the solidarity today. I really appreciated that.


(1) Aslan, Reza. "The Fire This Time: The Long Term Effects of 9/11." Los Angeles Review of Books, September 9, 2011. http://lareviewofbooks.org/post/9988565795/the-fire-this-time

Beauty Standards: Elitism and Skin Color

Since I was young, my mother compared my complexion to that of my paler sister and warned me not to get too much sun exposure. She made it a given that lighter skin was beautiful. Though I argued that tans fade, she said sun destroys the skin, so lighter skin became more than a beauty standard, it became a marker of an appreciation of beauty as well. She even mused over whether, among my white friends, my darker skin would lead to my being overlooked. I don't really blame my mom and her views didn't stop me from loving the warm sun on my skin or laughing when my white friends complained that I made them look ghostly pale, but I was surprised to learn that it has become a trend among paler South Asian girls to go tanning.

To provide contrast, I had an experience recently in the "ethnic hair section" at the store, where surprised to find skin lightening products alongside the olive oil shampoo I'd gone there to find. It's not surprising that skin lightening products exist. Fair and Lovely, an ayurvedic "treatment" for dark or uneven skin tone is big in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan. I have heard horror stories of women who used more aggressive means to lighten their skin. My surprise came from my unawareness of the extent to which the standard of whiteness as beauty is prevalent in black culture.

From what I understand, in most cultures, the beauty that is associated with paleness is as an elitist beauty standard. Women of higher classes maintained their prized paleness as a mark of the privilege of not having to work or even go outside if they so chose.

In American slavery, lighter skin color lead to household jobs rather than fieldwork. If a black woman was light enough, depending on where she was, her freedom might even be purchased by a doting white man. Across the board, the illegitimate children of white masters and their black slaves, tended to receive better treatment, as though the whiteness of their philandering fathers made their blackness somewhat forgivable. Again, lightness was an elitist standard enforced though the system of slavery by those in power. It can even be argued that the elitism of skin pigmentation lead to the enslavement of Africans, whose darker skin color made it seem like they were made for manual labor.

Later, the tan was adopted by Europeans and Americans as a mark of imperial life, exotic vacations, and leisurely sun bathing. Though it was a more accessible standard of beauty, the favorable tan did not come from fieldwork, which is still derisively called a farmer's tan or being a redneck. Since fieldwork had largely been replaced by office work, the tan indicated the privilege of relaxation that separated white collar work from blue collar work.

In Islam, though elitism often goes unacknowledged in its perpetuation, there is a prevalent interpretation suggesting that beauty is equivalent with whiteness. In Qur'an and Woman, by Amina Wadud, Dr. Wadud explains the highest beauty is that of a face aglow with the "noor," which means light, of angelic faith. Another contribution to this beauty standard comes from that of the ethereal houri, creatures of heaven who are described as being beyond human in height, having transparent, glowing skin, and virginal bodies that do not age. Both the concept of "noor" and the houri in beauty standards have lead to beauty standards akin with white beauty standards, which Dr. Wadud dismisses due to its inconsideration for black beauty. 

Now with all this in consideration, going back to the tanning of pale South Asian girls, I am interested in where their motivation to do so is from. I have also seen black women obviously tanning themselves at the beach. Though I don't think it comes from an urge to uphold my mother's beauty standards, I am inclined to be critical of this practice. At first, I thought it might be a defiance of the beauty standard that is still prevalent in Bollywood. However, other enduring standards are those of elitism and western luxury, the later of which is especially endorsed by western residing and western educated South Asians.

In India, there is fierce enmity between the wealthy who uphold Bollywood standards and those who uphold western standards. In America, there is similar dissent between wealthy blacks who emulate old money standards and those who choose the flashy expression of new money. Though I'm not sure under which standard black tanners associate themselves, but South Asians in America likely propagate western standards of luxury. Either way, tanning is probably an expression of elitist standards that is definitely laced, ironically, with white/western beauty standards.

Long before I stopped being relieved when my sports tan finally faded and learned to enjoy the color of my skin, I felt slighted by the existence of standards of color and knew that no one should judge others or even themselves by a standard so superficial. Of course, the standard is not superficial in that it's steeped in elitism.

This doesn't mean I'm going to stop enjoying the sun. There is work being to done to prevent what has been called "shadeism." I think my views fall more toward the prevention of children growing up with so much stock in any standards of beauty at all. Sure, the pursuit of such standards, if successful, lead to confidence in one's image. But what people don't realize is that it's the confidence that's beautiful, not the image. So, since I'm not one for the abolition of all standards, rather than the pursuit of beauty standards, which seem rather insecure in their exclusivity alone, how about something more positive that anyone willing can achieve, something that understands difference and can't be evaluated with so little regard? What that might be is probably best left for you to decide.

The Miseducation of Me

Yesterday, I started working as a clerk at the public library. In a library, organization is very important. Things are classified a certain way and need to be kept accordingly so they can easily be located when needed. When something slips through the cracks of the obsessive structure of order, due to human error or subterfuge, it is tracked down and the situation is cleanly rectified.

Having studied post-colonial and vernacular English Literature, Gender Studies, and Philosophy in college, I am not trained to put things in a preordained order. I'm trained to question order. I'm trained to analyze, deconstruct, and reassess as exhaustively as possible and I am trained to defend as innovative a reassessment as I possibly can.

I wasn't really made for that sort of training. I'm a South Asian immigrant, I am a Muslim, I am a woman, and I am poor. College was a training that mostly sees the world for its disorder and dissonance. Despite the questioning of order, believe it or not, it is hard to avoid Western, patriarchal*, elitist values, since they are the values that get an American college its credibility. I at least attended a Catholic University that wore its Christian values on its sleeve and did not worship secularism.

While college helped me see my place in society, which I had previously felt I was lacking and that I needed to work hard and be creative to earn, it is a place in society where I increasingly feel like I am trespassing, a place I cannot earn no matter how hard I work. But it's a place that is rightfully mine. My college degree mostly made me painfully aware of the possibility that I struggle in futility. This is not something I am willing to easily accept.

Questioning order is infinitely constructive for the privileged, for people that order benefits. But of course they are the least likely to do so. That leaves it for those who order has forsaken. But after a certain point, for those that order has forsaken and has left to question it, all order becomes an enemy, life becomes meaningless and their questions become a threat to no one but themselves. This becomes a sort of order itself, created and supported by human error and subterfuge. It is unsettling to realize that you are not of the former group, though you've been a confident, straight "A" student your whole life, when you are in the middle of college.

I have to believe that order can be good. I have to see it. When a library patron is scanning a shelf that I ensured was organized, when someone comes in for something and I know exactly where it is, when I can learn from my mistakes rather than feel like everything I do is a mistake, it helps me feel that I can earn my place as a positive aspect of a constructive order.

Obviously, I don't think the objective way that libraries are ordered is a way that people can be ordered because people are not objects and what is just for objects is not just for subjects. Order should contain justice because a belief in order requires a belief in justice. This belief in justice is apparent in religion, and so religion has been called "The opium of the masses," and "slave mentality," Marx and Nietzsche respectively, for it's support of unjust order through a belief in cosmic justice. But that's what's called "blaming the victim," in my book, and it's ridiculous to blame disenfranchised people who can empower themselves by believing in any greater order.

So as it turns out, not all minimum wage jobs are soul-crushing.



*You can be a patriarchal feminist. You probably are one if you think matriarchal societies and lesbians are all feminists. Chew on that now.

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.

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.

The New Old Me

“We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”- TS Elliot.

In high school, I was exposed to this quote in a science class, and in that context, I interpreted it in terms of scientific exploration for the purpose of learning more about the human condition. Basically, I took it to mean that you cannot know yourself unless you know the world you live in.

With a bachelor's degree in English, I can think of at least 5 other ways to interpret this quote. Now, sitting in my high school bedroom, with a bachelor's degree in English, one of the interpretations is particularly compelling because it explains why my entire college career felt like an existential crisis.

When my mother explains my initial college dropout to her friends, she explains that Geneseo is too far away, so I couldn't endure the transition. Believing she meant I was overcome with homesickness, I disavowed her explanation, knowing there was more to it than the distance. And besides, that made me sound like a wimp. More specifically, it made me sound like the stereotypical, domestically inclined, Bengali, Muslim woman the American feminist in me adamantly resisted. Though breaking that stereotype is important to me, my resistance was not just a matter of principle. I knew that in America, the woman I aspired to be required not just competence but prowess outside the confines of domesticity.

When I graduated high school, I was confident I could achieve my desired manner of prowess. In high school I was widely known and well liked (enough to be voted class president) despite being pretty nerdy and definitely not classically popular. I was perfectly happy with the place I had cultivated for myself and  believed it could be replicated in the world at large.

However, in my belief, I failed to take into account the reality of my situation. In high school, when I wasn't in school, I was always home or with my family. For me, unmonitored outside world interactions were limited to school hours and school activities, limited internet, books, TV and a handful of birthday parties my parents reluctantly gave me permission to attend. I was actually jealous when my peers started working because I felt even further behind in "real" life experience. I worked to gain experience by joining as many after school activities I could possibly interest myself in. Unfortunately, my opposition gave me a false sense of accomplishment and lead me deny my home life as a major element of my identity. It wasn't until I lived away from my family again that I understood the extent of my social impediments or their consequences.

Sitting in my room today, I am not nearly as inclined to escape it as I one was. This is not because I've become complacent. Just moments ago, I realized my college years were spent in frustration and self-hatred because, after my initial failure, I was forced out of any notions of worldly experience. This lead me to question the viability of my identity and aspirations outside the sequestered world of my high school years, since they had been conceived within it. Could I still be who I happily was and follow my dreams? Or did I have to be whoever I had to be and do whatever I had to do to survive in the "real world"? Unschooled in the former and afraid of the latter, I avoided answering questions I could barely formulate and lost myself in the world I had once myopically believed to be my own.

In the world beyond my parents' house, I have learned a lot. As a teenager, I invested a lot of emotional and  ideological energy against my confinement, not just to break a stereotype but again, because I didn't want to be a confined woman. That sense of rebellion became as much a part of me but so did my confinement. However, because I was in denial that my confinement defined me, I could hardly lay claim to my rebellion against it. Out in the wider world, I had to face the harsh reality that my confinement had defined me to a point of stultification in a world without forced restraints. Struggling against the identity formed in my sequestered upbringing, however, increasingly distanced me from the positive outcomes born from my confinement--my desire to grow, my sense of purpose, and my motivation.

I have to accept that, no matter what happens, a part of me will always be a girl who lived a sheltered life.

Park 51, Muslim America and my purpose in life

 Park 51, also known derogatorily as the Ground Zero Mosque, recently asked its Twitter followers, myself included, to email their website's editor if they were interested in blogging for them. I decided I might as well shoot them an email. My email, which was perhaps inappropriately long, described my own relationship with Ground Zero, how it was similar to that of Park51's, how it was formative to my identity as an American Muslim and how all this might be pertinent to Muslim Americans and Americans at large.

Writing that letter reminded me of the way I felt when I was in seventh grade, the way I felt when I was in high school and my intensively formative relationship with 9/11-- a relationship I'd unknowingly and unwillingly grown out of. I don't think my parents understood the impact of 9/11 on a young Muslim hijabi just finding her place in the world, considering their protests to my interests. I know I could have tried to persevere in my interests regardless--and I kind of did, but I really had no idea what to do or any system of support to guide me. It was not an abandoned interest, it was a dream deferred. And you know what happens to those.

Whether I am given the chance to blog for Park51 or not. writing that letter to them revived my dream and reminded me of what I believe to be my purpose in this life. Whether I had known it as exactly as I know it now, I'm not sure, so maybe articulating my blog ideas actually made me realize my purpose. Derailed from my purpose, I had no motivation.

In my letter, I said,

Whether we like it or not, 9/11 and it’s enduring aftermath are an integral part of the American Muslim identity. However, the historical evocation of our entrance into the general American consciousness is still in our hands to mold and this is an opportunity that must not elude us.

I may have less options for how to approach this than I might have had if I had pursued this in college. However, I do well with making do with what little I have. Thank you, Park51.

Guess who's back?

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.