Professor: Yalda Asmatey
4 credits
We will begin this course with a brief contextual overview of Islam in order to orient ourselves historically and socially to Muslim communities and to the development of Islamic civilization and its contributions to global history. We will then examine the histories and legacies of early African Muslim arrivals in the sixteenth century, emphasizing their presence within broader processes of enslavement, colonialism, and nation-building in the Americas. From there, the course will focus extensively on the diverse immigrant, refugee, and convert populations that comprise the contemporary American Muslim population. In particular, we will explore the lived experiences of African American, Indo-Pakistani, Afghan American, Latinx, and Arab American Muslim communities.
Throughout the course, we will analyze the social construction and production of Muslim “otherness,” demonstrating that this process is neither unique nor exceptional when compared to the historical marginalization of other racial, ethnic, and religious communities in the United States. Within this analytical framework, we will examine the emergence of national, regional, and local Muslim institutions, as well as the role of media, popular culture, and entertainment in the circulation and normalization of anti-Muslim representations and discrimination. Gender relations and dynamics across and within Muslim communities will be critically examined, with attention to the structural, political, and cultural forces that shape both internal debates and external perceptions.