Politics ISNA Moments and Society
Muslim Americans must devise ways to build diverse friendships within in the community.
Realizing the Ideal of Diversity by Samana Siddiqui
R
oughly 40 percent of white Americans and about 25 percent of non-whites socialize exclusively within their own race, says an ongoing Reuters/Ipsos poll released in late August. This is at a time when the United States has become one of the world’s most diverse nations, and cultural acceptance for racism has drastically diminished. In this context, how do Muslim Americans fare? “We have not realized the ideal,” says Dr. Ihsan Bagby, associate professor of Islamic Studies at University of Kentucky, and a member of the Islamic Society of North America’s Majlis Shura. “We have acquaintances across ethnic lines, but do we really have real friendships and brotherhood? No, I don’t think so.” “The issue is becoming acquainted with them, understanding them, appreciating their point of view, that’s what I think is missing … a deeper brotherhood as opposed to a superficial awareness of people outside one’s own ethnic group,” he adds. Islam puts a premium on a spiritual kinship that crosses racial and ethnic lines. God reminds believers that, He created human beings into nations and tribes so that they could know one another (49:13). In his Last Sermon, Prophet Muhammad (salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) rejected the notion of racial superiority. In Medina, he established the muakkha system, pairing up one migrant from Mecca (Muhajir) with a “helper” (Ansar) from Medina, transcending geographic, tribal, and racial lines. For instance, Bilal ibn Rabah, an African migrant from Mecca and an ex-slave, was paired with Abu Rawahah Abdullah ibn Abdul Rahman, a Medinan Arab. The 2009 Gallup survey, “Muslim Americans: A National Portrait,” finds that Muslim Americans are the nation’s most ethnically and racially diverse religious group. The community’s experience in terms of diversity in friendship and close social relations is a reflection of the reality revealed by the Reuters poll. “It is an issue in the greater society and is mirrored in Muslim communities,” says
52
Ihsan Bagby
Tayyibah Taylor, editor of the Atlanta-based Azizah magazine, a publication aimed at Muslim American women. “It has much to do with how we are conditioned to ignore our interconnectedness. Islam teaches us our value and worth is not contingent on our tribe or ethnic group, but the condition of our hearts. Islam makes it clear the differences are there to expand us in understanding and faith, not to contract us.” Long-term and sustained exposure to diversity also “helps children grow into more confident adults who are comfortable with the difference they will encounter at college, in the workplace and in the larger world,” says Maureen Costello, director of the Teaching Tolerance program at the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Ala. “Confidence and comfort in the face of difference are really important,” she says, adding that this variety offers a “richness of experience, the chance to hear and understand different perspectives, and a larger understanding of what it means to be human.”
Pull of ethnicity remains “Muslims are ethnocentric wherever they are,” says Dr. Aminah McCloud, director of the Islamic World Studies program at DePaul University in Chicago, and author of “An Introduction to Islam in the 21st Century.” “The friends they take home are of the same ethnic group and so is who they marry.”
Bagby notes that in bigger cities where various immigrant Muslims have congregated based on ethnic or linguistic similarity, it is clearly cultural preference that dictates where Muslims live and who they choose to interact with. “An overriding factor is the comfort of one’s ethnic background,” he says. “It is not a sign of racism. It’s typical of first generation immigrants who feel more comfortable in an environment where their language and culture is reflected.” The ethnic makeup of a particular mosque, Taylor believes, may be due to location but not exclusion. “There are many masajid across the country in which worshippers in one prayer line represent a multitude of ethnic backgrounds,” she adds. American-born children of Muslim immigrants face a choice to retain the ethnocentrism of their childhood or seek a different path. “Any person growing up has two poles,” Bagby says. “One is the pull of their background, the mindset and culture of how they grew up. And then they have other pulls of new people and new ideas and new cultural settings. The second generation in particular is struggling with both.” “Overall though, I see an improvement and not the negativity of it,” he adds. He cites as an example the increase in intercultural marriages among Muslim Americans over more than two decades. “I remember when a Pakistani and an Arab married and it was a big issue in the community in the late 80s,” he recalls. “But now, it’s not so much of an issue anymore and you see more and more of these marriages.” Yet, Bagby says, there are still strides to be made in some areas. “You see more of (mixed marriages), but not between African American and immigrant communities. And when it does happen, it often still is an issue,” he says. “I still hear kids say, ‘I’d better not bring someone outside of my ethnic group for marriage,” “my parents would reject someone who is dark-skinned.’ It’s struggling against those attitudes.” Joshua Salaam, youth director of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society (ADAMS)
Islamic Horizons November/December 2013