COVER STORY
The Living Legacy of Malcolm X
“For me the earth’s most explosive evil is racism, the inability of God’s creatures to live as One, especially in the West.” — Malcolm X, April 25, 1964, in Madinah BY EMIN POLJAREVIC
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ifty-five years after the assassination of the 39-year-old Malcolm X, his life-story continues to fascinate people across the globe. Young Muslims in particular are taking his legacy seriously. Observable groups of both online and offline Muslims in Western and Islamicate societies are analyzing his message to learn how to engage with perceived and real injustices. Muslim youth organizations and groups from Muslim-majority and -minority societies are tapping into bits and pieces of his message through “The Autobiography of Malcolm X” (written in collaboration with Alex Haley [1965]; http://www.black-matters.com/books/autobiography-of-malcolm-x-pdf.pdf), associated song lyrics, movies, documentaries and YouTube soundbites, including selections of words and images surrounding his persona. In Haley’s words: “No man in our time aroused fear and hatred in the white man as did Malcolm, because in him the white man sensed an implacable foe who could not be had for any price — a man unreservedly committed to the cause of liberating the black man in American society rather than integrating the black man into that society” (p. ix). This recent revival of Malcolm X’s lifework can be understood in the light of increased levels of Islamophobia and racialization worldwide. Young Muslims are invoking popularized, recognizable and relatively familiar symbols of resistance to endure intense discrimination and oppression in a wide variety of places. For example, in Malaysia, Al Ghazali Sulaiman’s fictionalized version of Malcolm X represents a figure through which the author calls for social reformation (https://www.goodreads.com/book/ show/32673585-malcolm-x). Recep Şentürk’s
2009 Turkish translation of Malcolm X’s message emphasizes the dedication to the Islamic principles that erase racism (https:// sks.ihu.edu.tr/rektor-hocamiz-prof-dr-recep-senturk-malcolm-xi-anlatti). Alexander Osman from the Organization of Austrian Muslim Youth, who has actively fought anti-Muslim racism and anti-Semitism since the 1990s, continuously draws upon his message (Alexander Osman, “Mühlviertler Hasenjagd, Malcolm X und die Muslimische Jugend Österreich,” Muslimische Jugend Österreich [ed.]), [2009]). In Turkey and Iran, his legacy is sometimes celebrated by naming streets and public spaces after him. In the U.K., a number of Muslim artists are using Malcolm X imagery and famous quotes to address racism and bigotry. In the wake of increased mobilization of Islamophobes and white supremacists in the U.S., the Islamic aspect of his religiosity has received more attention by both Blackamericans and other Muslim communities. Several underlying reasons may explain this transnational revivalism. First, the post
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9-11 Islamophobic discourses that had traditionally been confined to corners of Western civil societies have gone mainstream in the form of political programs and a well-funded hate-industry specifically designed to spread a negative, threatening image of Muslims and Islam via all media outlets. Second, the global resurgence of extreme nationalist sentiments among the powerful segments of the U.S., German, French, Indian, Chinese, Burmese and many other societies has resulted in growth of hostile and anti-Muslim political forces. Third, many states with small to relatively large Muslimminority populations have weaponized these existing negative sentiments by securitizing the issue of the “Muslim other” via the time-honored image of the hostile “other.” In this context of increasingly popular and state-sanctioned Islamophobia, together with the spread of more contentious politics, mass protests and public discontent, this former prisoner, who managed to transform himself from a small-time thug into a statesman-like leader with such a powerful and sophisticated intellect that he was invited to speak Harvard, Brown, Oxford and other leading universities, continues to represent a multilayered symbol of resistance for disenfranchised and racialized Muslim groups, especially in Muslim-minority contexts. English-speaking groups of young, socially and politically active Muslim minorities are seeking and discovering symbols of resistance to both structural and emerging acts of injustice and racism, many of which Malcolm X faced and conquered. Needless to say, they find his autobiography a major inspiration. Depending on the youth cohort, their fascination ranges from Malcolm X’s extraordinary process of redemption from petty criminal and drug addict to a disciplined leader who came to symbolize justice and resistance against oppression, as well as personal commitment to Islam and courage to continue to transform and excel. Each of his various names and nicknames mark a period in an extraordinary life-story — from his birth name of Malcolm Little, the hustler nickname “Detroit Red,” one of his prison soubriquets “Satan” to the celebrated letter “X,” a legacy of Nation of Islam’s tremendous impact upon him, to the honorary name “Omowale” (lit. “the child has returned”) bestowed by a Nigerian Muslim Student Society and finally the name engraved on his tomb in New York’s Ferncliff Cemetery, el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz.