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Nicholas Said, an African American Muslim in his Union Army uniform.

Fighting for Freedom: The Little-Known Story of Muslims and the Civil War

The stories of two Muslim immigrants who fought for the Union show that the American Civil War was an international fight.
via PBS on November 21, 2024
Cast of the opera "Omar" on stage, with Arabic script on the stage backdrop.

‘Tell Your Story, Omar’

A new, Pulitzer Prize–winning opera adapts the memoir of Omar ibn Said, an African Muslim who spent much of his life enslaved in North Carolina.
by Edward Ball via New York Review of Books on May 4, 2023
Artist's rendition of Omar ibn Said

A Quest for the True Identity of Omar ibn Said, a Muslim Man Enslaved in the Carolinas

Omar ibn Said was captured in Senegal at 37 and enslaved in Charleston. A devout Muslim, he later converted to the Christian faith of his enslavers. Or did he?
by Jennifer Berry Hawes via Post and Courier on May 27, 2021
Tintype photograph of Omar Ibn Said.

Educated and Enslaved

The journey of Omar Ibn Said.
by Benny Seda-Galarza via Library of Congress on July 22, 2019

Muslims of Early America

Muslims came to America more than a century before Protestants, and in great numbers. How was their history forgotten?
by Sam Haselby via Aeon on May 20, 2019

Muslims Arrived in America 400 Years Ago and Today are Vastly Diverse

Islamophobes today ignore the long history and contributions of Muslim Americans.
by Saeed Ahmed Khan via The Conversation on April 11, 2019
Students and teacher talking about homework at Islamic School in Seattle.
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Islam and the U.S.

What does it mean to be Muslim in America? And how has the practice of Islam in the U.S. changed over time?
via BackStory on December 18, 2015
A black and white photo of an American soldier on patrol in Kabul, Afghanistan, 2005.

God’s Directive

In the wake of the September 11 attacks, evangelical American missionaries followed military tanks into Afghanistan and Iraq to convert Muslims.
by Rozina Ali via New York Review of Books on October 31, 2024
New York City's Twin Towers.

New 9/11 Evidence Points to Deep Saudi Complicity

Two decades of U.S. policy appear to be rooted in a mistaken understanding of what happened that day.
by Daniel Benjamin, Steven Simon via The Atlantic on May 20, 2024
Joe Biden and George W. Bush.

Biden Is Repeating Bush’s Post-9/11 Playbook. It’s Not Working.

Like his predecessor, the president is decrying anti-Arab and Muslim hatred while helping fuel it. People are refusing to let him get away with this hypocrisy.
by Saliha Bayrak via The Nation on February 23, 2024
Arab American man holding child with American flag.

How Arab-Americans Stopped Being White

With the emergence of the US as a global superpower in the twentieth-century, anti-Palestinian stereotypes in the media bled over to stigmatize Arab Americans.
by Livia Gershon, Louise Cainkar, Shelley Slade via JSTOR Daily on June 17, 2023
Nicholas Said.

The Epic Life of Nicholas Said, from Africa to Russia to the Civil War

Dean Calbreath’s biography, “The Sergeant,” relates the improbable adventures of a brilliant 19th-century Black man.
by Martha Anne Toll via Washington Post on March 30, 2023
Illustration of Nation of Islam members holding hands with Muslims from the Middle East over globe.

The Nation of Islam's Role in U.S. Prisons

The Nation of Islam is controversial. Its practical purposes for incarcerated people transcend both politics and religion.
by Olivia Heffernan via JSTOR Daily on March 22, 2022
A family photo shows Balqes Jassem with her late husband, Abdul Ameer Alwan, and their daughter, Aman Alwan, at home in Richardson, Tex. The older Alwan was an Iraqi painter who passed away in 2015. The family came to the United States as Iraqi refugees in 2007.

New Americans

Hundreds of thousands of Afghans and Iraqis displaced by war have settled in the U.S., their journeys spurred by tragedy and loss in the wake of 9/11.
by Abigail Hauslohner via Washington Post on September 9, 2021
National September 11 Memorial & Museum

We Need to Reform the September 11 Museum

Approaching the 20th anniversary of the attacks, the National September 11 Memorial & Museum at the World Trade Center faces a reckoning.
by Todd Fine, Asad Dandia via Hyperallergic on August 1, 2021
John Coltrane writing on a piece of paper, with a saxophone in his lap.

How Malcolm X Inspired John Coltrane to Embrace Islamic Spirituality

Reflections on "A Love Supreme," artistic transformation, and the Black Arts Movement.
by Richard Brent Turner via Literary Hub on May 4, 2021
Richard Holbrooke and two images of people carrying weapons of war.

The End of the American Century

What the life of Richard Holbrooke tells us about the decay of Pax Americana.
by George Packer via The Atlantic on April 10, 2019
James Comey, a tall white man in a suit, receiving a certificate in front of wall with a "Birmingham Civil Rights Institute" sign and a quote from Martin Luther King, Jr.

Under Comey's Leadership, the FBI Targeted Black Activists and Muslim Communities

This is the man who has criticized the FBI's surveillance of Martin Luther King as "shameful."
by Jeanne Theoharis via The Intercept on April 24, 2018

Kneeling for Hollywood

How Hollywood portrays religious prayer.
by Melani McAlister via Modern American History on March 5, 2018
Thomas Jefferson's two-volume personal copy of George Sale's 1734 translation of the Qur'an. Library of Congress.

Why Thomas Jefferson Owned a Qur’an

Islam in America dates to the founding fathers, says Smithsonian’s religion curator Peter Manseau.
by Peter Manseau via Smithsonian on January 31, 2018

What the Prisoners’ Rights Movement Owes to the Black Muslims of the 1960s

Black Muslims have been an influential force in the prisoners' rights movement and criminal justice reform.
by Christopher E. Smith, Livia Gershon via JSTOR Daily on January 22, 2018
Drawing of a prisoner with his head in his hands, viewed from behind a fence

Guantánamo Bay is Still Open. Still. STILL!

41 men are still being held without charges, without a way to leave, without homes to return to.
by Sarah Mirk, Jess Parker via The Nib on January 17, 2018
Syrian float in the Chicago Liberty Day parade, 1918.

What We Can Learn from America’s Other Muslim Ban (Back in 1918)

Stacy Fahrenthold compares Donald Trump's Muslim ban to that of Woodrow Wilson back in 1918.
by Stacy Fahrenthold via Tropics of Meta on February 8, 2017

Lessons From A Japanese Internment Camp

Trump ally Carl Higbie recently cited Japanese internment camps during World War II as a “precedent” for a proposed registry of Muslims in the U.S.
by Livia Gershon, Hui Wu via JSTOR Daily on December 5, 2016
A painting of U.S. Navy Lt. Stephen Decatur battling Muslim sailors, Tripoli, August 1804.

America’s Forgotten Images of Islam

Popular early U.S. tales depicted Muslims as menacing figures in faraway lands or cardboard moral paragons.
by Peter Manseau via The Wall Street Journal on February 27, 2015
Mottled photographs of immigrants set against the Statue of Liberty.

The American Dream 100 Years After the National Origins Act

How a clerk on Ellis Island at the dawn of the 20th century documented discrimination through photography, and what that tells us about today’s malaise.
by Yousef O. Bounab via New Lines on February 17, 2025
Ibn Khaldun

The Muslim Thinker Who Inspired Reagan

How Ibn Khaldun influenced the president and a generation of conservative tax policy.
by Mustafa Akyol via The Dispatch on October 10, 2024
Palestinians inspect the ruins of a building destroyed in Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, October 8, 2023.

The Desire to Annihilate Gaza Wasn’t Born on 10/7 — It’s Part of a Long Tradition

A long Euro-American tradition of genocide and ethnic cleansing imagined freeing a barren Palestine from Palestinian barbarity and heathenism.
by Adam Yaghi via Religion Dispatches on June 17, 2024
Collage of photographs of U.S. Border Patrol.

The Racist Origins of America’s Broken Immigration System

How a little-known, century-old law perpetuated the odious notion that certain types of immigrants degrade our nation’s character.
by Felipe De La Hoz via The New Republic on May 1, 2024
partner

When Art Fuels Anger, Who Should Prevail?

Controversial artworks are flashpoints when artistic freedom and religious sensitivities collide.
via Retro Report on November 9, 2023
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