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| [article] muslims nurture sense of self on campus (ny times) |
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| se7en |
| 11/03/01 at 23:49:05 |
November 3, 2001 Muslims Nurture Sense of Self on Campus By LAURIE GOODSTEIN [url=http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/03/education/03SCAR.html?ex=1005842971&ei=1&en=97965fcdf1b52c07]NY Times[/url] WELLESLEY, Mass., Nov. 2 — The morning that Sarah Karim first decided to wear a traditional Islamic head scarf to school, she tied it on outside her house so her father wouldn't give her grief. On the way to the bus stop, she told her mother she had covered her head only because it was cold outside. And when her other relatives found out about it, they warned her that she would never be able to attract boys. Six years later, Ms. Karim, a 19-year-old junior, has found full acceptance as a covered Muslim woman here at Wellesley College, one of the elite "Seven Sisters" women's schools, west of Boston. She belongs to a campus group for Muslim women, some who have proudly donned the head scarves that their mothers refused to wear. "In my parents' generation," Ms. Karim said in the cafeteria between classes, "women who did cover were forced to by their families. It wasn't an independent choice they made. Now people like me are starting to choose it on our own." The head scarves are only the most visible sign of a gradual religious reawakening among the younger generation of Muslim college students across the country. They are studying Arabic and the Koran, making pilgrimages to Mecca with Muslim youth groups, praying five times a day in dorm rooms and chapels. More male students are growing their beards; women dress modestly in loose clothing. "In the last couple of years, Muslim students on campus have become more conservative religiously," said Asma Gull Hasan, author of "American Muslims: The New Generation," who graduated from Wellesley in 1997. "There were people like that when I was in college, but they were the oddballs. Now it's gotten more prevalent." Nadia Aziz, a junior at the University of California at San Diego, and communications director for a coalition of West Coast Muslim student groups, said, "I've seen such a change in Muslim students in the past few years. There are so many more coming to Islam. You can see a lot more people becoming religious, starting to pray on a regular basis. Within this country, there's an Islamic revival." Many of the newly devout are the children of immigrants to the United States, often educated professionals from places like Pakistan, India, the Middle East or Afghanistan. Their parents' identities were rooted in their cultures of origin. But the children say they have found themselves adrift, identified neither with the foreign cultures of their parents nor the American popular culture that strikes them as offensively libertine. "In high school I was asking myself, am I more Pakistani or more American?" said Ms. Karim, who grew up in both Maryland and Pakistan, and wrote her college entrance essay about her struggle with her triple identity as a Pakistani-American Muslim. "Being Muslim answers that question." Her friend Najiba Akbar, who grew up in Bayside, Queens, the 19- year-old daughter of two professionals from India, said: "I am Muslim first, not even American Muslim. Because so much of the American culture is directly in conflict with my values as a Muslim, I can't identify solely as an American, or even as an American Muslim." For many students, regardless of their faith, the college years are a period of intense spiritual exploration. Young people are exposed to classes in comparative religions and recruited by religious groups. They are also free to rebel against secular parents. But a particular force exerts itself on Muslim students, pulling them toward religious conservativism — alienation from their non-Muslim peers. "We don't date," said Ms. Aziz, who is 20. "I never went to my high school prom. We don't go out and party or drink alcohol. A lot of parts of youth culture here, Muslims can't be a part of. So a lot of us are finding out who we are through the religion of Islam because it's a way to differentiate ourselves." The head scarf — known as hijab — is the most distinct way for women to differentiate themselves. They say they are complying with the Koran's injunction to dress modestly. And they see no dissonance in wearing it at women's colleges and Ivy League schools where feminism holds sway. "Wearing a scarf just makes me feel more liberated," said Ayesha Syed, 20, a junior at Columbia University who began covering herself last year. "It sort of elevates you from the status of being seen as just a sexual object." College provides an instant Muslim support group most never had in high school. Asma Haidri said she was the only Muslim in her high school in Bloomfield, Iowa, but now as a junior and pre-law student at the University of Iowa, she is part of an active Muslim Student Association with 150 members. "I go to the mosque at least once every day. Sometimes I go five times a day, in between classes. I study there. It's like my second home now," said Ms. Haidri, 20, who also began covering her head in college. As a student at Stuyvesant High School in New York, Ms. Akbar said that to establish a spiritual routine, she used to join two close Christian friends in a Christian prayer group. She didn't share their faith, but there was no equivalent Islamic prayer group, she said. Now at Wellesley, with only 2,400 students, Ms. Akbar is vice president of a Muslim student group that includes 40 to 50 members, studies the Koran weekly and uses a prayer room set aside for daily prayers. In the cafeteria at lunchtime, she exchanges warm hellos with many students, but says that her closest friends are Muslim. "My religious identity is definitely stronger than it was in high school," she said. "Now I feel that my faith is more intertwined with my daily life." In interviews with more than a dozen American Muslim students across the country, only one said he saw this Islamic revival as connected to the more political Islamist movements overseas. "You feel a shift in the Muslim community all over the world, in Turkey, in Egypt, which are very secular," said Tareq Purmul, 23, whose parents fled Afghanistan during the Soviet invasion and resettled in North Carolina, in the Raleigh- Durham area. Still, he hastened to add, while he considers himself a devout Muslim he also wants to see the Taliban removed from power and to get a master's degree in business administration so he can run a business in the United States. Many students also said that they had no desire to leave the United States to practice in more conservative Islamic nations. "We have more freedom being American Muslims because we don't have the cultural baggage from the countries our parents are coming from," Ms. Akbar said in the Wellesley cafeteria. She is majoring in peace and justice studies and expects to return to New York City to work with a community organization serving low-income people. "You can practice your religion the way you want to," she said. "Because nothing is forcing you into it." |
| Re: [article] muslims nurture sense of self on campus (ny times) |
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| Hania |
| 11/04/01 at 03:50:56 |
[quote] "In high school I was asking myself, am I more Pakistani or more American?" said Ms. Karim, who grew up in both Maryland and Pakistan, and wrote her college entrance essay about her struggle with her triple identity as a Pakistani-American Muslim. "Being Muslim answers that question." Her friend Najiba Akbar, who grew up in Bayside, Queens, the 19- year-old daughter of two professionals from India, said: "I am Muslim first, not even American Muslim. Because so much of the American culture is directly in conflict with my values as a Muslim, I can't identify solely as an American, or even as an American Muslim." Many students also said that they had no desire to leave the United States to practice in more conservative Islamic nations. "We have more freedom being American Muslims because we don't have the cultural baggage from the countries our parents are coming from," Ms. Akbar said in the Wellesley cafeteria. [/quote] Salam I could really relate to what the writers were saying here. Even though I was bought up in a Western country I practice and seem to appreciate Islam more than my cousins who have been bought up in Islamic countries. Many of my cousins are very westernised and think that by wearing a hijab it's pretty 'uncool' :( (But Flared trousers, drinking Bbepsi and Michael Jackson are still okay!) I always use to say to myself if only I was bought up where my cousins were, then it would be so easier to be a muslim, but Allhamdulliah I'm happy for being bought up here. Allah Hafiz Han. |
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