The Racialicious Review For My Name Is Khan

by Special Correspondent Arturo R. García

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD
The die is cast early in My Name Is Khan, when the titular lead, Rizwan Khan (Shah Rukh Khan), having already been identified as autistic, is snarkily asked by a TSA agent what he has to tell the President.
“My name is Khan,” he answers. “And I am not [...]

Saving Muslim Women from the Oppression of the Headscarf, by Killing Them

by Guest Contributor Joesph Shahadi, originally published at Vs. the Pomegranate
I never intended to write about the scarf/veil/hijab/niqaab. Like a lot of people who write about the Middle East and North Africa (Muslim and otherwise) I roll my eyes at the Western preoccupation with the scarf, which seems to dominate the discourse. The Islamic practice [...]

Pink is for Tween Muslimah

by Guest Contributor Alicia, originally published at Muslimah Media Watch
It had to happen sooner or later. With Barbie and now Hannah Montana merchandise dominating the tween to early teenage market in Malaysia, products for young Muslim women in hijab are starting to appear, particularly on the bookshelves. And they look very pink.
The increasing pinkness of [...]

Desi Webs: South Asian America, Online Cultures, and the Politics of Race [Conference Notes]

by Latoya Peterson

These are the notes for “ Desi Webs: South Asian America, Online Cultures, and the Politics of Race.” The notes are from a paper by Madhavi Mallapragada, presented at the Texas A & M University Race and Ethnic Studies Institute’s Symposium exploring Race, Ethnicity and (New) Media.
Resist identifying South Asians as a knowable [...]

History and the Harem Pant

By Guest Contributor Mimi, originally published at Threadbared
Whether deemed a “must have,” as some contestants on The Fashion Show insisted, or a hideous mistake, the so-called harem pant is back in a big, billowy way. But the resurgence of the harem pant in the long shadow of war in the Middle East –specifically, those conflicts [...]

Link Love: The White Privilege & the Ummah Carnival

Compiled by Latoya Peterson and Fatemeh Fakhraie

Rolling Ruminations has hosted a blog carnival on White Privilege and the Muslim Ummah. As regular readers know, it gets kind of heavy around here when we start discussing the intersection of race and religion. True to form, the carnival featured a range of opinions. Our favorites [...]

Canada’s misplaced tolerance? Or your misplaced fear?

by Guest Contributor Krista, originally published at Muslim Lookout

Be prepared for some major eye-rolling in this article from the Calgary Herald. In it, Mahfooz Kanwar praises Canadian Immigration Minister Jason Kenney (see here for why this is a bad idea), and berates Canadians that he perceives as not having “assimilated” enough. A Muslim originally [...]

Searching for My Pakistani Identity

by Guest Contributor Jehanzeb Dar, originally published at Broken Mystic

It started off funny. I was at the mall buying a birthday gift for a friend of mine and, as usual, the store manager was friendly and conversational. After she took a good look at my gift, the following conversation took place:

MANAGER: Aww, is this [...]

Hoagland’s Hogwash: Islamophobia in the Washington Post

by Special Correspondent Fatemeh Fakhraie

Jim Hoagland’s April 12, 2009 article for The Washington Post, entitled “The War Within Islam,” is the best example of “journalistic” Islamophobia I’ve seen in a reputable news source in quite a while. Hoagland has written for The Washington Post for several years, and his focus is on both national and [...]

How to Write about Muslims (for real)

by Guest Contributors Sobia and Krista, originally published at Muslimah Media Watch
After getting all of that sarcasm out of our systems two weeks ago, we decided it might be useful to put together a list of actual guidelines for writing about Muslims. Of course, this is mostly just wishful thinking, because if reporters actually [...]

Losing My Religion

by Racialicious Special Correspondent Fatemeh Fakhraie. A longer version of this article appears on altmuslimah.
I finally got around to watching AmericanEast this weekend. Full disclosure: I had originally read Tariq Nelson’s review, which was a pretty good rundown.
AmericanEast is an attempt at mainstreaming American Muslims and attempts to portray the struggles Muslims face in [...]

For Art’s Sake: the Arabesque Arts Festival

by Guest Contributor Yusra Tekbali 
All week, all I and my Arab and Arab-friendly friends (fellow Near Eastern studies graduates) have been talking about is Arabesque: Arts of the Arab World, being held at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.  It is the largest congregation of Arab artists ever.
As a new Washington, D.C. resident, my status [...]

Frank Miller’s “300″ and the Persistence of Accepted Racism

by Guest Contributor Jehanzeb Dar, originally published at Broken Mystic

When Frank Miller’s “300″ film was released, I was absolutely outraged by the racist content of the film and more so at the insensitivity of movie-goers who simply argued “it’s just a movie.” Later on, I would hear these same individuals say, “The movie makes you [...]

Multiple Narratives and Contestations Over the Righteous Struggle

by Guest Contributor Margari Aziza Hill, originally published at Just Another Angry Black Muslim Woman*?

According to census data and information provided by mosques and community centers, Muslims in America make up .5% of the total population in America. Keeping it conservative, that equals just under 2 million. Some estimates go as far to say that [...]

Law of the Land: ABC’s Homeland Security Reality Show Isn’t Very Real

by Special Correspondent Fatemeh Fakhraie

Arnold Shapiro, the executive producer of ABC’s Homeland Security USA, states in a Washington Post article that, “It [the show] doesn’t have a political point of view.” The show aims to depict the men and women of the Department of Homeland Security as they do their jobs at the airport, the [...]