“You can’t go more than a block without finding a house of worship in New York City, an actively used house of worship,” said Hussein Rashid, a scholar of religion with The New School and Union Theological Seminary.

While accurate and up-to-date data on the state of religious identity in the five boroughs is hard to find, Rashid and other scholars say the city is as spiritually diverse as it’s ever been, even as religious affiliation is declining here in step with the rest of the country. Source: New York City’s religious diversity bucks stereotypes

“This is the power of story,” says Dr. Rashid. “It’s not lecturing at you. It’s saying, ‘Here’s this character’s experience. We’re inviting you to that experience and inviting you to think and reflect on your own experiences.’ And that’s the work of great art.”

The Crusades, 1000 years later 

Tuesday, January 18, 2022 

6:00pm ET 

REGISTER 

Registrants will receive an access link via email on the day of the discussion. 

Test your historical knowledge: Who “won” the holy wars? It may come as no surprise to hear there are varying perspectives on the Crusades’s causes and repercussions. By some accounts, nation-states and Islam emerged, while other accounts describe a region ravished and sectarian. Dating back over a millennium, these conflicts are a foundational example of how religion and ideology have been used throughout history to forcibly change societies. Taking inspiration from Unholy Wars—a new opera receiving its world premiere during Spoleto in 2022—panelists Ethel Sara Wolper (Professor, University of New Hampshire), Ussama Makdisi (Professor, Rice University), and Zeyba Rahman (Senior Program Officer for the Building Bridges Program, Doris Duke Foundation for Islamic Art) will discuss rare accounts of contemporary Muslim life as a result of this time period.

Spoleto’s ongoing discussion series returns with a new focus and expanded scope. More On That Now will cover a wide range of topics drawing inspiration from themes found in the upcoming 2022 Festival program and the broader artistic industry. Expert panelists will gather virtually and address the arts’ connection and intersection with religion, education, social justice, and identity politics. Dr. Hussein Rashid—an educator and academic whose research focuses on Muslim and American pop culture—will serve as the series-long moderator.

Omar Ibn Said definitively arrived on the shores of Charleston as a Muslim. And while we know he was a forced member of a Christian family and belonged to a Presbyterian church at the time of his death, can we say for sure he departed this life as a Christian? This conversation examines the latter end of Ibn Said’s life and discusses how religion has, throughout U.S. history, drawn people to resist or remain resilient in the context of social justice. Hussein Rashid, a professor at The New School in New York City, whose research focuses on Muslims and American popular culture, serves as moderator.

AVACGIS Guest Lecture Series with Hussein Rashid, on “Making the US: Muslims, Race, and Class”, moderated by Jennifer Victor (George Mason University) | November 10, 2020: islamicstudiescenter.gmu.edu/events/11587

"Making the US: Muslims, Race, and Class" from Ali Vural Ak Center for Global I on Vimeo.

AVACGIS Guest Lecture Series with Hussein Rashid, on "Making the US: Muslims, Race, and Class", moderated by Jennifer Victor (George Mason University) | November 10, 2020:
https://islamicstudiescenter.gmu.edu/events/11587

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https://gmu.us7.list-manage.com/subscribe/post?u=363affc885e5927d7734f38bc&id=6abb26ce76

Historically, the United States has defined itself in opposition to groups and ideas, from monarchies to poor people. The 2020 election has strong historical echoes with how the country defined itself at its founding, against Muslims and against Blackness. This talk will trace those echoes, and explore how Muslims are not immune to the racial dynamics of the country.

Muslims in the Movies provides a series of essays that explore the portrayal and reception of Muslims in Euro-American film, transnational productions, and global national cinemas. The volume brings together a group of internationally recognized experts to introduce Muslims in the films of Europe, North America, Australia, Iran, Egypt, North Africa, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, India, Indonesia, and the Philippines. The interdisciplinary collection explores issues of identity, cultural production, and representation through the depiction of Muslims on screen and how audiences respond to these images. Together, the essays operate as an introduction to the subject of Muslims and film for new readers while also serving as new works of critical analysis for scholars of cinema.

A group of brilliant Muslim artists, practitioners, academics, and thinkers who, together, are creating a transformative narrative strategy that will offer us the opportunity to change stories, ideas, behaviors and, ultimately, society.

Our generation is faced with a daunting task: stop climate change. But how? Dr. Rashid, who has witnessed his home city of New York transition from a sub-temperate to a sub-tropical climate in his lifetime, explains that it is more than just individual responsibility. There are individual choices that we can make but ultimately when a handful of corporations are responsible for over 70% of global greenhouse gas emissions, it is hard to place responsibility on individuals. That does not mean, however, that we as individuals do not have power. Dr. Rashid says, 

Those companies are all regulated by our governments. They are not governments in and of themselves and we can see the ways in which these companies are leveraging governments to not pay any taxes in the context of the United States, to have environmental regulations lifted for them, to get waivers for themselves. They don’t actually vote anybody in. They simply use the money we give them to then buy policies and politicians that create policies that are harmful to us. So essentially, we are paying for our own destruction. And so for me as an individual, I think about the individual things I can do to protect the environment, and I can make an individual decision as to where I am going to do my business.