Sunday, August 26, 2007

Book Review: Islam & the Blackamerican


I am recommending a book I read recently. If, like me, you are interested in sociology and religious issues, then Sherman A. Jackson wrote what I think is one of the more interesting books on Islam of late. In Islam and the Blackamerican: Looking toward the Third Resurrection, Jackson thoroughly addresses the influence Islam has made on African-American people.

Despite the prominent role of Muslims like Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali and many others held in the popular conscience of America during the 1960's and 70's, the face of Islam today is no longer immediately synonymous with Black people. Vast immigration to the United States, especially by Arab and Pakistani nationals, have changed the image of Islam in America. It is this dynamic, and its consequences for the prototypical African-American Muslim, that Jackson writes about in his book.

Sherman Jackson describes the effective 'appropriation' of Islamic culture into a viable protest culture, and ultimately a contending religious movement by Black Americans. Forerunners of the prevailing Sunni Islamic movement, which most African-American Muslims identify with today, were Noble Drew Ali and the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. Sherman explains how these men were able to forge a new state of consciousness and activism among working class and poor urban Blacks in early 20Th century America. They accomplished this feat using only strains of what Islamic culture that were to survive slavery. Do largely to the vision and organizational brilliance of Elijah Muhammad, immaculately dressed, industrious, educated, disciplined black men became the most recognizable face of Islam in America by the 1970's.

This all changed with the coming of immigrant Muslims. With their [other-worldliness], facility with the Arabic language, social customs -- be they rooted in Islam or not -- and their penchant for non-assimilation, immigrant Muslims became the de-facto authenticators of Blackamerican Islam. This dynamic was made even more possible due to the demise of Elijah Muhammad and the radical changes undertaken by the Nation of Islam's new leadership, W. Deen Muhammad. Sherman reveals how one of the most influential religious movements of the twentieth century found itself fractured and adrift without a paddle in a sea of change.

There is more to Jackson's book than space will allow me to convey. In order to avoid a complete summary of the book, suffice it to say that the author refers, hopefully, to a new resurrection of Blackamerican Muslims. A resurrection that does not compromise either their authenticity as Muslims, or negate their own cultural heritage. This movement is possible without casting off the highest ideas of American style democracy and prosperity, contends Jackson. To this end the Author suggests that African-American Muslims give serious consideration to the wisdom and moral direction espoused through Sufism - an Islamic tradition with well established roots in the Muslim world. Jackson posits that Sufism serves dual possibilities for Black people. First, it reconnects naturally to cultural traditions in West Africa. Second, it can arrests recidivism is the Black Muslim community through its emphasis on piety. And it has a cannon of religious precepts that will stand against scrutiny.

Read Islam and the Blackamerican.

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

Clean Water: Drink liberally

"If you can control a man’s thinking you do not have to worry about his action. When you can determine what a man shall think you do not have to concern yourself with what he will do.
If you can make a man feel that he is inferior, you do not have to compel him to accept his inferior status, for he will seek it himself.
If you can make a man think he is justly an outcast, you do not have to order him to the back door. He will go without being told; and if there is no back door, his very nature will demand one."

– Dr. Carter G. Woodson, The Miseducation of the Negro.

"And thus goes segregation which is the most far-reaching development in the history of the Negro since enslavement of the race. Infact, it is a sequel to slavery. It has been made possible by our system of mis-educating innocent people who did not know what was happening."

– Dr. Carter G. Woodson, The Miseducation of the Negro.


“I have found that, to make a contended slave, it is necessary to make a thoughtless one. It is necessary to darken his moral and mental vision, and, as far as possible, to annihilate the power of reason.”

-Frederick Douglass


"Foreigners, who have not studied economics but have studied Negroes, take up this business and grow rich."

– Dr. Carter G. Woodson, The Miseducation of the Negro.


"When they began to discuss business, however, he had to leave the room. About the only time he could see them in action was when they were at play, indulging in extravagances which the Negro learned to take up before he could afford them."

– Dr. Carter G. Woodson, The Miseducation of the Negro.


"In chameleon-like fashion the Negro has taken up almost everything religious which has come along instead of thinking for himself. "

– Dr. Carter G. Woodson, The Miseducation of the Negro.


"The Negro has been so busy doing what he is told to do that he has not stopped long enough to think about the meaning of these things."

– Dr. Carter G. Woodson, The Miseducation of the Negro.