The United States has grappled with racism since time immemorial. This behavior makes people of color, such as Black Americans, feel inferior. This perception has resulted in the whites having more privileges than the Blacks do in all aspects of life, such as good education, infrastructure, and access to medical health. The Islam community is not left out either, as the non-black Muslims practice racism towards the black Muslims. The black Muslims are of Latina or African origin, while the non-black Muslims include Asians and Arabs. This essay unravels cultural hegemony through the lens of Su’ad Abdul’s Muslim cool.
Cultural hegemony denotes changing power balance regarding culture (Hall 107). It has infiltrated into popular culture. Su’ad Abdul tries to explain how being a Muslim is in contemporary American culture in Muslim cool. This author studies race, religion, and popular cultures manifested in the ideas, dress code, and social activism carried out by both the black and the non-black Muslims who strive to end racism and oppression in the 21st century. These individuals yearn for equality and giving a new definition to Muslims. Muslim cool also emphasizes how blackness, which was the reason for racism, is used to engage the community by different organizations. The organizations organize various events, activities, and retreats to pass Islamic knowledge to the younger generation.
How blackness is marginalized
Khabeer states that blackness is vital in the history and future of the U.S. (Khabeer 81). Su’ad Abdul refers to the term “Blackness” as the histories, traditions, and customs of Black peoples and the circulating ideas and beliefs about people of African descent. From Su’ad Abdul Khabeer’s research, it is evident that being a Muslim was not enough. Other factors were important such as her race and ethnicity. These factors played an essential role in accessing her and people’s perceptions. Furthermore, what information she could access and what she could not access were also significant.
In the U.S., blackness was regarded as inferior compared to the whites’ superiority. Blackness was used to create equality by marginalizing the groups to dismantle the racial hierarchies that were set. It represented immorality with all the negative values such as criminal activities and a community that never respected God. A lack of value and history characterized it. Blackness was also seen as a symbol of social conscience by the white Negros. This was experienced where the poor blacks lived in a poor neighborhood that overlooked education and income levels. The blacks lacked access to the advantages that the south Asian and Arab U.S. American Muslims who lived in the wealthy suburbs enjoyed it.
Muslim cool
Muslim cool describes how to become a Muslim in the U.S., where blackness tries to challenge the racial norms in a community dominated by Asians, Arabs, and white Americans (Khabeer 2). This inequality is manifested in the ideas, dress code, and social activism in the “hood” and a complex relationship to state power. It is the ethnographic study of Muslim life in the United States concerning race, religion, and gender in the new United States. Organizations such as Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN), a non-profit organization that offers services such as community organizing and art-based events that are anti-racist in Chicago, have helped share knowledge and experiences of the Muslim culture as a supporter of Muslim cool. For instance, IMAN has supported blackness through its culture by organizing events that featured both Muslims and the non-Muslims, such as the blacks, Latinos, Arabs, and Asian Americans from different backgrounds. For instance, events such as the community café by the progress theater, where Muslims performed and attended was planned by IMAN.
Muslim Cool is the study of the relationships between race, religion, and popular culture. The black and non-black Muslim youths embrace Muslim cool by drawing on blackness to build their identity as Muslims. This move creates a connection rather than a division between the “black” and “Muslim” through the knowledge of self, which helps them understand others and the factors surrounding them. Additionally, the move has helped in fighting racial oppression and created room for understanding the definition of being a Muslim. For instance, young Muslims moving towards blackness are using Muslim cool in hip hop music to identify themselves. Through this, they can challenge hegemonic forms of knowledge in the U.S. Muslim communities where hip hop and black Muslim practices are viewed through the lenses of anti-blackness. This has proven to be a powerful intervention by young Muslims across the race and class whose relationship to blackness, hip hop, and black people are conveyed through faith and activism.
Hip hop is essential to “Muslim cool “because it has shaped Islam, which shapes the young twenty-first century Muslims, who draw on blackness and Islam as a way of thinking and being Muslim. For instance, Muslim youths have embraced hip-hop fashion and history. At the same time, hip hop has embraced Islamic themes and styles, like wearing the kufiya scarves and knitted kufi cups and adopting Islamic ethical practices (Khabeer28). Muslim rappers also often cite their introduction to Islam as a way of “regaining a knowledge of self.”
Additionally, hip hop contributed to the understanding of self, which is critical to being a Muslim since it offers a deeper meaning of Islam. For instance, in the case of Omar Mukhtar, who grew up as a Muslim, he fully understood his faith when he was exposed to hip hop. This individual understood the gists of Islam as knowledge, wisdom, understanding, freedom, love, peace, equality, happiness, and justice.
The activities organized by City Muslim Action Network helped to fight racial oppression by holding events that involved both non-black Muslims and black Muslims. For instance, we see that Esperanza saw herself when the progress theatre performed at the IMAN. Muslim hip hop artist’s involvement in Iman’s work of artistry, activism, and actions made it the epicenter of hip hop scenes in Chicago, the united states, and globally. This involvement united the black Muslims and the non-black Muslims when they gathered together to listen to the artists perform, and in doing so, it engaged the community. IMAN collaborated with the Greater Southwest Development Corporation (GSDC) and Chicago Public Arts Group (CPAG), a local non-muslim and non-profit institution, Juan Chavez and Zor, who are non-muslim master artists on projects that connected art and activism. The purpose of doing this was to mentor the youths who participated in producing art pieces for the public; therefore, young people were active in ways that mattered (Khabeer35).
Hip hop has given Islam a new meaning that Muslims can identify with, whereby young Muslims who are moving towards blackness are using hip-hop music to identify themselves. Through this, they can challenge hegemonic forms of knowledge in the U.S. Muslim communities where hip hop and black Muslim practices are viewed through the lenses of anti-blackness. Additionally, Muslim rappers have created a link between black Muslims and Muslims from an immigrant background. The songs’ information was meant to unite the people together by pointing out the various issues that were affecting the Muslim community.
Hip-hop and diplomacy
Abdul-Khabeer does not have a positive perspective on hip-hop diplomacy. Hip hop is being co-opted to further the agenda, which undermines its positive cultural functions. The U.S. kicked off the hip hop ambassadors program in 2005 with Toni black, a black American female artist, and a non-muslim. The united states organized tours to other countries that have enabled Muslim hip hop artists to tour turkey, morocco, Pakistan, Indonesia, and the occupied territories. Hip-hop diplomacy aimed to endorse united states foreign policy. The hip hop diplomacy re-enacted jazz diplomacy in the cold war era, where jazz artists were deployed as part of a cultural offensive against the Soviet Union by the U.S. state department. Additionally, the united states used black American artists to counter the perception that the U.S. was a racist nation, which the Soviets tried to use to their advantage. The united states also use hip-hop diplomacy to manage its profile abroad and manage the young Muslims perceived as potential terrorists. This affects “Muslim cool” by limiting its transformative power (Khabeer180).
Conclusion
In conclusion, the above information explains the struggles that black Americans go through as they attempt to fit in a society dominated by Asians and Arabs. It shows how black Muslims use blackness to construct an identity for themselves through hip-hop music by embracing the dress code and the ideas. The music has helped the young generation learn about the Muslim culture through words referenced in the song. The black Muslims try to challenge a hierarchy that the non-black Muslims set to create equality and conquer racism. The black Muslims’ efforts have been successful by using events and activities where the youth are encouraged to participate and gain cultural knowledge and experiences from different artists. This move has helped to bring the community together by engaging both the black and the non-black Muslims. Blackness was regarded as a less than a community of people living in the poor neighborhood; hence they did not enjoy the privileges of the whites.
Works Cited
Hall, Stuart. “What is this” black” in black popular culture?.” Social Justice 20.1/2 (51-52 (1993): 104-114.
Khabeer, Su’ad Abdul. Muslim Cool. New York University Press, 2016.
