part series is based on the book published by the US Department of State's Bureau of International Information Programs on Muslims living in America. This week: Part two of ‘Building a Life in America' With growing numbers, confidence, and organization, Muslim Americans contribute in every field, from business and scholarship to sports and the arts. Their stories range from Pakistan-born Samiul Haque Noor, whose spicy halal dishes earned him the 2006 award for best food street vendor in New York City, to Dr. Elias Zerhouni, from Algeria, head of the National Institutes of Health from 2002 to 2008; from Newsweek commentator and editor Fareed Zakaria, to actor and hip-hop artist Mos Def; from professional basketball star Dikembe Mutombo of the Houston Rockets, to Representative Keith Ellison of Minnesota, the first Muslim member of the US Congress. A new generation of Muslim Americans enriches American medicine, science, and literature. Obstetrician and gynecologist Nawal Nour, born in Sudan and raised in Egypt, pioneers women's health issues as founder of the African Women's Health Center in Boston, Massachusetts. She received an esteemed MacArthur Fellowship (nicknamed the “genius grant”) in 2003 and Stanford University's Muslim Scholar Award in 2008. Iranian-American scientist Babak Parviz of the University of Washington has made exciting breakthroughs in nanotechnology — ultra-small electronic and biological applications at the cellular and molecular level — including tiny devices that can assemble and reassemble themselves independently. Writer Mohja Kahf, who came from Syria as a child, has skewered American culture generally and Muslim Americans themselves with gentle irony and razor-sharp observations in her poetry (E-mails From Scheherazad ) and an autobiographical novel set in Indiana (The Girl in the Tangerine Scarf) — books that have drawn fervent admirers, especially among younger Muslim-American women. Fady Joudah, born to Palestinian parents in Texas, grew up to become an emergency-room physician, now working in Houston, and has served with Doctors Without Borders at refugee camps in Zambia and in Darfur, Sudan. He is also a major new poet and winner of the prestigious Yale Series of Younger Poets competition for his collection The Earth in the Attic. A new, truly American adaptation of Islam is emerging, shaped by American freedoms, but also by the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Even as surveys by the Pew Research Center and others show that Muslim Americans are better educated and more prosperous than the average, the terrorist attacks — planned and executed by non-Americans — raised suspicions among other Americans whose immediate responses, racial profiling among them, triggered in turn a measure of Muslim-American alienation. Sadly, suspicions of this kind are not uncommon — in the United States or in other nations — during wartime or when outside attack is feared. But now is not 2002, when fears and suspicions were at their height. Context is also important: Every significant immigrant group has in the United States faced, and overcome, a degree of discrimination and resentment. Among the healthy responses to the tensions triggered by the terrorist attacks is an expansion of the interfaith dialogue in the United States. “Anytime you share a space with someone of another culture, you are bound to grow as an individual and learn to see things from another perspective,” said Kareema Daoud, a doctoral student in Arabic language and literature at Georgetown University who has served as a volunteer citizen ambassador for the Department of State. The 9/11 attacks also galvanized the Muslim-American community to become more active in civic and political activities — to advocate for issues of concern, to build alliances with non-Muslim organizations — and to confront intolerance and threats of violence. “Active engagement and involvement in politics reflects the fact that American Muslims are part of the social fabric of America, and also reflects their patriotic concern for this country,” says editor and writer Nafees Syed of Harvard University in a commentary on the free-wheeling discussion Web site altmuslim.com. Paraphrasing President John F. Kennedy, Syed continues, “The question is not only how taking part in the political process will aid American Muslims, but how American Muslims can help this country.” Progressive forms of belief, a more prominent role for women, even the recent evolution of “mega-mosques” resembling in size the large evangelical Christian churches — are among the characteristics of a rapidly evolving, uniquely American adaptation of Islam.
