The context of identity

Aziz Poonawalla at City of Brass discusses Islamic identity and American identity, and notes the synthesis of the two along with how that merging is the whole point of America.



When discussing Islamic identity, it is important that we recall the Christian identity that many in the United States profess to have, and to consider why we fear the concept of an Islamic identity while seemingly missing the complementary idea of a separate Christian identity. Recall the question I asked recently in my post at Random Fate “Context, how often it is ignored“.



We seem to ignore context when it does not fit our prejudices, and this may very well be our undoing.



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Cross-posted to Random Fate.

2 Responses to “The context of identity”

1. Isidora says:

   August 31, 2006 at 9:03 pm

   Ok, I’ll be the first to comment on this. I am a Christian – an Eastern Orthodox Christian – first and an American second. I have been aware of this for some years, and it makes me uncomfortable. I have never stated it publicly before, because I am very much afraid that other people will not understand and will think that this means that I am disloyal to my country. I am not. I cannot imagine any circumstance in which my faith would lead me to commit treason.

   I may be a Christian first, but I am also an American. Among other things, I am a strong believer in Separation of Church and State (in America, at least) and a strong believer in tolerating various forms of dissent, religious and otherwise. I enjoy living in a democracy for a variety of reasons, but I am under no illusions that it is the only acceptable form of government, and I am not fond of our tendency to assume that every one in the world must necessarily want democracy and other American/Western things. Lots of them do; some of them don’t.

   I can relate to American Muslims feeling somewhat alienated. Being Anglo and wearing Western, but modest, dress, I don’t stand out physically the way they do, and I don’t have nearly so many people irrationally biased against me.

   Their dietary restrictions can make it difficult for them to eat with non-Muslims. (No alcohol, no pork.) That can be a problem for us when we are fasting (= abstaining from meat, egg, and dairy), which is somewhere in the neighborood of 40% of the time, varying from most Wednesdays and Fridays, to the seven weeks leading up to Pascha (Easter). My morning and evening prayers can be said more or less at any time and are preferably said in private in order to avoid calling too much attention to oneself and to avoid being distracted from the prayers by external stimuli. Muslims have it quite a bit harder. They have five set times for prayer each day, and the times aren’t negotiable. I always admired my Malaysian dormmates in college who would gracefully excuse themselves at the proper time every day, explaining that they had to say prayers. Their holidays are at very different times than that of the rest of America. Being on the Old Calendar, our religious feasts don’t exactly coincide with the Western ones. I’m sure that Jews can relate to most of these points.

   Aziz Poonwala as a Muslim says “Its reconciling tradition with modernity that is tricky. We all have multiple identities and we rarely “choose” one over another, but the conflict between modernity and tradition is sometimes trickier to navigate” I can definitely relate to that sentimate, coming from a religious tradition which goes back for very close to 2 millennia. One of the great struggles in my Church these days has to do with finding the proper balance between tradition and modernity.

   I’m tired, and I think I’m rambling. Hope this made some sense. Gotta get a couple things done and then get to bed.
2. C Stanley says:

   September 1, 2006 at 9:15 am

   Isidora,
   I didn’t feel that you were rambling, and you made a lot of sense. Your devout practice of your faith in the face of societal pressure to conform is very admirable, and I appreciate your sharing your experiences.

   I found it interesting when you said:

   I cannot imagine any circumstance in which my faith would lead me to commit treason.

   Do you think (as I do) that this is the crux of why Americans and Brits (and any other Western nations having these issues) are concerned about Muslims, though? Because there is evidence that SOME Muslims would commit treason for what they believed to be their faith. I think the problem is that we don’t have an accurate read on how many Muslims fit that category, and we don’t know how many of their religious leaders would potentially lead them down that path. That makes us nervous to the point that we want to hear them ‘pledging allegiance’ to their countries. I get that you are saying that this isn’t necessary, but do you see why some people would feel a lot more comfortable if they would?

   Since many devout Muslims seem to feel, as you do, that it isn’t necessary to force them to make this choice, what other factors might lead Westerners to have a greater comfort level in accepting that they want to have a dual identity as Muslims first, then their nationality second? How can we be more assured that they still wouldn’t choose one at the expense of the other?