2001: 9-1-1
Big Idea
Black Muslim Americans experienced a unique degree of isolation and discrimination as Americans had historically distrusted Islam and Black people. After 9/11 the attacks against Muslim Americans increased leaving many to feel for the first time like foreigners in their own country.
What’s important to know?
Anti-Black and Anti-Muslim: After the September 11th attacks, Black Muslims faced significant scrutiny and isolation, highlighting the ongoing struggle for acceptance in American society.
1: Anti-Black and Anti-Muslim
The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2011 where almost 3,000 Americans died was a day that changed the course of history for many people in the United States and across the globe.
The backlash that many Muslim Americans felt came most immediately from the 9-11 attacks. However, the seeds of distrust ran much deeper than one act of terrorism. As historian Edward Curtis IV (2013) wrote, “After World War II, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) used mainstream media to prosecute a war of disinformation about Muslim groups, and by the 1960s, engaged in aggressive counterintelligence to repress what it deemed to be the threat of political radicalism among Muslim Americans” (p. 75).
Muslim Americans who were also African American also garnered particular distrust. Malcom X, Muhammed Ali, and Louis Farrakhan — all representatives for assertive male Black leaders who were also Muslim — had long attracted the attention of the FBI and the general distrust of political leaders. A religion that stood in contrast and some might argue, conflict, with Christianity, surely attracted distrust in a nation that thought of itself as “Christian.” Add Black to the mix and now the distrust became even more serious.
Listen
Visit Dream Storytelling Interviews to listen to oral histories with Black Muslim Americans.
Your Turn
What impact did being a Muslim and being Black have on many Americans after 9-11? How did the “afterlife of slavery” appear in their lives?
-
Review the resources at “Black Muslim American,” from the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding.
Mineo, L. (2021). Born to take on Islamophobia. Harvard Gazette. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2021/09/muslim-americans-reflect-on-the-impact-of-9-11/
“Racial Profiling and Islamophobia.” (2023). Watson Institute for International and Public, Brown University.
Nash, M. (2008). Islam among Urban Blacks: Muslims in Newark, New Jersey: A Social History. University Press of America.
Rashid, S. (2013). Black Muslims in the US: History, Politics, and the Struggle of a Community. Palgrave MacMillan.
Book list highlight resources about Islam and the Black Experience in the United States.
-
9/11 Memorial and Museum resources for educators and students. (Grades 9-12)
Undergraduate and teacher certificate courses on Muslims in America.
-
STL NPR article on Muslims in St. Louis.
BBC article on Muslims in St. Louis.
PBS video on Muslims across America, sponsored by the Missouri Historical Society.
STL NPR, St. Louis Muslim Women: One Religion, Many Cultures.
-
Sheryll D. Cashin, To Be Muslim or "Muslim-Looking" in America: A Comparative Exploration of Racial and Religious Prejudice in the 21st Century, 2 Duke F. L. & Soc. Change 125-139 (2010).
Gomez, M. A. (2005). Black Crescent: The Experience and Legacy of African Muslims in the Americas. Cambridge University Press.
Marable, M. (2009). Black Routes to Islam. Palgrave Macmillan.
McCloud, A. M. (1995). African American Islam. Routledge.
-
Curtis, E.E. (2013). The Black Muslim Scare of the Twentieth Century. In: Ernst, C.W. (eds) Islamophobia in America. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137290076_4
Dream Storytelling Project Team, "Oral History Interview with Dawud Clark on March 14, 2021" (2021). Dream Storytelling Interviews. 18.
https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/dream-storytelling-interviews/18