Posted on 12/24/2008 7:54:17 AM PST by Between the Lines
Five years ago, young Muslims across the United States began reading and passing along a blurry, photocopied novel called “The Taqwacores,” about imaginary punk rock Muslims in Buffalo.
“This book helped me create my identity,” said Naina Syed, 14, a high school freshman in Coventry, Conn.
A Muslim born in Pakistan, Naina said she spent hours on the phone listening to her older sister read the novel to her. “When I finally read the book for myself,” she said, “it was an amazing experience.”
The novel is “The Catcher in the Rye” for young Muslims, said Carl W. Ernst, a professor of Islamic studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Springing from the imagination of Michael Muhammad Knight, it inspired disaffected young Muslims in the United States to form real Muslim punk bands and build their own subculture.
Now the underground success of Muslim punk has resulted in a low-budget independent film based on the book.
A group of punk artists living in a communal house in Cleveland called the Tower-of-Treason offered the house as the set for the movie. The crumbling streets and boarded-up storefronts of their neighborhood resemble parts of Buffalo. Filming took place in October, and the movie will be released next year, said Eyad Zahra, the director.
“To see these characters that used to live only inside my head out here walking around, and to think of all these kids living out parts of the book, it’s totally surreal,” Mr. Muhammad Knight, 31, said as he roamed the movie set.
-snip-
Noureen DeWulf, 24, an actress who plays a rocker in the movie, defended the film’s message.
“I’m a Muslim and I’m 100-percent American,” Ms. DeWulf said, “so I can criticize my faith and my country. Rebellion? Punk? This is totally American.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
*sniff* *sniff* I smell a fatwa coming...
‘For many young American Muslims, stigmatized by their peers after the Sept. 11 attacks but repelled by both the Bush administration’s reaction to the attacks and the rigid conservatism of many Muslim leaders, the novel became a blueprint for their lives.”
Might be the beginning of a movement, or just a bunch of kids doing their rebellion thing. But Islam cannot be reformed. It’s just too rigid. They’ll have to scrap big chunks of it and then pretend that it’s still Islam for the sake of cultural pride.
Better to follow in the footsteps of Johnny Rotten than Osama bin Laden.
I don’t think the media would be as excited about Christian punks.
Ultimately, whatever disagreements they may have with Islamic theocratic rule, they are still muslims. They haven’t “lost their religion”.
“Islamonazi Punks F*** off!”
There is something about American culture that tends to water down even the strictest religion. American Catholicism (the vast majority are of the “cafeteria” persuasion), reform Judaism and, especially, mainstream Protestantism are examples. One wonders if American Islam, rigid as it may be, will suffer the same fate.
Criticizing American is not "totally American". Criticizing politicians is a protected right, but slamming the entire country isn't when it stretches over into treason in war time. Just ask Axis Sally/Mildred Gillars.
So it's an over-rated piece of self indulgent crap written by another neurotic narcissist.
L
Let's not forget this fine fellow.
Seems to be drawing equivalence between Osama and corporate America. I don't find that to be a condemnation of Wahhabism at all.
Jerry Casale, of DEVO.
Mr. Muhammad Knight was born an Irish Catholic in upstate New York and converted to Islam as a teenager. He studied at a mosque in Pakistan but became disillusioned with Islam after learning about the sectarian battles after the death of Muhammad.
What is it that makes someone convert from Catholicism to Islam and then become “disillusioned” with what became of Islam after Mohammed?
“What is it that makes someone convert from Catholicism to Islam and then become “disillusioned” with what became of Islam after Mohammed?”
Probably knew next to nothing about Islam and its history if that was the first thing he found to be disillusioned about. I guess all the modern hijackings and suicide bombers and women in burkas never caused him to ask questions.
I recall reading several articles earlier this year about Christian Punk bands and Christian metal bands. Seems that most of the stories were out of New Jersey.
Or an honor killing or a beheading or...
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