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‘Alif the Unseen,’ by G. Willow Wilson – NYTimes.com

‘Alif the Unseen,’ by G. Willow Wilson – NYTimes.com. In her 2010 memoir, “The Butterfly Mosque,” G. Willow Wilson told the story of her conversion to Islam, charting her transformation from child of atheist parents to Boston University-­educated undergraduate to faithful Muslim with an Egyptian husband and an apartment in Cairo. Wilson wrote of the contrast between East and West, and of feeling compelled to keep her religious beliefs secret. “In the West,” she observed, “anything that must be hidden is suspect; availability and honesty are interlinked. This clashes irreconcilably with Islam, . . . where the things that are…

A Quote from Rushdie

In light of my earlier post: “But members of the new colony have only one real problem, and that problem is white people. British racism, of course, is not our problem. It’s yours. We simply suffer from the effects of your problem.” p. 138 “But it is often argued that those old days, those old ideas are long dead, [racism which resulted in slavery and colonialism] and play no significant parts in the events of contemporary Britain. If only that were true. If only history worked so cleanly, erasing itself as it went forward.” pg. 145 From: “Imaginary Homelands” (Salman…

Interview with G. Willow Wilson

Rearrange Your Head: An Interview with American Muslim Convert and Memoirist G. Willow Wilson | RDBook | ReligionDispatches. Sheikhas and alimas [female spiritual and religious authorities], if you can find any — and you have to look pretty hard — will totally change the way you think about Islam and gender. There is a long and revered tradition of female scholarship in this religion, but it’s dying out. Most of the female scholarship we have now is part of a new tradition—postmodern academia—not a continuation of the old. Old school sheikhas, educated the traditional way, will rearrange your head. In…