Related Posts

America to Zanzibar Opening

I am proud to announce the opening of the exhibit America to Zanzibar: Muslim Cultures Near and Far at the Children’s Museum of Manhattan. I served as the lead academic advisor the exhibit, and it is stunning. Below is a link to my Flickr album of the space, which I will continue update as the exhibit goes on for the year.

New Rumi movie?

Ali Eteraz is teasing about a new Rumi bio-pic, run with Qatar Foundation and Rumi Foundation. Looks really good, but some questions: Will it seriously deal with the fact that Shams-i Tabriz was most likely an Ismaili? I can’t imagine the Qataris would be too happy with that. Why do we need a non-Muslim playing the part of Rumi? Are there not enough good Muslim actors? I think the Iranians might object. Even Mel Gibson went with a no name for Jesus to make it seem more real, and that movie seems to have done OK.

Full Battle Rattle

A friend of mine sent me this link about a movie that deals with the virtual Iraq we have created in the US. I’m serious. We have built an Iraq in the US to train our soldiers to go to Iraq. Fighting them over here so we can fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them over here.