Media Appearances

Hussein Rashid answers 5 questions from the We Are Human… | PACH

Hussein Rashid answers 5 questions from the We Are Human… | PACH. This month, we chose Hussein Rashid as our featured PACH member. Hussein Rashid is founder of islamicate, L3C, a consultancy focusing on religious literacy and cultural competency. He works with a variety of NGOs, foundations, non-profits, and governmental agencies for content expertise on religion broadly, with a specialization on Islam. Learn more about Hussein and read his responses to PACH’s We Are Human questions below.

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Events

Being the First: Reinventing Superheroes | Barnard College

Being the First: Reinventing Superheroes | Barnard College. Someone has to do it first. But what does it take? Being the First showcases trailblazers, pioneers, and those who were “the first” in their field. Taking a look at the journey it took to get there, these candid discussions aim to break down stereotypes and explore strategies to accomplish personal, professional, and societal goals.  Sana Amanat ’04, director of content and character development at Marvel Comics, created the first Muslim superhero, Kamala Khan, with her own comic book series, Ms. Marvel. Amanat spoke with Hussein Rashid, adjunct faculty in the Department of Religion, about…

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Media Appearances

Break This Down: Q & A with Hussein Rashid on Pop Culture, Ramadan, and Islam’s Diversity | Barnard College

Break This Down: Q & A with Hussein Rashid on Pop Culture, Ramadan, and Islam’s Diversity | Barnard College. In Muslim traditions, you have heroes who are super not because of an innate position but through relationship with God. By developing spiritual wisdom and maturity, the hero is granted superpowers by the Divine. So in writing my article, the hyphen in “super-hero” shows that the person may always be a hero, but is not always super. That super quality is a gift granted by God, which may be earned but is not a permanent condition.

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Media Appearances

A Discussion with Professor Hussein Rashid | the.Ismaili

A Discussion with Professor Hussein Rashid | the.Ismaili. We are always judging ourselves by material attributes, material aspects. Instead of saying what is this person like as a human being, as a person? How can I better myself by being in contact with this person? I think that’s what materialism does, is it keeps us from God, it keeps us from ourselves, and it keeps us from making a human connection. Basically, what we do is, we willingly turn ourselves into nothing more than an object, by denying our divine connection in our very own humanity.

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Media Appearances

Enforced disappearance: Why a whole community is going missing – Home – Herald

Enforced disappearance: Why a whole community is going missing – Home – Herald. Gatherings such as the one at Baitul Huda are common for Ahmadi communities living in various parts of the United States. According to Professor Hussein Rashid of the department of religion at Columbia University, they are more a manifestation of a shared insecurity than of anything else. “Staying together does not tell anything about the community except the fact that they are a minority, and a besieged minority,” he says. “This is often the case with immigrant groups and those who are persecuted in their home countries…

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Media Appearances

Islam scholar Bernard Lewis left unfair legacy of disdain for Muslims – Religion News ServiceReligion News Service

Islam scholar Bernard Lewis left unfair legacy of disdain for Muslims – Religion News ServiceReligion News Service. Lewis’ transformation from scholar to neo-imperialist was not sudden, but there is a hint to be found in “The Assassins.” Originally published in 1967, it is an erudite work that sought to correct the record on the Nizari Isma’ilis, a Shiite Muslim community that had long been maligned as consumers of hashish, known in Arabic as “hashashin,” which transformed into the word “assassin.” The book fascinated me because it was a scholarly book at a time when scholarship was rarely applied to such topics.…

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Events

The Sarah Play – 14th Street Y

I’ll be participating in a talkback after this performance. The Sarah Play – 14th Street Y. Three actors struggle with how to tell the ancient, sacred story of Sarah and Hagar, the mothers of Isaac and Ishmael, through a modern lens. Drawing from the Muslim, Christian and Jewish traditions, and trying various iterations to determine which religion’s version of the narrative gets told, the actors wrestle with how to tell a tale when there are multiple accounts of what happened.

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Conferences

Are the Arts Essential?

Are the Arts Essential?. Specialists will take the customary deliberations about arts and culture into new, substantive, and shaping discussion. Beyond “leisure” or “entertainment,” beyond art’s personal impacts, beyond contributions to tourism, community building, or the classroom, do the arts and culture power progress? This convening will ask if (and how) the arts provide structures and strategies for social change, how they help define peoples and nations, how they deal with actual matters of life and death. Are the arts essential in ways that economics and medicine and politics are? If so, how is this manifest? What are the theoretical…

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Religion

Tweeting the Qur’an #Quran #ttQuran #Ramadan 2018/1439

Traditionally, Muslims read the Qur'an in its entirety over this time, in a section a day. The Qur'an is split into thirty sections, called juz', and one section is read each night.  This year is the 10th year I am inviting people to tweet the Qur’an for Ramadan. I will be tweeting @islamoyankee. To see how the call has (not) evolved, here are the six call outs: 2009 Windsor Star Article 2010 (despite the title, which says 2011) 2011 USA Today Article 2012 2013 Storify (including press stories) 2014 A piece I did on Immanent Frame   The Background [from the…

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