RESOURCES

Other Study Guides

Opera for Educators - “Omar” Guide | LA Opera - Official Site

Omar-workbook_2022_for-web.pdf (spoletousa.org)

Podcasts

Episode 6: The Soul of Music: Rhiannon Giddens excavates the past (nationalgeographic.com)

“The Long Journey of Omar Ibn Said.” Library of Congress, 2019.

Organizations

Abolitionist History – Muslim Justice League

Muslim Anti-Racism Collaborative (muslimarc.org)

WEST AFRICAN RESEARCH ASSOCIATION | WARA – Promoting scholarly exchange with West Africa, USA, and the global community.

Books

A Muslim American Slave: The Life of Omar Ibn Said. Translated from the Arabic, edited, and with an introduction by Ala Alryyes. University of Wisconsin Press, 2011.

Servants of Allah: African Muslims Enslaved in the Americas. By Sylviane A. Diouf. New York University Press, 2013.

Music in the World of Islam: A Socio-cultural Study. By Amnon Shiloah. Routledge, 1994.

Websites

Omar Ibn Said Collection at the Library of Congress.

“Educated and Enslaved: The Journey of Omar Ibn Said.” By Benny Seda-Galarza. Library of Congress.

Articles

“African Muslims in Early America: Religion, Literacy, and Liberty.” National Museum of African American History and Culture.

“Sound and Community in the Muslim Call for Prayer.” By Joseph Progler

Smithsonian Folkways Magazine.

Guide Authors

Lucy Caplan is Lecturer and Assistant Director of Studies in History and Literature at Harvard University. She holds a Ph.D. in American Studies and African American Studies from Yale University.

Allison Chu is a Ph.D. candidate in Music History at Yale University. Her research focuses on the intersection of identity and opera in the twenty-first century.