New Releases

Innocent Until Proven Muslim: Islamophobia, the War on Terror, and the Muslim Experience Since 9/11

Maha Hilal 2021. Pp. 336. HB. $29.99. Kindle. $20.99 Broadleaf Books, Pine Bush, N.Y.

Maha Hilal, co-founder of the Justice for Muslims Collective (https://www.justiceformuslims. org/), is an expert who has spent her career researching, writing on, advocating and organizing against institutionalized Islamophobia. She relates the powerful story of the 20-year War on Terror, exploring how the official narrative has justified the creation of a sprawling apparatus of state violence rooted in Islamophobia and excused its worst abuses.

Hilal offers both an overview of the many iterations of this “war” in law and policy and examines how Muslim Americans have internalized oppression, how some influential members of this community have perpetuated collective responsibility and how Muslim Americans’ lived experiences reflect what it means to live as part of a “suspect” community. Along the way, this marginalized community gives voice to lessons that we can all learn from: its members’ experiences and how to create a better future.

Tolerance and Risk: How U.S. Liberalism Racializes Muslims

Mitra Rastegar 2021. Pp. 303. HB. $108.00. PB. $27.00. Kindle. $25.65 University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, Minn.

Rastegar argues that portraying Muslims as beneficiaries of liberal values has helped racialize them as a risky population since 9/11. These discourses, which hold up some Muslims as worthy of tolerance or sympathy, reinforce an unstable good Muslim/bad Muslim binary in which any Muslim might “change” sides. The author explores these discourses in this light — being portrayed as a highly diverse population that nevertheless is seen to contain a threat that requires constant vigilance.

She offers several case studies to examine the interrelation of Muslims’ representations both here and abroad. She outlines how representations of tolerable or sympathetic Muslims presents them both as a population with distinct characteristics, capacities and risks and circulates the standards by which individual Muslims’ trustworthiness or threat must be assessed.

Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire: Twenty Years After 9/11

Deepa Kumar 2021. Pp. 304. PB. $17.95. Kindle. $9.99 Verso Boks, Brooklyn, N.Y.

Kumar, a leading scholar of Islamophobia, traces the history of anti-Muslim racism from the early modern era to the “War on Terror.” Importantly, Kumar argues that Islamophobia is best understood as racism rather than as religious intolerance. An innovative analysis of anti-Muslim racism and empire, “Islamophobia” argues that empire creates the conditions for anti-Muslim racism that, in turn, sustains empire.

Updated to include the end of Trump’s presidency and with a new foreword by Nadine Naber (a public speaker on Islamophobia), Kumar offers a clear and succinct explanation of how Islamophobia functions in the U.S. both as a set of coercive policies and as a body of ideas that take various forms: liberal, conservative and rightwing. The matrix of anti-Muslim racism charts how the media, think tanks, the foreign policy establishment, universities, the national security apparatus, the legal sphere and other institutions produce and circulate this form of bigotry.

Anti-Muslim racism not only has horrific consequences for people in Muslimmajority countries who become the targets of this endless “war,” but for Muslims and those who “look Muslim” in the West as well.

Before the Nikah: Proven Principles to Help Single Muslims Choose Wisely and Build Strong Marriages

P. Aneesah Nadir 2021. Pp. 172. PB. $16.95. Kindle $0.99 Book Power Publishing, Mesa, Ariz.

Usually, most people spend more time preparing for their wedding than their marriage. Dr. Nadir’s “Before the Nikah” provides Muslim singles tools to help them choose wisely and prepare for a healthy, long lasting, sakinah (tranquility) filled marriage. Based on two decades of teaching Muslim singles in her eponymously named course, she helps answer questions such as what does a loving, compassionate, peaceful marriage look like? How to choose someone who is compatible? What skills are needed to build a fulfilling relationship? What if parents don’t agree with one’s selection? What are the questions that need to be answered before a couple marries?

BOOKS FOR YOUNG READERS

The Sleepy Farmer: The Farmer Who Almost Missed Fajr

Shazia Afzal (Illus. Ingy Hamza) 2021. 10 Page Board Book. C$15.75 Compass Books, Toronto, Canada

Shazia Afzal’s “The Sleepy Farmer” offers the perfect balance when it comes to Islamic teachings and the storyline. The story is about a farmer who almost missed fajr, and how all the farm animals tried to wake him up by making different sounds. In this engaging tale, young readers can get involved in the reading by repeating the sounds each animal makes on every page. “The Sleepy Farmer” shows how important it is to do everything to wake up your family for fajr.

Lina, the Tree and the Woodcutter

Eman Salem (Author & Illus.) 2021. Pp. 24. Age: 4-8. PB. C$10.00 Compass Books, Toronto, Canada

Lina is in the company of the old wise tree when suddenly they are interrupted by a loud hacking. It turns out that a new woodcutter has been testing his new axe to cut down trees in the forest. Lina and the old tree tell the woodcutter why it’s important to leave trees unharmed. This bilingual book, the third in the “tree” series, offers an important lesson about the environment, especially because Prophet Muhammad (salla Allahu ‘alayhi wa sallam) linked it to Islam.

Esa and Sol’s Adventures: The Hunt for the Saphaea

Asma Maryam Ali 2020. Pp. 80. PB. C$11.55 Compass Books, Toronto, Canada

Can Esa and Sol find Zarkali’s missing astrolabe? Help them choose what to do on their adventure as they search for it. The right choices will lead to discovering some ancient missing Hebrew and Arabic scriptures along the way; the wrong choices will lead to dead ends.

Ali, a former elementary school teacher and now a practicing psychotherapist who resides in both Canada and Granada (Spain), offers 14 possible endings.

The Sugar Monster and Leyla

Esra Aslan 2021. Pp. HB. $19.95 Blue Dome Books, N.J.

Aslan, a clinical therapist specializing in child and family therapy, employs Mike the Sugar Monster and his best friend Leyla to help her readers understand that while we love to eat candy, chocolate, soda and all those sugary foods, we should instead eat watermelons, bananas, dates or other sweet fruits.

The story relates how sugar affects our lives and what we should eat to be healthy.

Cave Time Journal: Intellectual Lift-off Towards Self Discovery

Shazia R. Anwar 2021. Pp. 104. PB. $9.99. Kindle $ 0.99 Principled Approach, Allen, Tex. ‘Cave time’ denotes time for reflection, introspection, and getting answers pertaining to one’s creation and life purpose. This Self Discovery leads to the fulfillment that puts one at peace with themselves and others.This intellectual lift off aids to improve our mental and physical health as well as our relationships and creativity.

Aimed at children aged 13 and up, the book seeks to serve as a stepping stone toward the journey of self-discovery in relation to God.

This journal is a collection of 25 powerful concepts, which she has used as coaching techniques over a period of 10 years with her students and clients. ih