MCC Diversity Lecture: Crushing Islamophobia with Countercultures

Event Date: 

Thursday, May 5, 2016 - 6:00pm

Event Location: 

  • Multicultural Center

How should we understand the nature of contemporary Islamophobia? What motivates it? What sustains it? Who gains by it? Moustafa Bayoumi-author of the award-winning books How Does It Feel To Be a Problem? Being Young and Arab in America and This Muslim American Life: Dispatches from the War on Terror-discusses "War on Terror culture" as way to comprehend today's Islamophobia. He will examine the ways the media, law, and politics mutually reinforce each other in viewing Muslims as potentially dangerous outsiders. Bayoumi will also address a growing "War on Terror counterculture," that, by resisting the stereotypes and challenging the prevailing narratives of the "War on Terror," fights not only for the rights of Muslim Americans but for the civil liberties of all. Moustafa Bayoumi is a Professor of English at Brooklyn College.