Shall Owe Words

As part of my assessment for an Islamic Studies course this semester I was required to interview a member of the Muslim community and post a ‘blog’ about them. In case anyone is interested, I’ve replicated my entry below. There are a number of other students entries publicly available on the class blog: Kaleidoscopic Islams.

Interview with an Imam

I count myself lucky enough to have recently had the chance to interview a very distinguished Muslim, one who is both an Imam in the local Brisbane community and a leader in multiple areas of the wider Islamic community of Australia. For the sake of anonymity he will be referred as simply ‘Imam’ or ‘the Imam’.

When I presented the opening question for the interview – What does it mean for you to ‘be’ a Muslim in Australia today? – the Imam responded very broadly, describing not only his personal experiences but also those of the wider Islamic community. He began by saying that it is very easy and safe for him to live inAustralia, both in a religious and a cultural sense. Religiously, he is free to practise his faith as he wishes; in other words, he is able to follow the Shari’a as described in the Qur’an. There are no restrictions upon this facet of his life. Culturally, the Imam – as with all members of the Australian population – is expected to behave within certain boundaries, however this has not been a difficulty. He also stated that he personally has not been a target of racial discrimination, and that he feels quite comfortable functioning within Australia. In order to further demonstrate this ease of functioning, the Imam wore a traditional thobe to the interview, thereby ‘proving’ to us that is safe for him to live how he wishes.

These initial responses are very similar to the results obtained in the study completed by Forrest and Dunn (2006), but differ in a number of specific areas. For example, the survey found that, while ‘most people’ perceive that there are different races in Australia, the vast majority of those surveyed did not attach any discriminatory significance to this. This correlates with the Imam’s experiences as a person of Arab descent, as he did not describe himself as having been racially discriminated against. However, Forrest et al. also found that almost half of those surveyed were concerned about multiculturalism, and indeed these people stated that there are groups which do not fit into their view of Australian society. The results from an associated survey -The Racism Project – conducted by UNSW (2001) clarify this statement, as this survey found that, out of all the cultural sub-groups present within Australian society, Muslims face the highest levels of negative attitudes. Therefore, whilst in his day-to-day life the Imam did not feel that he faced any negative attitudes, it is clear that these attitudes do exist.

At this point the focus of the interview expanded from the personal experiences of the Imam to the experiences of the Muslim community as a whole, covering topics including the influence of politicians, the position of women in Islam and many others. However, although the Imam’s opinions on and experiences relating to these topics were overwhelming positive, it became clear that there are still negative influences upon his life. Most dominantly, the Imam’s frustration with an oft-biased media was quite obvious; he mentioned how the media often purposefully ‘twists’ Islamic beliefs, his personal experiences, and how he – and the rest of the Islamic community – must peacefully endure this bias, in effect ‘disengaging’ from the media. He sees our media as having a negative influence upon not only Muslims, but upon the whole of Australia; in his words, ‘The media is really damaging this country… for it creates hate amongst each other.’ The Imam also cited the influence of certain recently removed politicians as particularly negative. However, regardless of such negatives, the Imam consistently held that Australia is a safe and positive place for Muslims to live and worship

This position clearly parallels the results of Hassan’s (2002) study, which suggested that Muslims are quite comfortable practising Islam in Australia and in fact do so to a greater extent than Christians from the same community. The Imam’s experiences with the media are also quite typical of Muslims in Australia; Aly (2007) notes that the media ‘plays a central role in shaping the attitudes and perceptions of Australian Muslims towards … and within the broader Australian community.’ Aly further discusses the issue of Muslim perception in the media by analysing representations of Muslims in terrorism-related articles, mentioning a number of cases of misrepresentation. The Imam’s intentional disengagement from the media is perceived to be a sort of ’strategic withdrawal; a form of media activism that empowers individuals to re-construct and re-define their identities as members of a broader community.’ With any luck, this ‘tactic’ will have the desired effect, and will improve the media-related experiences of both the Imam and the wider Muslim community ofAustralia.

In conclusion, what does it mean for the Imam to ‘be’ a Muslim in Australia? As far as I could tell, the Imam sees his position as a Muslim in Australia to be one of overwhelming positives; in his opinion, the struggles posed by the media and politicians to be insignificant in the face of the divine truth of Islam. As for the future, he feels that ‘if they keep things going the same way that they are going now… then we [Muslims] have no problem in Australia.’

Bibliography

Aly, Anne, Autumn 2007. “Australian Muslim Responses to the Discourse on Terrorism in the Australian Popular Media”. The Australian Journal of Social Issues, 42:1 27-4.

Forrest, J. & Dunn K.M., 2006. “Racism and intolerance in Eastern Australia: a geographical perspective,” Australian Geographer, 37.2: 167-186.

Riaz Hassan, 2002. “On Being Religious: A Study of Christian and Muslim Piety in Australia,” Australian Religion Studies Review, 15.2: 87-114.

UNSW. School of BEES. 2001. “Regional Response profile – Racism Survey: Brisbane Division,” http://www.bees.unsw.edu.au/school/staff/dunn/racismfindings.html (accessed October 20, 2008).