Fi Yadd Allah [In God's Hand] 13 May 2007
Posted by EDITOR in GUESTS, Spirituality.4 comments
Our guest contributor this week is Laury Silvers, a professor of religion at Skidmore College and editor of progressiveislam.org.
My mother is getting old. Old enough now she realizes that her children do not have good relationships with one another or with her. Old enough to realize she doesn’t want to die with the family not a family at all. Whenever she was in a tight spot, my mom used to play that Stones song, “You Can’t Always Get What You Want.” She’d play it over and over. I remember her sometimes lying on the floor listening to that song with the speakers on either side of her head. It’s a little late in the game to want us to be a family now, Mom. I don’t see it.
Wayfarers 25 February 2007
Posted by EDITOR in GUESTS, Spirituality.4 comments
Our guest contributor this week is Asma T Uddin, a Philadelphia-based attorney and associate editor at Islamica Magazine.
I work at a large corporate law firm and share a secretary with a senior partner whose office is two down from mine. Today, she informed me that the partner’s father had passed away. I had heard him speaking of his father’s illness, whether in hushed tones or in a loud frenzy as he ran out of the office to see his father at the hospital each day. I guess I knew this was coming.
Naked Eyes: Reflections on Wearing Niqab 18 February 2007
Posted by EDITOR in GUESTS, Politics, Relationships, Spirituality.36 comments
Our guest contributor this week is Sahar Ullah, a Masters student in Middle Eastern studies at the University of Chicago.
There are reasons why we are placed in certain situations and make certain choices. If anything, experiences make for good stories.
Personal experience also has a way of rendering generalizations and the idea of objectivity problematic. In a room of vicious critics, it’s always interesting to observe the discomfort when the subject of study speaks. When the latest debate on face veils broke out (provoked by Jack Straw’s comments), my past experience gave me a story I needed to share.
