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ASSOCIATE EDITOR
Shazia Kamal Los Angeles, CA
Shazia Kamal is Associate Editor at AltMuslimah.com, overseeing and facilitating the marketing and promotion of AltMuslimah in the social media sphere. Her other responsibilities include co-planning the AltMuslimah marriage, dating, and relationships roundtable series, building partnerships with other faith/gender media organizations, and developing AltMuslimah's offline projects.
Shazia holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from the University of California, Berkeley. She is a community activist and has worked with a line of non-profit public policy and community-based organizations to improve understanding between people of all faiths and backgrounds. Her commentary has also appeared on the On Faith religion blog at the Washington Post, as well as Common Ground News Service. When not in her “writing lab,” Shazia 'emcees' and hosts weddings and cultural and religious events. She can be reached at shaziakamal(at)gmail.com.
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 | | Muslim Americans on TV TLC presents: “ALL AMERICAN MUSLIM” By Shazia Kamal, November 11, 2011 TLC’s new eight-part series, “All-American Muslim,” is set to air this Sunday and follows the daily lives of five American Muslim families in Dearborn, Michigan, the country’s largest Arab-American enclave. I spoke with Shadia Amen and Jeff McDermott, whose road to marriage is featured on the show. Shadia is an Arab-American Muslim and her family would like for Jeff to convert from Catholicism to Islam in order for the union to be valid in their faith. ( No comments) |
 | | Ferial Masry An interview with Ferial Masry By Shazia Kamal, November 4, 2011 When I heard female activists pretty much ran the Arab Spring, I could not help but think that this was not a new phenomenon. Not only have Muslim women been active in the Middle East for generations, but they brought this same legacy with them to the West. However, the mainstream media does not highlight the efforts of these women often. ( No comments) |
 | | Activism through social media Reaching new heights in women’s rights activism By Shazia Kamal, October 28, 2011 Mehrunisa Qayyum, in her blog PITAPOLICY, which covers politics and analyses development in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, assessed the most recent list of the top 100 Arab women by ArabianBusiness.com, noting the growing impact of “women who have transformed their business entrepreneurial skills into social entrepreneurship….”
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 | | Angela Peabody Interview with Angela Peabody, CEO of Global Woman Magazine By Shazia Kamal, September 30, 2011 I had a vision for 5 years to create a magazine for women that would cover women’s issues. But I didn’t want a magazine that just covered one type of woman’s issue, or one type of woman. I wanted a magazine that every woman in the world could relate to…any woman from a village in Africa, or Asia, or Latin America, or Europe… I wanted a magazine like that. ( No comments) |
 | | Fordson “Fordson” the Movie is Worth Watching By Shazia Kamal, September 8, 2011 Although not a follower of football, I am the first to acknowledge and celebrate the importance of football in this here United States of America. So I was honored to attend a sneak preview of the film and special Q and A session with the cast and crew of Fordson, a documentary film that follows high school football players in Dearborn, Michigan during the last ten days of Ramadan as they prepare to play their rival high school. ( No comments) |
| | Ramadan Ramadan on Twitter- A Cyber Celebration By Shazia Kamal, August 11, 2011 The month of Ramadan has cued Muslims from all over the United States and the world to take some time out to spread the word about this holy month. While some record their daily experiences on their blogs, others are publishing ye ole “Ramadan 101” articles on webmagazines. Others are updating their twitter feeds with 140 character reflections on what Ramadan means to them. ( No comments) |
 | | Book Review The Sweetness of Tears by Nafisa Haji By Shazia Kamal, July 6, 2011 For many years, I had been trying to figure out how to explain, describe, encompass, sum up, or simply understand what has happened to this world in the last ten years. I have been wondering how humanity, faith, identity, tradition, race relations, extremism, terrorism, and international law have shaped our world and our senses since 9/11. I finally found what I was looking for in the intricate fiction narrative created by Nafisa Haji in her novel, The Sweetness of Tears. ( No comments) |
 | | The Tablighi Jamaat A question of gender equality By Shazia Kamal, March 30, 2011 Of the various strands of Muslim reformers and reformists, the Tablighi Jamaat, a Muslim association composed of volunteers and centered on internal individual and community regeneration, is a phenomenon that has taken form in recent times. The first convention of the Tablighi Jamaat was created and led by Maulana Muhammad Ilyas, and took place in New Delhi, India around 1927. ( No comments) |
| | Women's History Month Reflecting on Women’s History Month By Shazia Kamal, March 16, 2011 During this month of March, we are celebrating Women’s History Month. When I think about this time of celebration, I think of women rising to the occasion to tell our stories- our girl-powered, female-inspired, women-lens-ed experiences- our truths, adventures, narrations, retreats, and journeys- present through the uninhibited XX-chromosome-vision. ( No comments) |
| | The Many Faces of the Revolutionary Egyptian Woman By Shazia Kamal, February 16, 2011 A revolution by the people, for the people, is not about to go down without the steadfastness and courage of the Nisaa' Mesr, the women of Egypt. Shattering Mubarak’s regime while also shattering the image of submissive and weak Arab women, victory belongs to them. ( No comments) |
 | | Dress Little hijabi women: A questionable phenomenon By Shazia Kamal, December 15, 2010 Baber Ibrahim, in his Guardian piece, “This Trend of Young Muslim Girls Wearing the Hijab is Disturbing,” propagates a hodgepodge of observations and speculations about why there is apparently a visible increase in the number of little girls (under the age of ten) donning the hijab. He claims that wearing one at this age leads to the sexualization of girls, which runs opposite the goal of observing modesty and humility. I would call that claim fair only because of the hegemonic sexualized worldview of typically everything related to gender issues in Islam. ( 4 comments) |
 | | Perspectives No need to go undercover to get to know Muslims By Shazia Kamal, November 15, 2010 I appreciate Cassidy Herrington stepping out of her comfort zone, or as she said it, “climbing out of [the placating, soothing] “lap” of safety, to wear a hijab for a month. She gets credit for making a sincere effort to understand Islam and Muslims by going literally “under cover” for a month donning the hijab. I sincerely applaud this undertaking. ( No comments) |
 | | Homosexuality in Islam An identity in flux By Shazia Kamal, November 3, 2010 When news of Saudi Prince Saud Abdulaiziz Bin Nasir Al Saud being found guilty of murdering his aide and possibly being gay made headlines, I figured then that the discussion of homosexuality in the Muslim world had unofficially shifted from the private realm to the public one. Knowing the silent and largely hostile attitude towards homosexuality, I actually felt uncomfortable for the Muslim world, as well as Saudi Arabia, for being squarely placed in the spotlight for a taboo topic. ( 3 comments) |
 | | Perceptions What does a Muslim woman look like? By Shazia Kamal, October 8, 2010 I am not "visibly" a Muslim female -- in other words, I don't wear a hijab, the headscarf worn by some of my Muslim peers. Because people cannot instantly identify my belief system through my physical appearance, specifically my garb, I have not been at the receiving end of the direct hatred and vitriol that has been spewed at those who do don the headscarf; I have not had someone snatch off my headscarf in order to taunt and humiliate me; and I have not been dismissed or ignored in a professional or social setting because of my "suspicious" appearance. ( No comments) |
 | | Motherhood “Mother, now I know…” By Shazia Kamal, October 1, 2010 When you are a mother, you will know. This is usually the closing statement at the end of a long-winded argument between mother and daughter. The two bicker over everything under the sun, from what outfit the daughter should wear to Aunt Aliya’s dinner party to whether she should take up the job opportunity in Way-Too-Far-To-Even-Discuss-Town, USA. ( No comments) |
 | | Book "The War Within Our Hearts" “Keepin’ It real” with young people By Shazia Kamal, September 6, 2010 Today, making and keeping connections with American Muslim youth sits at the top of the priority list for Muslim communities across the United States. We are witnessing an increase in the rise of youth groups, organized youth associations, and Islamic classes geared specifically towards youth. Facilities are becoming widespread, but the real preparation lies not within room availability but in didactics; how can parents, teachers, and leaders communicate Islam to an entirely new species – Muslim youth of the 21st Century – while being “down” and “straight” with all that is “street?” ( 1 comment) |
 | | Pakistan floods The plight of Pakistani women at the height of disaster By Shazia Kamal, September 3, 2010 With one-fifth of a nation under water and sluggish donations to fund relief efforts for flood victims, there is a fragile element within a drowning, disenfranchised population, a group that has historically and categorically been cast as a lower-grade victim in times of disasters - women. The Association for Women’s Rights in Development notes that “Gender-biased attitudes and stereotypes can complicate and extend women’s recovery, for example if women do not seek or do not receive timely care for physical and mental trauma experienced in disasters." ( No comments) |
 | | Morality When the virtue police come a-pokin’ By Shazia Kamal, June 2, 2010 Whatcha gonna... whatcha gonna do… whatcha gonna do when the Virtue Cops come for you? Run? Hide? Feel guilt running down your face and drop to the ground asking for forgiveness in front of everyone? Or would you transform into a drop-kicking-iron-fisted UFC fighter and beat that officer to the ground? That’s what one Saudi woman elected to do when an officer from the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice (known on the streets of Saudi as haia (pronounced haiy-ya)), stopped her at an amusement park in Al-Mubarraz to investigate her male companion. ( 3 comments) |
 | | Miss USA 2010 Does Rima Fakih represent Muslims in America? By Shazia Kamal, May 22, 2010 The crowning of Ms. Rima Fakih, 24, as Miss USA 2010 on May 16, brought forth a mixed reaction from Arab and Muslim communities across the globe. Facebook and Twitter erupted with a barrage of updates, from declaring a victory for Arabs in America, to completely opposite reactions lamenting the inappropriate and inaccurate representation of Muslim women in mainstream America. ( 10 comments) |
 | | Beauty Color-coded confessions: Background shades of the marriage process By Shazia Kamal, December 21, 2009 “He is educated, Mashallah ...a lawyer, and the age difference is just right. I talked to his mother, too. She was absolutely delightful, she agreed with me on everything! She is sending his picture through the e-mail right now.” Barely able to contain her excitement, my mother grabs her reading glasses and positions herself before the monitor. It is the Moment of Truth. ( 9 comments) |
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Founder & Editor-In-Chief
Managing Editor
Associate Editors
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