On Saturday nights, a man stands on the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica yelling false and insulting words against my religion and its followers. I am Muslim; I wear a headscarf, so this feels personal. And while I’ve become somewhat desensitized to it, it is still awful to listen…
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Last week Dalilah Muhammad took gold in Rio’s 2016 Olympics, winning the 400-meter hurdles and clocking in at a breakneck speed of 53.13 seconds. The Queens, New York, native has dominated this race to the point where she has three of the five fastest times in the world, yet her…
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Interested in becoming a therapist or advocate for social justice in the Muslim community? A degree in social work might be right for you. The majority of mental health providers in the United States have a degree in social work.[1] This means that a psychotherapist or counselor is more likely…
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For the past few weeks, my whole family has gathered in our living room in the evenings to watch the Olympics. It has been a family tradition for the past few Olympics, and usually swimming, women’s gymnastics, diving and track are the favorite events. “Phelps is just so amazing,” everyone…
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Genetics counselor Lama Eldahdah spends most of her time thinking about reproductive probabilities, but when she sits down with Muslim patients who are battling infertility, the conversation rarely focuses on odds. “Religious people say it’s God’s will, non-religious people say it’s statistics,” said Eldahdah, who works for Chicago’s Reproductive Genetics…
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An Australian boxer talks to Maria Khwaja Bazi about being a Muslim woman and someone from an ethnic background. Bianca “Bam Bam” Elmir is dressed in a sky blue shirt, squished on a Skype screen on an early morning in Melbourne. Although she is half a world away, her energy…
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One thousand people. Enough to pack a good sized sports arena. That is how many people died when the Rana Plaza garment factory in Bangladesh collapsed, and while some point the damning finger at the deplorable working conditions in developing countries, if you dig deeper, you realize the real culprit…
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When a group of talented female musicians came together in Pakistan to play in the Nescafe Basement Series, Season 4, their performance was unlike anything an audience in Pakistan–or globally–had ever seen. Covering John Newman’s ‘Love Me Again’, this talented ensemble included a violinist, pianist, and guitarists perfectly complemented by musicians on…
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I don’t think I’ve ever rooted for a U.S. Olympic athlete to win a gold medal more than today when Ibtihaj Muhammad began her quest for victory in the women’s individual sabre fencing competition. And I say that as someone who has passionately rooted for countless American Olympic athletes over…
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Hijabi. The word stumbles about my tongue in an ungainly fashion instead of rolling off gracefully. When it escapes my mouth, it falls flat. I realize then that I hate it. This word confines me within a box, reducing who I am as a human being to a dress code…
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