Post date: Oct 27, 2016 3:59:26 PM
This article, posted by Antonia Blumberg of the Huffington Post, discusses the possibility that Islam will be less essential to seventh grade curriculum in Tennessee public schools because of parents’ fear that their children are “learning too much” about Islam and are being “idoctorined” into Islam. This goes right along with the recent rise of Islamophobia in the United States and reminds me of “The Onion” piece that we read in week 3 of class. After reading this, a big part of our discussion was about how knowing less or more about a different race or religion may not make a difference in our prejudices. Knowing less can make us ignorant and in this ignorance we stereotype and generalize all of a people into one or two categories. Knowing more doesn’t necessarily lead to the opposite realization either. However, Blumberg discusses this very idea with Georgetown University’s Engy Abelkader, who claims that “now, more than ever students need religious literacy.” Abelkader wants students to be comfortable looking at Muslims and the Islamic religion as more than being terrorists, which is what much of the current discourse is in America. In this case, Abelkader believes that more knowledge would at least lead to a greater understanding of Islam and allow students to decide how they feel for themselves instead of the state deciding for them.