Ep. 5: Reyhab Patel

Elaine

 Welcome back to Cha-Tea circle. Hey everyone this is Elaine here. This is part two of our two part series on Muslim Futurism and dreaming with Muslim creatives. Episode one featured Abbas Rattani and the work featured on the Mipsterz arts platform for Muslim creatives. If you haven't checked that out yet, I wholeheartedly invite you to have a listen.  

Today, we'll be speaking with one of the artists who is featured on the platform. Reyhab Mohmed Patel. Reyhab is PhD student at Carleton university whose work focuses on countering Islamophobia and exploring the intersecting themes of fashion, art and religion alongside imagining futurism as resistance. I first met Reyhab at Mosquers the Muslim Oscar's held in Edmonton, Canada. And my partner Aftab Hafeez helped create the music for her project Khawab which we'll talk about today.  Co-op beans to dream in Ooredoo and it's a storytelling project that focuses on transforming Muslim women in Toronto into their fictional alter egos.  

Hey, Reyhab. Welcome. Thank you so much for joining me today. How are you doing? 

Reyhab

I'm great. I'm so excited to be here.  

Elaine

And happy Ramadan! Thanks for joining during Ramadan. 

Reyhab

Thank you. It makes it even more special.

Elaine

So for our listeners who are getting to know you for the first time, I was wondering if you would just share a little bit about your origin story and your inspirations for your work with Khawab and anything else you'd like our listeners to know about you.

Reyhab

Yeah, for sure. So as you introduced, I am Reyhab Mohmed Patel. I am a PhD student. I like situating myself in my research and things that I do, and what that means is, well, I'm South Asian, and I use South Asian because, my mom's Pakistani, and then my dad's Indian, so I'm just a mix of brown, which is great.

But they met and got married in Saudi Arabia, Jeddah. So, I feel like I come from a very mixed culture where, a bit of Pakistani, Indian, a bit of Saudi and Arab cultural practices every day in my family as well. So I think when I started thinking about Khawab and to do a project that incorporates Muslim women's identity, it was like, well, there is no singular Muslim women, right? We are not a copy and paste of one another. So whenever I'd wanna do something fun. I want to do something creative, as a joke, my mom would be like, “Okay, you keep dreaming.“ So that's where the word “to dream” came from. So the word Khawab in Urdu is to dream.

Elaine

Yeah, thank you for that. Maybe I can also ask you to just situate yourself, where you are located right now and how your project intersects with where you're located currently. 

Reyhab

For sure. So I'm in Canada. My family lives in Toronto and I'm studying at Carleton University. So I'm in Ottawa. I did my undergrad at TMU and I did sociology with a minor in psychology, and then my Master's was in fashion. 

When I originally wanted to do my Master's, it was either sociology at University of Ottawa or fashion at TMU. And I remember my dad being okay, “will, a Master's in fashion get you a job?”

And I was like, It doesn't matter if he'll get me a job because I'm going to do a PhD anyways, so I might as well do something that I'm passionate about. 

Throughout my Master's, this was a turning point. I originally wanted to do something on social media and see how Muslim women were using clothing to express themselves. But, midway through my Master's, the London attack happened where the Afzaal family were brutally murdered. And I think that really just, it, it took me a moment to realize, like, the, this Muslim family was murdered because they looked Muslim. Because the grandma was wearing shalwar kameez, the mother was wearing a hijab, right? These visible aspects of these Muslim women kind of situated them as, Muslim. 

And to be in Canada, which is considered, like, “oh, Canada's so tolerant, it's so multicultural”–it shifted my interest. In a way, I would say like, um, like rage was burning through me as an academic to be like there isn't enough work on that we think about fashion as like celebratory, let's celebrate Muslim women in fashion, like Halima Aden in Vogue and just that–I was like, okay, but it's also very traumatic and dangerous, right?

Like when we think about mainstream media, how that influences the way Muslim women are perceived beyond the narrative of either they’re radicalized Muslims or they’re super liberal Muslims. What about in between, right? And I think that really, inspired me to go on and understand what it meant for Muslim women to wear the clothes that they were wearing every day.

And so when I applied for my PhD, I said, in my Master's, I discovered this concept called spatial visibility, which means our spaces make us visible. So for Muslim women, when they're taking, for example, for my participants, if they were taking the subway, they'd be like, “Well, I might as well put on a hoodie because I'm safer this way traveling at 9 p.m. as a Muslim woman instead of putting on a hijab.” So that space in the subway would make them into a hyper visible Muslim woman.  

But throughout that summer after my Master's, I kind of got pulled into Khawab and I met so many Muslim creatives and I was like, wait, I'm using art, I'm using fashion to understand how Muslims are overcoming Islamophobia. And meeting these fellow creatives, I'm like, there is a whole landscape to understand how art is being used, especially because the term art is shifting away from this traditional understanding. 

Elaine

Yeah. Thank you for sharing all of those diverse influences and your inspiration in fashion, and I love the anecdote of, you know, I can do an MA in fashion because I'm going to do a PhD anyways.  

So for our listeners who don't know, could you share what exactly is Khawab in terms of the presentation, the art form? And also you mentioned the different Muslim creatives you met and were inspired by, maybe collaborated with. Could you say something about these different people and how you worked with them? Just shout out to whoever else is a part of this project. 

Reyhab

Yeah, I'll start off with the process. I reference my Masters a lot because it did kind of inspire me to combine and like bridge academia with the arts, right? So the concept that I was using was Muslim Futurism that the MIPSTERZ founded and built a lot on. So I'm like, okay, how do I bring Muslim Futurism when I think about fiction and Muslim identity, I'm thinking about the mainstream media, right? But to me, I was like, no, Muslim women can be exceptional. 

And, when I was defending my Master's thesis, they asked a question like, okay, what do you want to be in five years? I'm like, okay, well, academically, I want to be a Doctor. But personally, I want to be a superhero. And then my professor Joseph, he was like, “Reyhab, you're already a superhero.” And I think in like that moment , it did trigger something in me where I'm like, yeah! I closed my laptop. And then I'm like, wait, I reopened it. And then I'm emailing the MIPSTERZ. 

It was just like, a body reaction to me being like, Hey, I have an idea for a project. And I'm like, I want to showcase Muslim women when they're alter ego. Cause if I'm here as a hijabi academic Muslim woman saying I can be a superhero, there's so many other alter egos that have to exist. So, I went in, I emailed Abbas and Yusuf and being like, okay, let's set up a meeting. I have this idea. I don't, I didn't know the process. I didn't know how funding would work or anything but it was just like let me just throw this out there. I created like a pitch on powerpoint of just images and I'm like this is roughly what I'm thinking, let's do something. So he's like, okay, “What is your biggest dream? And then what is something more tangible?”

And I was like, okay something more tangible is let's do a photo series. So originally we thought that we're going to take a before photo of their everyday identity. So, for example, Urooj Khan was one of my participants. She's an actor in real life. We also had Minhas who works like a nine to five job, but her alter ego was an elf, right? A daisy token elf. 

And then we had SuKha as well, who was a fashionista, but also her alter ego was this really cool, underwater octopus warrior. So it was so exciting to be like, yes, let's do a participant call. I kept saying that this project is more of a collaboration because I don't want to influence the alter egos of my participants. I don't want to say like, ah, this is what you should fit into. 

So part of the casting call or sorry, participant call was: “Tell me about yourself and describe your alter ego in the most like detailed way possible.” So we did get a range of people. I met up with them on zoom just to kind of get a brief idea of how can I include people in this project, right?  

We had a few people from the States were interested as well, but it was Toronto based, so I was just like, I'm so sorry, maybe when we extend this, like, we can't stop with our dreams here, we gotta keep going. So, that was really exciting to understand, okay, Khawab means to dream.

So when Yusuf was like, okay, “what's the project's name?” And I'm like, I'm not saying I'm a dreamer. I'm just thinking about “to dream” because I'll constantly be thinking about it when I'm going to bed or waking up and it's a part of myself of like I want to do something exciting. 

So, Khawab in its essence, let me summarize it for you, is a photo series project. It's a series of portraits that kind of look at Muslim women's alter ego. It's as simple as that. If someone who identifies as Muslim. And they're like, “This is who I am in my reality. And if I could be anything without the limitations of reality, this is who I would be.” And I'd be like, okay, let's bring it to life. 

Elaine

Yeah, that's amazing. And everyone, please check out the photo series. I believe there will be other installations of this coming up, which maybe you could speak to. And another question before we get to that, just, you mentioned Muslim Futurism, and I was wondering if you could describe what that means for you in the context of this project.

Reyhab

So like my PhD project is on Muslim Futurism. So in summary, I described my PhD as to understand how Muslim artists are using artistic practices to overcome Islamophobia. So when I was doing my proposals and I'm trying to get a supervisor, I'm like, okay, I want to use Muslim Futurism. The concept itself was super intriguing, but again, there's not much in-depth literature on what Muslim Futurism is. MIPSTERZ did have a conference as well on trying to conceptualize it, so I jokingly was telling Abbas that, “Hey, you know, maybe MIPSTERZ is moving into something more intense, something more new.”

But Muslim Futurism is the present for me. I'm gonna spend my PhD years trying to conceptualize it, and so far, the way I've been able to define it is as an emerging social movement that uses arts and fashion as modes of identity formation and self-expressions as a way of resisting rampant Islamophobia. So Muslim identities beyond the constraints of hegemonic and oppressive realities and not limited to like settler-colonialism, Islamophobia, Orientalism and anti-Black racism. So that's the way I've conceptualized it and that's the framework that I use in a lot of my work. 

Elaine

Great. And the installation or future iterations of Khawab, where will that be taking place? 

Reyhab

So the first one you saw like a sneak peek of it at Mosquers the shout out to the Mosquers for allowing me to showcase my work. It was such a surreal moment to be like, “Hey, this is my portrait. These are my pictures that I was able to kind of bring to life.”

The other bit is now we do have a soundtrack coming in collaboration with Aftab and I'll let him say a few words. That being said, Iowa University, I believe Colorado Springs as well, there should be two Exhibitions one public and the other one in a university setting. For our Canadian listeners, we're working towards creating an exhibition slash an event where you can come and kind of experience your alter egos and learn about the privileges of being able to think about the future, especially in this day and age where we're constantly consuming the horrors of the world.  

Um, one thing I do wanna emphasize is when I talk about the present, especially when it comes to the concept of Muslim Futurism and to dream, it is very privileged. It's a very privileged standpoint for us. For our Palestinian, Sudanese brothers and sisters who are suffering, they don't have the privilege. Their future could be looking at like, will we have a meal the next day? Where are we sheltering the next day? And I'm very grateful for the MIPSTERZ to take on this position of being like, yeah, we can have these hard conversations at the same time as we're celebrating ourselves, right? 

It's not a selfish to be like, hey this is what I'm thinking about but being constantly like our position is different from them but when we think about the unity of like Muslim identity of what it means to be Muslim and how a lot of the policies, the coverages and the outrages that we see also are situated within that realm–it's been a difficult place to navigate. So even to be like, hey, I'm a dreamer or I'm dreaming with Khawab, there's a bit of, like, survivor's guilt to it, even though I'm not Palestinian. I feel their trauma, the secondary trauma, right? Of wanting to help, but there's only so much that we could do within this position.

So, to even think about our alter egos is a way of celebrating our joy, but acknowledging that there's so much work to do and our future starts today.

Elaine

Yeah, thank you for those comments. And I was thinking about that as well. And in this moment, there is this kind of survivor's guilt to be dreaming. But at the same time, I feel it's such a necessary form of engagement. And when I look at figures who I've admired in the past, they've all been dreaming in the worst circumstances, they've never stopped dreaming. So yeah, I just wanted to offer that word of solidarity, basically.  

In the process of creating Khawab, I was wondering if you could share what kind of medium did you guys make the photo series through? And also, how did your participants choose their alter egos? Was there like a greater story behind that? Each person's alter ego might've been different. Maybe you could share yours or anyone else's who would be comfortable having a bit of their story shared. 

Reyhab

So I actually had a Google Sheet that I gave access to my participants and it wasn't like I was capping out on just five participants. It was okay, who could meet up on this day, right? Because I was moving to come to Ottawa. I wanted to book this space, but I also didn't want it to be like an overwhelming project where we were just stuck with these photos and you're like, okay, what do I do? And I wanted to keep it within my capabilities. 

Alongside photographer friend, Hamza, who was like a great, great help. I'm so thankful for him because to me, I would be word vomiting things to him and he'd be like, “I got it.” And then I'm like, “how did you know?” And he's like, “Oh you said it” but I'm like, “yeah but when I think back that didn't make sense!” And then he would ask me to sketch out the portraits to be like, “okay If you're think how do you want it captured show me” and I'm like “I'm not i'm not an artist.” He's like “No no, you are an artist just do it.” And then I was looking back at some of those sketches and I was laughing because I don't know how Hamza took that and kind of made it into that. 

The photography piece was a really, really big piece to it. And the reason that I wanted Hamza to be my photographer for this project was I think I clicked with him on a very personal and spiritual level where I'm like, you seem like an exceptionally cool person. I would love to, get to know you and I'm so thankful for that project because I have a lifelong friendship with him in that sense of I can talk to you about like my spiritual–the word I can't even find the words–like if I'm having troubles and I'm just like, “Okay, I need somebody to understand this from a very Muslim perspective.” And he would be giving me that advice. And it wasn't that “Oh, I'm just looking for solitude.” It was very, yeah gentle in that sense. He was like, “I think with your project, it seems cool. We should use Midjourney.”

I was like, okay, I have no idea what a Midjourney is. And he's like, okay, well, let me tell you what a Midjourney is. So we kind of explored and played around with Midjourney and DALLE to  get these backgrounds. And I think the use of AI was so interesting. At that moment when we did it, we were like, yes, okay, awesome. Let's put in these descriptions. And while we were doing that, I realized that AI was quite biased, right? If we were writing South Asian, you're getting like what was the word? The orientalist color scheme of it, right? And then if I'm writing, okay, like a Muslim woman, all of a sudden, you get a random piece of Islamic art.

And I'm like, okay, I don't understand the association with that, but cool. So it stood out for me and, I'm like that's, that's, I was like taking down my little academic notes and be like, okay, I can write a paper on this, on AI's biases, you know? And when I was trying to Google AI bias, there was maybe two or three papers or they're like blog posts that people have written. So I'm like, okay, this is clearly an issue that I'm going to just pinpoint for next time.  

But I did create a Google sheet where I had  prompts of okay: Who is your alter ego? What do they look like? What do they do? Do they have their abilities? How do they associate with who you are, or if they don't associate at all?

So I had them kind of fill that out before the day of the photo shoot, so a lot of them were like Google images of this is what I think my alter ego looks like and everything. And that helped me with the preparations because a lot of the clothing that we brought, some of the makeup and everything really built from their inspiration, right?

For Aalya, for example, she's a pottery artist and she said, when I talked to her, she's like, well, I think about Jalpari. And Jalpari is a mermaid in Pakistani folk, folklore, so she was like, yeah, there's a lot of familiarities and we don't talk about it enough in the west. You know of like south asian mermaids Pakistani mermaids and like the pictures that she did, she showed bangles henna and the traditional mermaid as well. So she brought in her costume and then we had Desiree who was the makeup artist and they're like, “Well, I love glitter and color so I bought a lot of my glitter and color.” I'm like, “okay in case we need it.” And she created an exceptional look on her with a lot of dimension, textures where it's like, yeah, I wouldn't have imagined it either.

So that's why I keep saying it's a collaboration, right? There was this big idea and step by step. We started like minimizing it. At no point did I want to be like, oh I'm in control of the narrative. This is what your alter ego should look like. I keep thinking back to Minhas's. So Minhas and SuKha, they were their own makeup artists. So they did their own makeup. And again, you create your alter ego. You do what you see fit. 

So for Minhas, for her token elf, she had her South Asian attire. But I also without my mom knowing went through her stuff and  brought out this really pretty shawl Dupatta that had  embroidery in it. And funny story because when I went home and I was showing my mom the images, she's like, “I have something like that.”

And I was like, “Oh, totally.” And I washed it and put it back in her box. It was never missing.  But now she knows and she's just I'm like “Don't worry, I'll buy you another one.” Like, it's fine. You know? But yeah, it was a team effort where all the participants, everyone that came together on the shoot, it was like, we were there building at the moment. What emotions are we feeling at that moment? What emotions do you want to be perceived? Right? 

So when it came to mind, for example, my alter ego was an anti-hero. We talk about Muslims,  all the time about being viewed in a very negative light, right? And I'm like, okay, but if I'm a superhero realistically, let's think about it like a Muslim woman wearing a hijab. Make her brown cuz I'm brown. If I was running around the streets trying to beat up criminals. I would be labeled God knows what, right? 

So I'm like, it's giving anti-hero. And I think that's where I'm like, yes, this is who I want. And the photos were meant to emphasize that emotion of, you're seeing vibrancy, you're seeing a bit of my personality, but there's also like the fear of the unknown, cause I'm wearing a mask at that moment.

Like in a way, I was mimicking the idea of a niqab because my mom wears a niqab. And then I remember just like a couple of days before I was reading how these celebrities were talking about the niqab as “Oh my God, they're letter boxes.” And people are like, “Oh my God, it's so scary.” And I'm like, okay, so you're scared of the niqab.

But if I'm a superhero wearing a mask, it looks so cool. So where's the double standards coming from? You know? So it was kind of like a play on those types of accessories and what we're feeling and the main point for me with these portraits was I wanted to capture an emotion and a feeling so that's where the soundtrack working with Aftab came into place where I would be describing these emotions in me like, listen, when I listen to this piece in the soundtrack, the climax sounds like this and this is what I feel and that's what I want the soundtrack to encapsulate.

So when someone's looking at these portraits. I'm hoping they would feel this uneasiness. Maybe then they feel a bit of lightness when they move towards the lighter portraits. 

Elaine

The photo, your anti hero, like, superhero alter ego is really badass. And I love the way, I mean, it's so much richer now knowing from your own interpretation and perspective, how you're trying to reinterpret or resignify or even like to play with people's double standards or assumptions about certain accessories. That's really cool. 

I was thinking you had mentioned really early on that there were people in the United States who were also interested in joining in the project. This made me wonder what would be the difference between Muslim women of Toronto or of Canada versus the United States. If you were to extend the metaphor of dreaming, you know, further beyond these national borders, what would change? And maybe that would highlight what's unique about the project right now.

Reyhab

Yeah. I'll say this much. Working with the MIPSTERZ who are NYC, New York based, I've come to realize that our spaces are very different, like for someone who's not in North America– they're like “Canada and the States, they're one and the same,” but they're very much not. My understanding of the States ever since I was young It's like well, we would cross the border to go to Buffalo for example, right? I would be like hiding. My Muslimness would be at the top is like, oh my god: am I gonna get hate crimed? 

And this is me crossing from Niagara Falls to go to the US Niagara Falls Buffalo, right? But then as I got older and when I started going to New York City, and then we went to Boston, it was like, okay, no, it is very media, the media is showcasing the States, as like “ah, we're very anti-Muslim.” And I say this as somebody who, who hasn't lived in the States, right? And also the conversations that I would have with Abbas of being, look, it's really intense here. And I'm like, okay. It's also intense and kind of but I don't know if it's at the same level of I'm fearing for myself of safety in the public space, you know? 

And I think that also led to how artistic spaces are very different. When it comes to for example being like I'm gonna pay all my participants. I'm gonna pay the photographer and the makeup artist instead of relying on their generosity of their labor. I was like, Hey, then if I have some money, I'll give you an honorarium. And I think that was a really big difference of how the exchange of labor and services in the artistic spaces. 

I think in Canada, we're very much like, “No, we should be paid, right off the bat.” And even some of the jobs that I'm doing, it's like, okay, cool, I'll do this. And they’re like, “Okay, but make sure you're not going over your hours. And if you are, you let us know, and we'll make sure to pay you.”

And then what I hear from my friends in the States is like, “Oh, well, I haven't gone paid for six hours that I did six months ago!” And I was like, “oh, okay.” That was a very drastic difference of work ethics that I'll say that I am like learning about but also the Muslim identity so kind of going back to what I felt as a South Asian Canadian Muslim going into the States versus what it meant to be living as a Muslim in the States is so different. And I don't think I can speak on that experience at all. 

A lot of my experiences with Islamophobia happened in my adulthood. I just remember growing up knowing that, hey, people don't like Muslims. And it's much worse in the States. When my brother, he's a scientist and he wanted to do his Master's PhD in the States, my parents were like “Nope!” They're like, “Are you good? You're a brown Muslim man and you're going to be a scientist? You're looking to be flagged.” And my dad was like, “Yeah, you're probably already you know, being surveillanced and you're in Canada.” So like you're gonna stay away far as possible.” And so he did his study in Canada and then he went to Europe to do the rest.

So there was that fear also that the U. S. is really bad against Muslims. But then seeing all these artists and people engaging in everyday as a resistance of being unapologetically Muslim–is so inspiring to see their lives as Muslim Americans being “we're here to stay and you're going to respect us.” It's so, inspiring, but also, it gives me very much a like a reflection of oh, maybe I am…for me living in Toronto, especially like I'm very privileged, you know, in a diverse space. 

I just want to quickly add to this–the little town that I live in. I grew up around a lot of brown, black people. That's just what it was. So when I left for university and I would get on the subway and come to Toronto and I would be working in core downtown Toronto and when I got my first retail job, I had somebody be like “So do you think I'm gonna go to hell?” Snd I'm like, excuse me, and she's like “Yeah I had a Muslim girl tell me I'm gonna go to hell cuz I'm wearing shorts.” And I was like, “Okay I'm doing your eyebrows,” you know, because I was working in a beauty store and I'm like, I'm not here to I'm not sitting on a throne judging you and I think it just made me like oh people don't know Muslims in Canada either, in Toronto. Because everyone's like Toronto is so diverse, right?

The experiences that I can tell you, I had a co-worker once tell me like, “You should come into work without a hijab,” and I was like, whoa, whoa, okay, I should complain to HR but I'm three months in a job I don't know if I want to at the moment–where it shattered my understanding of  the soft Canadian narrative…where I was surrounded by a lot of brown people.

A lot of my experiences pre-adulthood, were very much, I want to say naive, and so when I got into academia, I went like, Islamophobia is an issue, and I still had professors in my undergrad being like, “it might be your lived experience, but Islamophobia is not an issue in Canada.” And I'm like, this is, I'm like, I could see the direct, very big difference just from a subway ride away.

Come on. Like, when I go back home, cool, I'm surrounded by brown people. The moment I come to Yorkville, core Toronto, come on, I have all these white people making these assumptions about my Muslim-ness. I had somebody once yell at me that they were going to punch me in the face because of my hijab, and I didn't even hear them fully because I had headphones on.

But, everyone was just looking at me, and I'm like, Okay, you know what? If I cross the street, I could walk past him, but I could also get punched. So, I'm going to take the long way to school. And I never experienced that, and it was like, Ah, no, Islamophobia is very much here. It's literally in my face. But, we were conditioned to think that Canadian society is very soft and gentle and where we don't experience it, but very much it was covert, you know, you don't see it until you see it until you're experiencing it until your classmate is telling you about it. 

Elaine

Mm hmm. Yeah, what you're saying makes me think that maybe there's some way in which the American narrative dominates such that people are like, Oh, that's where it's really bad.

And it causes maybe someone thinking of Canada being like, Oh, well, this is like, we're so much better. There's no Islamophobia here through that weird comparison with America. 

Reyhab

Exactly, exactly. I think the biggest difference was it's like, the States is super violent against Muslims. At least in Canada, you're not getting beat up. But then, the examples that I've given, like the Quebec mosque shooting was one of the worst mass shootings in Canadian history. And there's that, right? There, there was a woman who got–a black Muslim woman who got stabbed in Edmonton, right? We talk about the Afzaal family. There are all these incidents and so even, NCC and the National Canadian Council for, uh, sorry, the National Council for Canadian Muslims, that's their work.

And from October to I want to say January was the date, there was a 1,300 percent increase in anti-Muslim and anti-Arab hatred. So, that was a like very big, in your face. Like, it's there until, like, you're not speaking about it. 

My brother, I remember–he told us this just two years ago. Because he grew up in that 9/11 society. Where he's like, yeah, we were doing a play. And they made me Abdul the terrorist. And we were all laughing in high school. And he was, like, an immigrant kid. He came here when he was, how old was he? 14, 15, right? And so, he's just going along with it, and he's like, “Yeah, even the teachers were laughing and stuff.” And I'm like, oh my God I'm like, why don't you ever tell me? And he's like “it just felt like, okay, it was just a part of my identity.” It's just like, “that's just like who we were.” And his name was Abdul Sami Patel, right? Ah, you even have like a very hyper Muslim name! 

And okay, I'm like my name is Reyhab and I go by Reyhab Mohmed Patel But when I've gone for interviews and they read Patel they're like, oh hi Like Fatima” and I'm like no. “Mariam?” No. “Oh, Patel. Oh, I thought you like you were Hindu.” So it's just like okay. So is my name shielding me from that Muslimness? 

But I just wanna quickly add that recently I went on a trip to Saudi Arabia and, some of my mom's family friends, they were asking me what my study and what my research was. And I was talking about Islamophobia. And they're looking at me like, it's such a foreign concept of “Ah, Islamophobia? Like, oh, like how, like what happens there?” And I think like that really, like, I'm still trying to navigate it, it's been three weeks, and I'm still thinking about it, I'm like, Ah, there's, there are people who have never experienced Islamophobia in any sense, you know?

And, there's a whole different way of going about issues that they, as a society, are going through, even as Muslims. But it's like, okay, well, that's interesting to know. My research is very contextual to Canadian Muslims. Because I can’t speak on American Muslims. I for sure cannot talk about Muslims in Saudi Arabia, you know, because the concept of Islamophobia within that realm did not exist to so many of them.

So that was really interesting. So yeah, for a lot of the participants from the States, and I think I had somebody reach out and they were in Scotland at the moment and they're like, “I'm traveling in between X, Y, Z,  I want to come in.” And it was like, I'm so curious to see what your experience as a Scottish Muslim is, but I couldn't include them in this project. 

Elaine

Yeah. That would be super interesting to see what is the range of experiences that people have? And I think even within, you know, Canada, there's so many different experiences because it seems like overall, this might be a broad generalization, but I've noticed this myself,  a lot of racism and hate crimes, violence, they tend to be very high in cities as well.

So, you talking about having grown up in another town, of mostly brown people, it it makes a lot of sense to me that your experience would have been different. And then, all of a sudden, it seems like in cities like in San Francisco too–there's this polarization that happens where any issue of the day or how people perceive you it just explodes that much more. 

Reyhab

Yeah. And I am  a TA in some of the work that I do in my PhD as well. And when I'm talking to these students and they'd be like, “Yeah, I come from this little town in near Ottawa that's like five six hours away, and this is the most diverse I've seen.” Snd to me I'm like, “Yeah, Ottawa is diverse, but it's not the most diverse I've seen” And it does kind of put into perspective of, okay this is who the media ends up targeting as well, right? Like people who don't have experience of meeting Muslims, knowing their stories, and they're just constantly seeing people like themselves. So seeing someone else, it's obviously very much othering to itself, you know? 

Elaine

To that end, This is a big question. So you can move with it in any direction you want. But in terms of the stories that you want to put out there with Khawab or with your research or other artistic projects, what do you want to convey to the world about Muslim identity, in a broad sense?  

Reyhab

You know, like this is something I talk to my sister about all the time of what it means to be  Muslim and seeing these stories of “This is Muslim representation.” And then sometimes you'll hear people say “We don't want Muslim representations like that's not who we are.” But it's like “No this could very much be a reality for someone.” And the goal of my project really when I did the call was you must self identify as a Muslim. And something my mom has always raised me to believe, even if you have a grain of rice worth of faith, you're considered Muslim. Like, that's who you are. 

So, for me, I'm not there judging who is a good Muslim because I think the concept of a good Muslim is very, it comes from an anti-Muslim like islamophobic perspective as well, right?  Are you conservative or are you a liberal Muslim? Like no we're following the same faith, right?

In the end, especially in the realm of Islamophobia, no one's gonna be like, “Ah, you're a liberal Muslim. Ah, you're a conservative Muslim.” No like you're Muslim. So if you're gonna get hate crimed, you're gonna get hate crimed, you know? That's just the reality of it. So just the complexities of Muslim identity. It's an internal battle, but it's also a battle to find community, of wanting to find people who are like-minded. And I don't want to complicate that for anyone. Instead, I want to be able to showcase and create a space where someone feels comfortable showcasing the Muslim side of themselves. 

And some of the other projects that I'm doing, especially before this summer–was I want to showcase Muslim joy. A lot of the stories that you see is Muslim trauma, right? South Asian daughters, for example. There'll be so many stories about South Asian women and their mothers. It's so complex. It's traumatic. And this is a conversation I had with one of my friends of, “Yeah, my mom's toxic, but I love her.” I will love her till the end of time, and that's just something that we will understand, and I refuse for our relationship to be labeled under that, for other people to be like, “Yeah. This is not healthy.” But I'm like that might not be healthy to you but I choose to accept it for its flaws but also all the joy that it brings me. I want to highlight the sense of familiarity within that sense. So I hope going forward a lot of the work that I do can highlight Muslim joy instead of trauma. 

Like I said, the future starts today. So what I do today will impact what I do tomorrow and the privilege of thinking about tomorrow and the joys. And I want to bring it back to the Palestinian resilience once again. We're constantly seeing the horrors, but at the same time you'll see a video of a child laughing. You'll see these men who are pulling bodies out of rubbles again and again, but they're also comforting these children. They're making them laugh. 

There is still that joy and I strongly believe like joy is resistance right? In the face of Islamophobia in the face of trauma when someone is trying to be like “You know what,  you don't belong.” It's like, “okay, but I do.” You saying that isn't going to change anything, right? 

I'm here, I'm existing, and I am enjoying the life that I have just by existing and doing what makes me feel like I belong–should be like the end result of it.  

Elaine

Yeah,  yeah, I got little chills when you said joy as resistance. I was thinking exactly of the kind of videos you were saying, and I was reflecting for myself how, I don't know if you notice this in the media that you consume, but oftentimes the only kind of violence we see on television or through news reporting is on black or brown bodies, and we never actually are bombarded with images of white bodies undergoing violence. And so I think there's a way that that is a very harmful image to consume again and again, because it associates trauma, then with black and brown bodies and it becomes the sole image that you see and that's very damaging because it normalizes violence in this really grotesque way. 

Reyhab

I think what stands out and I still think about it all the times that, almost every day when it was, I'm pretty sure it was one of the–somebody from, I can't remember who it was, but I'm pretty sure it was a politician, I can't remember if it was European or American, but he was like, “Yeah, like, of course we feel for Ukrainians, they look like us, right?”

And I was like, okay, like, that, I think, changed my perception of everything. Where it's like, I knew this to be true, but you just validated it. Looks like you as in what? Blonde hair, blue eyes? But we have Palestinians in this specific context, okay. You have kashmiris who also have light eyes and blonde hair, you have ethnic people with the same features. But the main difference is like they're not under your realm of who is considered white.  

It's hard for me to be like, I look forward to creating things that showcase joy, where I think a lot of us are trying to navigate what it means to be joyful without holding guilt. Because there is a lot of work to do and I feel like in order for us to even get there, we have to take one step forward in being confident in calling out the horrors that we see, but also being like, I am very, what can I do? Right? And that can be through consumption, what I'm choosing to engage with and what I'm choosing to consume. And in the last six months, my consuming habits have completely changed. And I know there are a lot of people who are like, it doesn't really matter. It's all one in the same. And I'm like, maybe? 

But actively, I'm still choosing something else, you know? I'm choosing that like–to me at least is not actively contributing to a larger issue. And that could be like fast fashion as well you know  because I talk about fashion and art all the time. In a way, they've situated fast fashion as a way for poor people to buy, right? But it's the over consumption where someone's like fast fashion is  bad buy it from that boutique and I'm like “Okay look, if I go and buy that one shirt from that boutique, it's gonna cost me half my paycheck.” Let's be honest, right?

Like if i'm a part-time student versus if someone's buying fast fashion they're like, “Sell, I can get four or five outfits from that.” But realizing that you don't constantly need things. You don't constantly need to produce things that it's okay to slow down. And even in the work that we're doing, in my Master’s, in my PhD, it was so hard for me to find a supervisor because they're like, “We're so interested in your work, but we don't have experience with this. So, no.” 

And I was like, okay, maybe I should change my project into something else. But then I realized, I can slow down. I can take a breather, and that's okay. I don't need to go by this timeline of speeding up, finding somebody who is perfect. Because perfection doesn't exist in that sense. And I am so lucky to have found an amazing–my Master’s supervisor, Allison, has been like a godsend I think she has changed my perception of what academia can be and it can be fun and it can be emotional and for her in my Masters, I think it was such a hard time especially in the pandemic because I did my Master's virtually. 

There was times where I would be presenting and they I did a project for belonging and I straight up sobbed like I was crying. And like I think that I'm like, oh my god, if I was actually in front of all these people I couldn't have turned off the camera, you know? That's embarrassing. But, I was so lucky to be in tuned with my emotions that now as like a PhD student. I will say it I'm yeah, I'm an emotional person, but that's not gonna make me any less of an academic.

I'm, okay. It's okay for me to feel horrible. It's okay for me not to–I'm, sorry, I can't hand in an assignment to you on islamophobia because of what I'm consuming. It is mentally and physically exhausting and this is not on my priority list, so I'm going to need to step back, take a break. And my supervisor Xiaobei Chen is a wonderful person–she is a wealth of knowledge and I think I'm so lucky to have her. For her to take me on as a student as well. I feel so, so lucky. 

And her class was the first class that had a section on Islamophobia and I think that filled my heart with so much joy 'cause I am a PhD student. So we're talking about four years undergrad. We're gonna add two years of my Master's, sixth, and then my seventh year in post-secondary education–this is the first time I've ever seen Islamophobia on a syllabus. So yeah, it's, it's changing. So for me, if I had looked for a supervisor a year before, no, I didn't find it. But I found her at the right time, right? At the right moment. 

And that's what I'm trying to convey is–it's okay to slow down. And especially say, the arts and the work that we're constantly producing and to have the empathy. And I'm so happy that that mode of education and learning is also changing of being like–let's be empathetic to students. We don't need to torture our graduate students because they're going to be educators and then they're going to be like, well, “I learned it this way, so I'm going to be like this as well.” But to have that empathy is what makes us, I think, stronger as human beings.  

Elaine

Yeah, I appreciate you foregrounding the empathy and also feeling emotions. In a lot of ways, I think what accounts for both the violence of the world, the compounding violence of the way media portrays certain quote unquote others, and the violence of academia is precisely this separation with feeling and with empathy. And so the fact that you can feel your feelings is, is already a kind of resistance.

So hear that Academy? Feel your feelings! 

Reyhab

My thoughts always end up like, I want to bridge academia and the arts, because the arts is known to invoke emotion. So why can't I bring that into my academic place?  If I'm presenting and I get emotional, that's not going to make me any less than, you know? I think, if anything, it makes me better equipped to handle these–the hardships that, not only that I face, but, say my students will face, that my colleagues will face. I'm better equipped to be there as their support, and I'm not saying that I'm obligated to help them, but, you know, the world is horrible. One, one shoulder can mean a whole world to someone. Even if it's just, like I'm so sorry I can't hand in my work because, well, I'm consuming a lot of horrible images and I feel messed up and I can't write about it.

It's like, yeah, it's fine. I don't have a deadline to meet for a couple of weeks. So you can take your time, you know? I just think kindness and empathy, especially, it's a very tying ground. And that's something that I'm seeing change in the artistic and the academic field. And I'm, I'm so  excited in a way to see us change. Feel your emotions. It's okay. We don't need to be heartless. You know?  

Elaine

Yeah, and I was thinking when you mentioned your current advisor was the first faculty who had a section in their class on Islamophobia, I was thinking, actually, wouldn't it be great if, in a future iteration of this course or a course you teach the section is not on Islamophobia, but on Muslim Futurism or joy or–that's again is another shift in the narrative and also in the way that we're consuming, like what it means to be Muslim or, Islam in different contexts, whether it's in Canada or the U.S. or…

Reyhab

Well, fingers crossed. I am proposing for next year. I hope in the next couple of months at Carlton,  their first Fashion course and it's storytelling using like art and fashion. 

Elaine

Fingers crossed. Keep us posted on when the course comes into fruition and how it goes. Yeah.  

To bring us towards the last part of our conversation, you've reflected a little bit on the intersection of academia and creative work. Any aspirations, anything else you would like to mention that we haven't mentioned already today? Or anything else you'd like to name as a dream and manifest? 

Reyhab

Yeah, I want to do a lot and I think that's completely okay. For the longest time, I believe that you could only do one thing. For example, for my mom, I'd be like, Oh my God, like I'm doing this creative project X, Y, Z.  And it was right after my Master's, right? So I'm telling her all excited and she's like, Oh, that's cool, but you're still gonna do a PhD, right?

And I was like, yes I'm still gonna be a doctor and I want to do it and like my brother is a doctor He has his PhD. My sister just graduated as well, and she's also a PhD and then there's me. So like my last name is Patel and I keep telling my parents I'm like don't worry, if God wills we're gonna be the PhD Patel’s–we'll nickname ourselves that, like all your kids have PhDs, you know? And I think it just kind of fell into that routine of yeah, I'm gonna do a PhD because I want to be an educator. 

At one point I was thinking about going to teacher's college but then I decided to do a Master's and then when I was a TA especially, I realized how much I enjoyed talking about these big ideas of the world and changing what it means to be a teacher and at a student at the same time where I'm like, yeah, this, this is what I want to do.

And like going forward. So I was like, okay, what are your next steps? Cause my sister just finished and she was struggling to find a job. Okay. Like, and I'm just like, Oh no, like, is this, should I quit now while I'm at it? So I can get a job instead of being like three years behind? And I realized no, I want to be–I want to curate and I want to teach, so why not do that as a Professor?

Why not talk about different ways of learning and teaching? And, for example, the course that I'm making, I have options for non-written work as well, because there's different ways of learning. Art is a way of understanding. And, and for example, what I keep saying is, for some people, it's easier to write 1 500 words and for someone else, they might conceptualize their thoughts in a different format, whether it's literally talking or it's, you know, through artistic mediums. And I'm like, well, they all end up at the same point. 

As an educator, I want to know, were you equipped to take these ideas and understand and translate them? Yeah, okay. Well, then I think I did my job. For some people if they're in sociology, for example, yeah, you should know how to write a paper, yeah, you should know how to cite, but you should know how to translate your ideas. But if you're not gonna publish papers all the time, there's no point in me asking you to write a 2,000 word paper as your final where it's gonna give you anxiety because I've been on that thing, especially when you have four or five other courses. 

Or you do something that it's easier. Well, if I'm asking you to tell me about five concepts and you're like, you know what, I can tell you that in an infographic–give me the infographic. I want to know, you know? And I think just, going forward, I want to bring back that joy of connecting with people and I guess for now it's within the academic setting and I'm stepping forward into the artistic spaces and I'm so excited. And I'm like, I want to be an artist. If you ask me what I want to do I'll give you ten things.

I have notes of a short film that I want to create one day and I'm like, okay I don't know I don't know where, where to go about this. Where do I get funding?  Who do I talk to about creating this story? And then I'm like, oh, well, I have an idea of another photo shoot that I want to do. And I enjoy colors because colors invoke emotions and they're fun. And I want to bring color to my life. And I want to do a photo series for that. 

Talk to me every day and I'll tell you a different idea that I want to do. And I'm like, I will do them all. I'm not going to just stop at  getting my degree and be like, ah, I'm done with. No, like life doesn't have to be boring. We can continuously do things. 

It's just, I hope that this drive stays and it's not set ablaze by the horrors of the world where we can continue to bring them to life. Like our ideas, you know, like let's bring people together. Let's go back and I'm gonna just–this sounds really random, but I fell into the rabbit hole of the hundreds reddit… So when we talk about sci-fi and then dystopia, futures, there was something where they're like, yeah,  destruction of society starts with the destruction of art and culture because you forget who, where you come from.

And I was like, Ooh, that was so profound coming from like a reddit post. It changed my life and I'm like, you know what? You're right. I'm gonna hold on to my culture. I'm gonna hold on to art because you know, even 50, 60 years from now, I can look back to it and like my everyday life would have impacted how I view it then compared to how I'm viewing it now. 

Elaine

That that's like the best Reddit post I've heard. And I agree. I think that's something especially where I'm at and working with a lot of undergrads, most people are thinking about their education instrumentally, which is partially how they got to a place like Stanford, and thinking about how to make money, what to do to make money.

And I think that if anything, I hope these students and, others, PhD students are not excluded from this, can reconnect with other aspects of themselves and other forms of expression because it's so vital and I do feel that that is something that a lot of people feel but maybe suppress this desire to create and to bring something new into the or just to express that's a kind of creativity too and so much of that is suppressed in our education now. 

Reyhab

Yeah like yeah, my master's in fashion and I work in beauty retail, so as you can tell I enjoy doing makeup a lot and wearing colorful outfits and everything like that. And I would be buying stuff. I enjoy going and like getting a fun liquid liner or a colorful editorial look and all of that. And  I would have people be like, oh my god. How you must have so much money like you're buying stuff and I'm like actually no I'm working four jobs right now but I'm gonna be broke regardless, so I'd rather be broke and having fun than being broke and like sob, because I'm gonna sob about it anyway, so I might as well do that while I'm applying, my eyeliner, you know?

Like, I'm doing this fun look. And I think just bringing our joy into the small things that we do.  I bring makeup as an example, right? Like for someone if it's doing a full face of makeup brings you joy do it. I love that I can go into my graduate seminar wearing the most fun clothes that I can like that I enjoy right? Like oh, it's a cardigan with strawberries on it. And then I'm wearing my pink rain boots. And that's fine. I'm not thinking twice about, oh my god, is this like, how a graduate student should look like? And I'm like, no, like, yeah, I'm a graduate student and I look like that, so that's all that matters, you know?

It brings me joy. It, it's reflecting who I am, but it's also like, hey, no, there's no deeper meaning, no offense, there's no deeper meaning in me wearing that strawberry cardigan. I just wore it because it looks cute. To me, like yeah, like, that just fit my mood, so I want to wear it, you know? And I hope that students especially understand that. Do things that bring you happiness because the world is still going to be horrible.

I'm so sad, like, the reality to me, at least, is, there will never be a perfect world. But that's where these concepts of Muslim Futurism come into place that we are privileged to think about how we would imagine utopia, right? What it means to live in a world that is anti-oppressive. And even if we reach the height of utopia, for example, a world is perfect. Are we gonna have happiness? No, but  let's do it  one step at a time, like of bringing joy to your life. Bring empathy to your life and that's I think that's a part of my Islamic values as well Like my parents have always taught us you be kind and give. If you give, God will give you more. So if I have two dollars left I'll give somebody a dollar and that's okay because again, I was a rich person with two dollars.

I'll be rich with a dollar anyways, you know? And I feel good giving it to someone. Hopefully that dollar changes somebody's life, even if it's getting a meal. But I mean in today's day and age, like I don't know what that dollar is doing to be fair. Like it might just be sitting in a back pocket chilling while that five dollar coffee bill is waiting for it to be paid like that, you know?

But it's okay to feel your emotions. And to allow yourself to feel them, especially in the work that we're doing–whether it's academic, whether it's art, whether it's the combination of the two, because that's what we're going to do. We're going to bridge them together. 

Elaine

I'm so excited for your future work, your current work, bridging academia with the arts. That's also a personal passion of mine. And I was reflecting as you were speaking that I think what's so powerful about your example of a cardigan with strawberries is that it's not for anyone. There's no instrumental gain. So that's something really lovely in the logic of a system in a world which doesn't create a space or really values that kind of spontaneity for yourself, for no reason.

For just joy. So, you've inspired me to rethink my own wardrobe. I will, I will be looking into new cardigans and shirts and suits for myself. 

So  we're coming to a close and I wanted to invite you to share a takeaway that either you've had through our conversation today or that you would like listeners to have leaving our conversation today.  

Reyhab

Honestly, a recent bit of empathy and joy is where it's at. Joy is resistance. You shouldn't be ashamed to feel your emotions because as women, our emotions are usually used against us of being like “You can't think critically because you're emotional.” But it's no, I think I can think much more clearly now that I've had a good cry, like, you know, like now I can think about it without worrying about holding in my tears. It's okay to feel and the reality is, you can feel joy, you can feel anger, and you can feel a lot of things, but I think that's what makes us human.

And I think going back to my psychology bit of my degree, it's like, no, but that's what's making us into functioning beings. This is how we build community, right? As a Muslim, I always tie back to the sense of ummah, of  you we are one in the same. So like, let's stop separating ourselves from, from little things, little differences, and instead, in the grand scheme of things, spirituality is between you and what you believe, right?

Nobody can tell me otherwise of how to believe and what not to believe. But that spirituality gives me a sense of guidance, and I hope for the listeners, you’re confident in being able to engage with your emotions and knowing that it's okay to feel things. That, that is it more than anything. 

Elaine

Well, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me and to share about your amazing work and your own story and your own dreams. This was such a rich conversation for me and I'm sure for all of our listeners, so thank you. 

Reyhab

Thank you so much for having me.