Macon, Georgia, mayor converts to Islam

hmm, not bad. I like it.

Not that there's anything really bad about that disconnect, and not that there's anything less heritage-finding about connecting with what your African counterparts are doing now, but something about it makes me vaguely skeptical. (I mean, it kinda steps on the old-model beliefs, really, because modern people want a monotheistic religion -- nobody wants to say "let's return to our animist roots.")

But whatever -- I had to type all that to realize it's just a nit that I pick at, and I don't particularly mind the results either way: you know, whatever complex reasons people have for being attracted to a religion are their complex reasons, and I'm happy for whatever people decide and all.

I think this is probably a huge part of the "returning to heritage" rhetoric associated with Islam for (some) African American converts, i.e. it's more about attempting a connection with Africa now than about history. I think African American conversions to Islam started happening at the same time as Third World politics gained currency, so the whole utopic idea that black people around the world could and should forge a shared identity politics. The cultural politics of that obviously happened in a lot of different ways, not always religious, but for people who were interested in religion, I think there was a way that Islam could function, because it already had a foothold in parts of Africa and very much did not have a foothold in the European West, as a kind of "third way." (the other obvious example being rastafarianism, I guess.) and even though that political moment has (maybe mostly) passed, Islam maybe still retains some of those associations. obviously that's just to address one dimension of the African American Muslim experience and it's not particularly relevant to many people's experience (children and grandchildren of converts, for example.)

haha you should've been in philly during the 80s, or NYC during the early 90s.