islam awareness week and MSA @ UT

I was asked about the origins of Islam Awareness Week at UT. I'm glad I was asked. I finally get to tell our story. But I feel hesitant to speak about my role for fear that my façade of humbleness will shear at the anchor bolts. here goes... for us at UT, IAW started way back in Fall 95 and I was its coordinator for its first few years. but the real origins go back further, what follows is based on legends and exagerated truth: I believe our IAW's roots lie with the first among the american born/raised muslim generation to enter college back in the late 80's, (folks like Asim Ghafoor Sahib). Those were the dark ages of MSA. Up till the mid-80's MSAs were more than campus clubs, they did community activities. But after masjids were built and the community activities shifted, the MSAs were left with nothing to do. A few students (members of international islamic movements) kept the orgs alive on most campuses with the simple OLSP (One Lecture Per Semester) formula. But wait, the ground was rumbling, some of the freshman american muslim youth had been community activists since high school (taking part in MYNA-Muslim Youth of North America). And now, desiring to be active on campus they joined the MSAs and by 1991-92, some of them had become officers. An OLPS MSA was boring, these kids wanted more (when do they find time to study??). I think it was some of these students in the mid-west that did the first “Islam Week” in 1990-92. and because most of the young activists around the country knew each other, the idea spread. By 1992 these american youth had revived MSA-National (Muslim Students Association of United States and Canada) and commissioned the “Ad-Hoc Task Force for the Establishment of Islam Week” which eventually evolved into today’s MSA Islam Awareness Week Task Force. (asad blows the dust off of his moldy “MSA Box”)*. The task force decided in late 1992 that “if 50 different MSAs conducted Islam Weeks at the same time, we could go from addressing issues concerning Islam in the Cincinnati Enquirer to USA Today, ABC News, and so on...In addition, coordinating Islam Weeks creates the much needed interdependency between MSAs.” So, all affiliate MSA's were told about it and “Islam Week – a resource book” was available at the MSA national convention (held with theISNA annual convention) I still have a copy of that first draft manual. It quotes the objectives taken from a U of Cincinnati Islam Week Proposal: “1) To present Islam; its teachings, applications, culture, and civilization... 2) To expose and educate school teachers... presenting Islam, clearing up misconceptions, and explaining the needs and rights of Muslims... 3) To foster collective work among the different components of the Muslim community... through joint sponsorship... Each local organization can play a significant role. 4) To maximize the participation from every member of your MSA through events that require particular talents and interests not found in many MSA activities. At the same time, MSA workers should be exposed to Islamic organizational work and leadership principles. 5) To reach out to “unknown” Muslims on your campus and invite them to become part of the community... 6)To fully cooperate with other MSAs across North America who have conducted similar events and the Continental MSA office with the intention of eventually having a continent wide Islam Awareness Month Insha’Allah...” It also quotes from a U of Illinois Islam Week Proposal: “One may ask, but why in a week? Well basically, it appears that by having an Awareness Week, it becomes a sort of official, formal, ‘hey it must be something important’ kind of event, which could lead to some curiosity, if not genuine interest in finding out about this thing called ‘islam.’ Thus the average Joe U of I, ‘leave me alone, I could care less’ will Insha’Allah be attracted to find out what everyone is talking about – Islam Week! In addition, think about how much attention national campaign projects, designed weeks and months with a particular theme get. During Black History month…all recognize the rich history of African-Americans. Many follow-up projects result. Whether its African studies Departments at universities… or documentaries about the civil rights movement, all gain credibility and steam from the month.” ... - Basically, for the early young activists that created the idea, it came down to “if others can do why not us”, and by 1994 it was officially named Islam Awareness Week and it was becoming a reality on a national level. Now... BACK IN TEXAS... there was no IAW in the wild west when I arrived in Fall 94. The MSA at UT was classic OLPS (OK fine, maybe we had a newsletter a few years before, or did some prison dawa, and many Palestine and Bosnia rallies). I credit to Rizwan Jaka and the rest, they did take OLPS to a higher level, they could’ve written a book ‘Zen and the art of Lecture organizing”. Our MSA worked like machine, when it came to our Big lecture per semester. (Shaikh Quick in Fall 94 and Imam Jamil in Spring 95 were awesome) but we were ready to evolve. I had come to austin from miami, where my sister and friends at UM were planning their first IAW that semester. I had also been a member of MYNA and attended the ISNA conventions - there was a buzz around doing IAWs. all of my friends at various MSAs were exchanging e-mails of what they were planning. And it wasn't until a year later, Fall 95 that I coordinated our first at UT. I was selected VP of our MSA, and since Mairaj (the prez) had little experience, i was in charge, the big dog, noombro uno muchacho. Of course everything wrong that happened that semester was his fault (stemming from his “6th Street is Haram” fatwa at welcome dinner 95. nice move bro) IAW was just one of the many events we planned for Fall 95. we created a list of events at our Beginning of Semester “I can’t wake up that early on Saturday” Fajr Meeting: #1 - HIGH PRIORITY -“We Must Do” Events included: Prayer on West Mall (never happened); Campout on the Capitol (never happened); PeaceNet (died a quick death at UT); Islam Awareness Week; Daily Dawah Table; Annual New Student Welcome Dinner; Establish the MSA office; Establish weekly halaqas (evolved into the legendary Cookie Halaqas); Late Jumma; Weekly Meetings open to All; and a Sports Event (Zeyn and Asif’s Basketball Tournament - Zeyns life has never been the same since). #2 - MID PRIORITY -“We Should Do” Items included: MSA Shirts, Caps, etc (happened a year later); Pool / Bowling Tournament (ie Zeyn Patel Night); Voter Registration Drive (never happened); Knowledge Competition (never happened); Homework / Old Test Collection (never happened); MSA 1995-96 Scrapbook (happened a year later); and a Picnic (turned into a Bar-B-Q after a Lecture by Shabir Aly. #3 - LOW PRIORITY -“We Could Maybe Do” Items included: Nutrition Classes by RAYFlex (never happened); Quranic Memorication Competition (never happened); and Paintball Jihad (happened 2 years later)... We didn’t let this list stop us from organizing other things: Dawud Adib Workshop (that was Mairaj flirting with Wahhabism); Islamic Relief Presentation on Chechnya; a Sisters’ Dinner; Qiyam ul-Layl-1; and Qiyam ul-Layl-Strikes Back... looking back at it, that Fajr Meeting where we decided that IAW and weekly halaqas will be a priority, (taken along with whatever happened during Hussam and Riz’s time that established our Dawah Table and Weekly Meetings), laid the foundations of MSA UT as we know it. Keep in mind that all of the above was just in Fall 95!!... (I won’t go into all the Texas M’s Intrigues of Spring 96.) I was told by the lady that used to guard the Office keys that no other group seemed more active! our MSA’s history is amazing... Anyways, back to IAW: ...Before that exhausting semester of greatness, I used to be a simple helper. i used to design flyers once in a while. and on a couple of important occasions, at our dawah table (which needs a history of its own to be written by Monem), I would display the handicrafts I had bought on recent trips to Pakistan. Now I (and/or Mairaj) had placed me in charge of our first IAW. I incorporated all the goals from the various resource manuals i could find (and my own love of Muslim history, art, and culture) to create a vision of an event that I saw as a CELEBRATION of Islam and Muslim Culture. Aside from simple opportunities to pass out flyers, I wanted to show that Islam was much more dynamic and beautiful than anyone thought. So, I wanted it to be BIG. Bigger than all those other awareness weeks out there (BLACK, LATINO, ASIAN, GAY, etc). I wanted to pack it with events. The resource manual from 92 had a flyer from U of Cincinnati which showed that they did an event every day. I thought that was great, for those who weren’t able to make it to one event, I could say "howdy, don't stress yall, there's something tonite too! And don’t forget our beautiful cultural exhibit, its runnin all week, you can’t miss it! just head towards the sounds of music as soon as you enter the Union!” SO... We (the IAW committee) planned one event each night plus 2 daytime events and a big opening or closing dinner (which never happened), everything was to be free. here's the events we did: our lectures included: one of our national leaders, Imam Siraj Wahhaj speaking on Liberty and Justice for all…; one of our texas leaders, Imam Qasim Ahmed on the Universality of Islam; one woman speaker, Mary Ali on Women in Islam (I don’t remember who suggested her, but she wasn't impressive); and a local student speaker, Usama Aziz on the Quran – (he had quite a following); we also had a free Movie; a Culture Fair on West Mall with student group participants; a Human Rights day where I posted up gruesome pictures of Muslim victims of oppression while Asim Ghafoor and Rehan Jalali made fiery speeches on West Mall; and lets not forget my center piece for IAW, my week long culture exhibit (Open every day from 10-3). It was an expansion of my past Dawah Table exhibits with additional contributions from other students.; I had even planned for a lecture by Dr. Abou El Fadl (I was in his Quran class and knew that he could speak on Justice in Islam - but it never happened)... - The previous MSA@UT generation had established a culture of co-sponsoring the big lectures with the Texas Union, Student Government and Office of Dean of Students. For example, to raise the thousands of dollars needed for the Imam Jamil lecture the previous semester, Rizwan Jaka (past prez) had dragged me around all over campus to various meetings. He gave me a taste of what needed to be done. we assigned volunteers to do various tasks and we (like those before us) dragged younger students with us as we went to submit our proposals for funds. Various campus sources gave us most of the close to $4000 we needed to pull of our first IAW. While some of the lectures had poor turn out, and the daytime events seemed sloppy, Imam Siraj and the daily cultural exhibit was a big hit with our volunteers, with the Union staff, and all who went to see it (though I did get a couple of complaints from conservative activists about my music being a part of the exhibit.) ...In the end, Alhamdullilah, our IAW was received as a successful event. Due to family and school reasons I decided not to be an officer the following year, but I stayed on as IAW coordinator. I was givin an opportunity to refine my vision for the event and improve upon the mistakes that we made the year before. My refinements over the next few years led me to create a planning guide which some other MSAs now use. We learned our lesson from our first IAW, and In 1996, we did fewer lectures and added: the Sounds of Islam Concert; a mini mosque (which I was asked to design and build with some local brothers for separate dawah purposes); Jumma on South Mall; and a Calligraphy Exhibit; our Culture Exhibit grew to include the Discover Islam Posters... that Culture Exhibit introduced the beautiful sounds of Raihan and Yusuf Islam’s latest offering... The next generation of MSA officers added a Poetry Reading and College specific talks... IAW will continue to evolve and its focus will change as organizers change, maybe even its relevance. For me, IAW was just an excuse to share with everyone my love of muslim arts and crafts, and history. I guess I felt like I was alone in seeing its beauty and wanted some company. I can’t describe how much joy I felt every time someone asked about a handicraft object in the exhibit and I got a chance to tell them about the region, its people and their art. I always ignored MSA-National’s corny themes (“Islam a Mercy for Humanity” or whatever) and instead encouraged the Arts in our IAW, because a thought from Seyyed Hussain Nasr’s book on Islamic Art and Spirituality has always guided me. it is relevent to minority life in America. it proved its truth to me after the response I got from our first culture exhibit. He said that when trying to tell others of the greatness of Islamic civilization, no amount of apologetic talk can match the results of showing them a single example of a masterpiece of Islamic art. Out of all the events we’ve done over the years in IAW, and all the press releases we've sent out, nothing got press coverage like the calligraphy exhibit we did in 97... I've learned that i don’t need a masterpiece, even my box full of over the counter handicrafts gave people a glimpse of the glimmers of beauty that linger on from our glory days. peace and love.