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Islam Comes to America by Jane I. Smith Muslims in America represent a great many movements and identities: immigrant and indigenous, Sunni and Shi‘ite, conservative and liberal, orthodox and heterodox. While exact figures are difficult to determine, most estimates for the beginning of the 21st century put the number at around six million. Of these, well over half are members of first, second or third generation immigrant families. While there were some Muslims among the African slaves who came to work in plantations in the American South, very few retained any kind of Islamic identity. It is generally considered, then, that the first Muslims to begin the process of becoming American were those who arrived in the West in the latter part of the 19th century. Migrations to America have taken place in what can be seen as a series of distinguishable periods, often called “waves,” although historians do not always agree on what constitutes a wave. The earliest arrivals came between 1875 and 1912 from the rural areas of what was known as Greater Syria, which included the current states of Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Palestine, then under the rule of the Ottoman Empire. The majority of the men coming from this area were Christians, though some were Sunni, Shi‘i, ‘Alawi and Druze Muslims. Mainly economically motivated single men, they worked as laborers and merchants, intending to stay only long enough to earn enough money to support their families back home. Some were fleeing conscription into the Turkish army. Gradually they began to settle in the East, the Middle West and as far as the Pacific coast. Most remain anonymous in the annals of American history. After the end of the First World War, the demise of the Ottoman Empire resulted in a second wave of immigration from the Muslim Middle East. Not coincidentally, this was also the period of Western colonial rule under the mandate system created to “govern” Arab lands. The war had brought such devastation to Lebanon that many had to flee simply to survive. Significant numbers of Muslims decided to move West, now for political as well as economic reasons. Many joined relatives who had arrived earlier and were already established in America. This second wave of immigration was curtailed, however, with the passage of U.S. immigration laws in 1921 and 1924 that imposed quotas on certain nations and peoples, including Arabs. During the 1930s, the movement of Muslims to America slowed to a dribble. Those living in the United States were now realizing that their dreams of returning home probably would not be fulfilled, and they needed the support and structure provided by their families. Immigration during this period was limited specifically to relatives of persons already resident in America. The third identifiable period of immigration, from 1947 to 1960, again saw increasing numbers of Muslims arriving in the United States, now from countries well beyond the Middle East. The 1953 U.S. Nationality Act assigned each country an annual quota of immigrants. These arrivals were primarily from Western Europe, since the act was based on late 19th century population percentages in the U.S. Still Muslims began to come from such areas of the world as from Eastern Europe (primarily from Yugoslavia and Albania), the Soviet Union, and a few from India and Pakistan after the 1947 partition of the subcontinent, although the Asia exclusion act was still in effect. While many of the earlier Muslim immigrants had moved into rural as well as urban areas of America, those in this third wave tended to be urban in background, and made their homes almost exclusively in major cities such as New York and Chicago. Some were members of former ruling elite families abroad. They were generally more westernized than their predecessors, better educated, and came with the hope of receiving more education and technical training in America. The fourth and most recent wave of Muslim immigration has come after 1965, when President Lyndon Johnson sponsored an immigrant bill that repealed the longstanding quota system based on a static notion of national American diversity. This was a signal act in American history, making it possible for the first time since the early part of the twentieth century for someone to enter the country regardless of his or her national or ethnic origin. Immigration of people from Western Europe began to decline significantly, with a corresponding growth in the numbers of persons arriving from the Middle East and Asia. More than half of these immigrants have been Muslim. Until the last several decades of the twentieth century, then, most Muslim have chosen to come to the U.S. for purposes of economic betterment or education, with some emigrating after the first world war because of political turmoil. It is just such turmoil that has been the reason for much of the recent Muslim arrival in America. A number of specific events in various parts of the Islamic world have brought immigrants and refugees to the West seeking escape and asylum. The humiliating defeat of Arabs and Muslims by Israelis in 1967 was disastrous for Palestinians, after which many began an exodus to Western Europe and America that still continues. The Lebanese civil war and its aftermath have been the cause of significant numbers of Lebanese coming to the United States. After the Iranian Revolution and ascent to power of Imam Khomeini in 1979, following nearly a decade of debilitating war between Iran and Iraq, some Iranians could no longer remain in their homeland and came westward. Many have settled in America, with significant numbers relocating in California. Iranian Muslims continue to suffer from American prejudice against Iran as a result of the anti-American invective of the Ayatollah and his followers. It is estimated that there are nearly a million Iranians in the U.S. today. Since the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait and the so-called “Gulf War,” large numbers of Kurds have come to the U.S. Also newly-arrived for reasons of political strife and civil war are Muslims from Somalia, Sudan and other African nations, Afghanistan, and refugees of ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia. For decades various forms of strife in India and Pakistan, including the breaking away of East Pakistan to form Bangladesh, anti-Muslim pogroms in India, and conflicts in Kashmir, have encouraged many from the sub-continent to seek a calmer environment in the West. England and the United States have been especially popular destinations. While Pakistanis, Indians and Bangladeshis have been a small part of the Muslim immigration to America all through the 20th century, in the last several decades their ranks have grown significantly and today probably number over a million. Pakistani and Indian Muslims, many of whom are skilled professionals such as doctors and engineers, have played an important role in the development of Muslim political groups in America and in lay leadership of mosque communities. Today more and more Muslims are arriving from countries such as Indonesia and Malaysia, also highly trained and assuming positions of leadership in American Islam. Arab Muslims, both Sunni and Shi‘i, continue to comprise a significant proportion of the Islamic community in America. They are increasingly highly educated and successful professionals, and are also leaders in the development of a trans-national, trans-ethnic American Islam. Turks, Eastern Europeans, and members of numerous African nations including Ghana, Kenya, Senegal, Uganda, Cameroon, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Tanzania and many others are highly visible members of the complex community that constitutes the American umma. Immigrant Muslims have the unique responsibility for working out not only how to most effectively relate to and work with each other, but also how to coalesce with members of various African American Muslim movements. Africans immigrants sometimes find this particularly complicating as non-Muslim American citizens often fail to distinguish between Black Africans and Black Americans who identify themselves as Muslim. In the early days of Arab immigration to America, Muslims were often forced into menial work such as migrant labor, petty merchandizing, or mining. They commonly resorted to peddling, which required little in the way of language skill, training or capital. Others served as cheap laborers on work gangs such as those involved in the rapidly expanding business of railroad construction in the west. As women began to join the men in America they were forced for economic reasons to find employment in mills and factories, where they worked long hours under very difficult conditions. These were hard days for Muslims in America, as they often suffered from loneliness, poverty, lack of language skill and the absence of extended family and co-religionists. Gradually, however, as Muslims realized that returning home was no longer a viable possibility, they began to settle into the American context. They married one way or another – young men who could not find Muslim partners imported their brides from the home country or, in some cases, married outside the faith. They began to find employment in more permanent kinds of businesses, often relying on traditional skills to begin restaurants, coffeehouses, bakeries, and grocery stores. They learned the language, began to become more economically independent, and sought out other Muslims for the formation of communal contexts in which to begin the religious education of their children. Seldom, however, did they find life in America to be easy, despite the rhetoric of a country founded on the backs of immigrants and serving as a “melting-pot” for all races and ethnic identities. They often encountered anti-Muslim and anti-Arab prejudice, complicated by the fact that their sometimes darker skin caused them to be associated in the minds of many Americans with “negroes” or “blacks” and subject to various forms of racial prejudice. For some time, therefore, the response of many Muslim immigrants was to attempt to hide their religious and ethnic identities, to change their names to make them sound more American, and to refrain from participating in practices or adopting dress that would make them appear “different” from the average citizen. Gradually, as the Muslim immigrant community became much larger, much more diversified, much better educated and much more articulate about its own self-understanding, attempts to integrate fully have given way to more sophisticated discussions about the importance of living in America but not necessarily assimilating to its culture. Part of the context for such discussions has come from the formation of Muslim communities, Sunni and Shi‘ite, across rural and urban America, and in more recent years of organizations representing religious, political, professional and social forms of association. There are few places in the United States today in which one does not find Muslims living, working and sending their children to public schools, and where some kind of recognizable facility for worship (mosque, renovated house, storefront) is not available. The first Muslim communities in America were in the Middle West. In North Dakota, Muslims organized for prayers in the very early 1900s, in Indiana an Islamic Center of sorts was begun as early as 1914, and Cedar Rapids, Iowa is the home of the oldest mosque still in use. Dearborn, Michigan, outside Detroit, has long been home to both Sunni and Shi‘i Muslims from many parts of the Middle East. Many Dearbornites have been drawn by the opportunity to work at the Ford Motor Plant, and having formed a community have been joined by other Muslims. Together with Middle Eastern Christians, they form the largest Arab settlement in the country. Other major American cities have figured prominently as favorable locations for Muslim immigrating to America. The shipyards in Quincy, Massachusetts, on the outskirts of Boston, have provided jobs since the late 1800s. The current Islamic Center of New England was the dream of a small group of families who settled there in the early part of the 20th century, and is now a major mosque complex serving business people, teachers and other professionals as well as merchants and blue-collar workers. Islam has been present and visible in New York City for over a century. For most of its history the largest city in the U.S., New York has been home to a rich variety of racial-ethnic groups, and its Muslim population has included merchant seamen, tradesmen, entertainers, white-collar professionals, and owners of major businesses. Muslims in New York represent a broad spectrum of nationalities from virtually every country in the world. Mosque building activity has flourished in New York, and has been the subject of several recent journalistic photographic essays. National Islamic organizations find the city a particularly fruitful place to extend their activities, and a large number of elementary and upper-level Islamic schools, as well as Muslim stores and businesses, are springing up all over the city. An early home to immigrant Muslims was Chicago, Illinois, which some claim had more Muslims in residence in the early 1900s than any other American city. Today they are from the Middle East, India, Central Asia, and many other parts of the world. Muslims in Chicago are active in promoting their faith, providing a range of services to the Islamic community and interacting with one another as well as with non-Muslims. More than 40 Muslim groups have been established in greater Chicago. Muslims in both Los Angeles and San Francisco have found an agreeable climate in which to flourish. They too represent most geographical and cultural areas of the Muslim world, most recently Afghanis, Somalis and citizens of other African countries. The Islamic Center of Southern California is one of the largest Muslim entities in the United States, its well-trained staff widely known for their writings and community leadership, and an imposing physical plant that provides virtually every service that the immigrant Muslim community might possibly need. Immigrant Muslims face enormous challenges as residents of America, which they are addressing in a variety of ways. They must consider questions of identity, occupation, dress, acculturation, relationships between different racial and ethnic Muslim groups as well as with other American Muslims, how and where to school their children, appropriate roles and opportunities for women, and a range of other concerns. Many are moving from a phase of dissociation from American life to more active participation in political and social arenas. Members of the immigrant community are providing important leadership to all American Muslims as they search for individual and communal answers to what it means to live in diaspora. American Muslims appear to be moving into another stage of identity in which these kinds of issues are being resolved in new and creative ways. The result may well be that a truly American Islam, woven from the fabric of many national, racial and ethnic identities, is in the process of emerging.
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