Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:06 Welcome to on the square especial podcast brought to you by SAP Willow square in collaboration with the may. Dan, I am Dr. <inaudible> Javier senior editor of staphylo square and curator producer of this podcast where every month we get on the square and into some real talk about race at a slam in the Americas,
Speaker 1 00:00:31 Alaikum, peace be on to you. I am Zahir Ali Sappa lo squares history editor this past year as part of black history month SAP yellow square explored the Muslim collection at the Smithsonian institution's national museum of African-American history and culture with a different object each day that helped tell the rich histories of Muslims, of African descent in the United States. On this episode of on the square, we are going to dive into the stories behind some of those objects and talk about the importance of black Muslim material culture. And to help us do that. We are joined by Talani Salahadeen the museum specialist in language and literature at the Smithsonian's national museum of African-American history and culture. In addition to collecting literary objects, she has acquired objects, reflecting the religious diversity of African-American communities. Some of these objects are on display in foundations of faith, in the museums, making a way out of no way gallery, which explores religion as a strategy of survival and progress to Lani. Welcome to on the square and thank you for joining us.
Speaker 2 00:01:40 Oh, thank you. Uh, Zaire, it's a pleasure to be here with you today. Start
Speaker 1 00:01:45 By if you can just tell us about the mission of the national museum of African-American history and culture and the role of Muslim objects in that
Speaker 2 00:01:54 Mission relates to religion. The museum wanted to show the diversity of African-American religious traditions and practices. So that meant that we had to, in addition to the black church and two denominations associated with Christianity, we had to also include non-Christian practices and traditions. And so we definitely include, uh, the Muslim experience, the black Jewish experience, as well as a little bit about Buddhism as well, and traditional African religious practices. And so to show that diversity, you know, we collected about 166 Muslim objects, and still are in the process of collecting, uh, religious artifacts for people
Speaker 1 00:02:48 Who may not know, what do we mean when we speak of material culture? What kind of stories can an object? Tell us
Speaker 2 00:02:55 Material culture simply refers to the objects we use in our everyday lives. They are materials that are produced by human beings and use by human beings. If human society were to disappear, these objects would disappear. So they are human produced and used and they reflect self identity. And self-expression the way we express ourselves. So they might include tools of the trade. They might include domestic items. And, and let me go back. When I say tools of the trade, I'll give some concrete examples, mechanical tools, signage, weapons, even medical implements. Those are examples of tools of the trade and domestic items, things that we use around the home cooking utensils, things that we use to beautify our home bases and bowls and, and paintings, things of that nature, all considered material culture. And of course the things that we wear, our garments jewelry, these are all, all a part of our identity. And self-expression collected
Speaker 1 00:04:11 In the museum collected over 100 objects for the inaugural collection relating to Muslim history and culture. How did you go about identifying and locating the objects that you collected? We
Speaker 2 00:04:24 Start by, as I referenced in the beginning, thinking about or operating from the framework of diversity, showing that ideologically and theologically African-Americans have historically been diverse, not of one mind at all, and that's a beautiful thing. And so we begin with working within that particular framework, we think about what are the objects associated with Islam? What are objects associated with Jews? What are the objects associated with Buddhism? And then we reach out to individual practitioners of these various faiths. And also we reach out to of course, religious organizations and religious institutions, and sometimes to other museums as well that housed these things and may want to, to lend them so that, yeah, that's how we go about collecting objects, identifying how we want to use them, and then reaching out to the individuals and institutions where we can find
Speaker 1 00:05:27 Them. As I said, we were honored to feature some of those objects as part of a black history month special on SAP, yellow square. And I wanted to see if we can talk about some of the stories behind the objects. If you know, we'll post a link on our site to the, the objects and we provide some historical context. I'm interested in the human stories behind collecting these objects. So I have some favorites and I know you have some favorites too. One of them that stood out to me was an egg carton from Muslim farms. And I wonder if you can talk to us about, you know, you just look at it, it's a, it's an egg carton, it's labeled Muslim farms. And it, of course, it's just remarkable that someone saves an egg carton from way back when, but can you tell us about the story of this egg card when you first saw it or heard about it and what was the story? And it becoming part of the collection.
Speaker 2 00:06:23 I decided to collect from former members of the nation of Islam. I reached out to an associate of mine who happened to be the granddaughter of Elijah Muhammad. And so she really helped to introduce me to a network of potential donors, primarily in Chicago and in California and in New Jersey and New York. And so I traveled to all of those places as far north, as Fresno, California, as well as LA the donor of the egg carton lived in Chicago. So went to her home and I saw all these things, garments and things associated with the nation. And then I saw this egg carton, and some other things is associated with economic development program of the nation of Islam. And I said, wow. And she saved an incontinence. So the first thing I did was, you know, to look at the condition of it, is this something I can actually take back to the museum?
Speaker 2 00:07:22 And so I did, and it worked out perfectly well because we ended up doing a three D imaging of the carton and you can go into, I think it's on the second floor. There's a display where you can actually see the carton and it's being rotated and you can see all sides of it. So it's fully three dimensional. And that means that we don't have to put it out on the floor for people to see. So it doesn't have to be handled because of course the more you handle an object more you contribute to as decay. And so you can see everything, uh, equally as well as if you were viewing the actual object. And so that particular egg carton was so important to me because it represents the entrepreneurial spirit of the members of the nation of Islam, which, uh, Elijah Muhammad and his wife, sister, Claire Muhammad promoted in represents their economic development plan. As we know, the nation owned farm land in Michigan, and they raised chickens that produce the eggs that they distributed to the markets. And these were stores that they owned. Uh, there were, the eggs were delivered to these stores, buy in trucks, a fleet of trucks that they owned. And we're talking about cities throughout the United States, major urban centers where these stores were located and where the eggs were distributed. And so, again, that speaks to the, the self-reliance that the nation of Islam promoted the nation.
Speaker 1 00:09:00 We're one of the pioneers of what we would now call the food sovereignty movement or the food justice movement, addressing what we now call food deserts, right? The, the lack of access to healthy and natural food in certain communities. And, and they also pioneered access to Muslim food to lawful Muslim food. They didn't, as you said, they didn't, they had farms, they had chickens, they had beef, the sort of hulau food that Muslims will require to eat. So it's quite remarkable. And this egg carton is like 50 years old. Right, right.
Speaker 2 00:09:35 How
Speaker 1 00:09:36 Was it kept so that by the time you saw it, it was in such good shape.
Speaker 2 00:09:40 You just had it inside a plastic bag. Now I'm not sure where that was. Maybe probably in the basement with the other items that she brought up. Um, but she did have it in a, in a plastic bag. So I guess that helped. And the fact that it probably was not handled much as well, and, and perhaps in a cooler climate in the basement that helped as well. But going back to something you said, you had said, well, just want to add to it. You know, the nation of Islam were pioneers in the imputation of millions of pounds of Whiting fish. And it's addressed that issue of the food desert that you were talking about because in the urban centers, a lot of people were not able to get fresh fish. And so they, um, they satisfied that need through their international imports, uh, program. I have
Speaker 1 00:10:34 One of the things, the other objects we featured from the museum's collection was a sign. I think, of the international trade, a division of the nation of Islam. Another object that stood out to me was a tape recorder used by Malcolm X, at mosque, number seven in New York. And again, looking at this, there's nothing that says on its own, that there is something about this object that says Muslim history, but knowing the context of the object that this was used by Malcolm X, it looks like a reel to reel recorder, right? So this is not for people listening. Don't even know what an audio right, or audio cassettes. This is reel to reel tapes. I'm interested in the story behind that object
Speaker 2 00:11:25 Colleagues collected that particular tape recorder. I think that one was not a donation. It was a purchase from a man who lived in New Jersey. I believe he was from there. We use it to tell the story of Malcolm X as the highly charismatic spokesperson for the nation of Islam and how after he was released from prison in 1952, he really helped through his public presentations. Uh, he really helped to increase the membership of the nation, which at that time was only about 400 members, but he increased it to over 400,000 members just because people would come out and they would listen to him on the streets. And, and the words spread very, very quickly. This man was out here speaking and just making so much sense. And, and his, his words were resonating with African-Americans throughout all the cities. He was based in Harlem at the time. So this particular recorder came from mosque, number seven in Harlem, no
Speaker 1 00:12:33 One can deny his skill as an organizer, and certainly his talents as an orator, and also his instinct of the importance of media, right. Malcolm helped to found the Mohammed speaks newspaper. So the importance of media in the growth of the nation is, is an important story. And the other thing that I kind of was struck by what the tape recorder is, how well and how much the nation documented itself, right through the ministers and the nation of Islam will certainly Malcolm recorded all of his speeches and would send them to Chicago for review. Elijah Muhammad would review the lectures that his ministers were giving. And this was a sort of quality control and message alignment, making sure so that the ministers were on well on the same page as him. Um, that's right. That's right. But what, and what comes out of that, of course, is this really rich wealth of archival. This, some of this stuff is still in people's basements and people's garages. Right. But, but it exists. So this level of documentation, you know, this is, is incredible, um, and, and important for
Speaker 2 00:13:52 Yeah. And, you know, and we also have an issue. It was fairly short lived, but messenger magazine I believe was started by Malcolm as well. Yes. Another
Speaker 1 00:14:04 Object, which we weren't able to feature because there wasn't, um, a good enough high resolution image, but there is an oral history on the museum's website, which we will link to. We're going to play a small excerpt of it in this episode. And it's an oral history with a mirror Mohammed who was the granddaughter of Elijah Muhammad and Clara Mohammed. And she talks about an object that is part of the museum's collection. That is a pendant that Clara Muhammad wore. Can you tell us a little bit about that object and why, why was important to include that
Speaker 2 00:14:36 In the collector? Yes. This was a pendant, a platinum pendant that, um, Elijah Muhammad had commissioned someone to design for his wife and he presented it to her in the fifties. And she worked around her neck, uh, all of her life. And right before she passed away, though, when she became ill, she passed it on to her granddaughter. A mirror, a mirror has kept it all of this time. And, uh, it was very difficult for her to part with it, but she understood the importance of having it. There. It for her is symbolized the love between her grandparents. There's a lot of controversy surrounding, you know, their relationship, certainly ASRS that Elijah Muhammad had with other females. Um, but she saw, you know, something totally different. And she wanted that story to come to the forefront. She said that they had a very symbiotic relationship.
Speaker 2 00:15:36 Um, you know, she little known to a lot of people. She was the one who introduced Elijah Muhammad to the nation of Islam. Well, at the time she had introduced him to far out fraud Muhammad, who was the founder of the nation of Islam. She went to hear him speak on a number of occasions, and then she invited her husband, uh, to come. And then he ultimately became a leader in the nation of Islam, as she was a leader herself within the nation, in the educational arena. She began to establish what became known as assistant Claire Mohammed's schools. And they grew and were formed in every urban center across the United States. And many of them are still in existence today. And, uh, she endured a lot of challenges from the authorities because they were keeping the children out of the public school system and educating them at first in their homes. They had these small schools in their home comparable to what we know now as the homeschooling movement. So they were doing that, you know, way back and in the late forties and fifties. And so they had this relationship that was very, I would say, synergetic, uh, the synergy between the two of them was phenomenal. And so they were able to do their work and to express love for one another. And so a mural wanted that to be known.
Speaker 1 00:17:10 We're going to play a clip from her oral history, where she talks about that. And then we're going to come back.
Speaker 3 00:17:16 That pendant was my grandfather's love offering to my grandmother for her tireless efforts in the beginning, early infancy stages of the nation of Islam. When they traveled between Detroit and Chicago, there came a time when they, when they moved to Chicago, settled in Chicago, that my grandmother didn't want her children and the member's children to be in the public school anymore. She thought they could do a better job. She took her children out of the school, despite the Chicago police and school system that said, you can't do that. So she was homeschooling when, before the name homeschooling probably existed and she was almost arrested and she was hauled into court for it. And she refused to put her kids in public school. And through that effort, it just grew and grew. And for myself, I became, I went through with the exception of eighth grade, the sister Clara Muhammad school. At one point, it was called the university of Islam. And it later changed the sister Clara Muhammad school. And those schools are still in existence to this day. The
Speaker 1 00:18:33 Other thing that I really like about having this object in the collection is that so much of the histories of, you know, just so much of our histories period, but so much certainly of Muslim of black Muslim histories in the United States are told around the stories of men, right? Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali. We often don't get the experiences of women represented in these histories. And as you pointed out, Claire Muhammad played such a crucial role in the development of the nation of Islam. So it's really, I'm really happy to see that that story is represented. And certainly she, wasn't the only woman, right. To have significantly shaped the development of Islam in the United States and in the black community. There are so many other objects that we could get into and we encourage people to, again, we'll post a link where they can see some of the objects, but I wonder when you go into this with us in mind, here are the kinds of objects we want. And then you're, you're surprised by what you're presented with. Certainly there are religious, what we would consider more explicitly religious artifacts that are part of this collection. They are Crohn's, they are, uh, prayer, rugs. They are prayer beads. Are there other kinds of objects you would like to see that maybe we haven't been able to talk about or feature?
Speaker 2 00:19:54 I would like to see more on Muslims in military service because they were present there, but we don't have a, to my knowledge, anything associated with that. So objects, military objects that belonged to Muslims who served also, I keep running across, you know, the DM movement. We don't have anything on Aquaman, DM movement. And from my understanding, they were quite foundational in helping to promote the presence of Islam in the Western world. There
Speaker 1 00:20:29 Are drumsticks by art Blakey who, you know, and their drumstick that he used in the eighties, I think, and we featured it and kind of use that as a way to like backdoor the story of the affidavit. Because a lot of the, in the 1950s, I think magazine ran an article on jazz artists who were embracing Islam and a good number of them came out of the, or came through the Atma movement. And so that's, that's definitely an important part of the story.
Speaker 2 00:21:01 Yes. And some of those artists, um, are featured in the musical crossroads gallery in some form or another, um, you had mentioned already the band leader and, uh, jazz drama, art Blakey, and the pianist augmented Jamal, the saxophone is use of Latif. Yes. They were all there. The pianist McCoy, Tyner as well. Right. So good enough. A good number of them. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:21:28 And what's, so, what's so interesting is that some aspects of black Muslim history is sort of invisible unless, you know, right. It's, it's not legible for people who don't know, like if you don't know the histories of that, you'll just be like, oh, okay. You know, like there was, I think we featured a flyer for a last poets concert and the flyer was from the Darla Islam. Right. Like it was, but, but if you didn't know what it was, it said like Jamaat celebration. And if you didn't know what that was, you'd be like, oh, okay. And so some of this is so it's there in almost hidden in plain sight. Right. Um, that has to be explicitly mentioned the community that I think without doubt, that has had the most influence and certainly in the 20th century, revival of Islam in the African-American community is the nation of Islam, the nation of Islam and its lineage, whether the community of Emam Mohammed or minister Farrakhan are well-represented in the collection. And I think you've mentioned that you'd like to see stories of the Atma muddy and stories of, of those serving in the military. Are there other kinds of stories that you hope that we would get?
Speaker 2 00:22:47 I just think those two quickly come to mind for you. Why
Speaker 1 00:22:52 Would it be important to having those who've served in the military? Why would that, why would those stories be important?
Speaker 2 00:22:57 They're important because when you think back to the fact that 20 to 30% of the Africans and slave Africans who came here were Muslims, and we're talking about during the 15 hundreds, they began coming to what became known as United States. And during all of those centuries, they made contributions to civilization, to the civilization in almost every area of life. Um, and so military not excluded. Um, and so that's just an area that we, we don't have. And it also addresses the issue. You know, a lot of times the general perception is that Muslims are anti America, but to have served in the military really shows the ultimate, I think, in patriotism, the willingness to be able to sacrifice your life, you know, for the nation in which you live, uh, certainly shows that you are, you see yourself not as separate, uh, but as an integral part of that.
Speaker 2 00:24:07 And of course there were Muslims who, you know, we had the Muhammad Ali story, which shows that there were Muslims who took a stand against serving in the military. And we understand that role as well, because many of the wars, particularly the one that Muhammad Ali refused to support, these were unjust wars. You know, um, we, weren't always justified in our actions, uh, and all the countries. And so some Muslims took a stand against it, which is very understandable as well. The fact that serving in the military shows the patriotism, how we view ourselves, uh, within, you know, the, the borders of the United States. I think that can be addressed through objects, military OBS. I
Speaker 1 00:24:52 Think you make a really good point about making sure that we all understand the diversity within the black Muslim communities, in terms of the political ideologies there, how people understand their relationship to the United States, how people understand their relationship to the country, how people define patriotism. Right. You know, for some people, for example, what Muhammad Ali did was, was anti-American and to others, it was the ultimate expression of patriotism. Right. That's right. You know, so because you might love your country so much, you want to make sure it doesn't go down a path that you think is not good. Right. And that's part
Speaker 2 00:25:32 Of patriotism as well. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:25:35 So I think, I think that's a really good point for people to understand. So are these objects all on display or are they rotating? How does the museum decide when and how long to put objects on display?
Speaker 2 00:25:49 Right. The 166 objects I mentioned are part of our inaugural exhibition. So they are on permanent display. And as we collect more objects, there's a potential for some of those objects to be rotated out and new ones rotated in. Um, but generally they have to fit the same theme that's there. And if you don't see the objects on display, you know, you can always come to the website to do a search of the collection. You just click right on search the collection. And, you know, you can do a search by name, by title, by object. So that's, that's another way as well. So the museum has recently reopened as many of our listeners know. And so yeah, you can come to the museum and see, as you mentioned earlier, most of the objects associated with are in the making a way out of no way gallery on the third floor. We also have some, um, religious, some Muslim artifacts on the, in the segregation gallery, which is on the lower level of the museums.
Speaker 1 00:26:58 I was fortunate to come to the museum in 2016. I think there was like a preview before it was open to the public. And that's really where I got the idea to do this theme of Muslim stories in the museum, because I starting with the story of enslaved people. I started seeing, obviously, as you've mentioned, the story of some Muslims who were enslaved and I was like, oh, I wonder how Muslims show up in this in the museum. Cause you know, I wasn't, I wasn't sure how it would show up. Um, I think I expected Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali to show up in some way. So I started just logging all of the different things and I was just like, wow, there's a whole thread. There's a whole story running through, you know, and I'm sure people could do that with the Christian story and the Jewish story and the nationalist story and the integration, this story like there, all of these multiple thematic histories, because you can't like you can't exhaust, I couldn't exhaust the museum in that.
Speaker 1 00:27:58 I think we had four hours for the preview, the preview. And like, you can't exhaust it in one day, but I was just like, it's, it's almost like, oh, like let's do them. The quote unquote Muslim tour of the museum. Let's do the, you know, the political tour of the museum. You'd always get a different experience each time. And so I'm so excited. The museum has reopened to the public and, and I hope that people who are listening, who are able to schedule a visit to come to DC, make sure this is on your list because it it's so powerful. Also I think this may be of all of the Smithsonian museums and, and I think of all of the national museums and I've been to history museums. This collection may be the most significant in terms of content and amount and prominence of Muslim American history.
Speaker 1 00:28:50 And that it is in the national museum of African-American history. And culture tells us something about the significance of the histories of African-American Muslims and the significance to the religious story of America and the Muslim story of America. And so I'm just so elated that these objects are there. What advice would you have for people who are, you know, maybe they can't donate something to the museum, but are interested in preserving their family histories. We opened the conversation, talking about what material culture was, what, what kind of objects should people think about saving? I think there's some things that people automatically think about like photographs and maybe correspondence, but when you're looking at, you know, like an ed cart or an old recorder, what advice would you have for people who are, who want to preserve their family histories?
Speaker 2 00:29:47 Yeah. I would tell them to think about saving those objects that their family members used in their everyday lives, in their work. You know, they all went to work in their homes, they were at home. What kinds of things did you see or did you, did other family members tell you about that were recurring, uh, in terms of their usage, you know, among a certain family members, you know, aunt Betty was always in there ironing, you know, she was always, you know, so where is that iron that Betty used to use? You know, or, you know, my grandfather, I think about him. He, I remember him. He, he died when I was very young, but I remember him always smoking a pipe and every picture of grandpa there, you know, some smoke in this pipe, you know, whatever became of that pipe, safe things that can be personal effects that become kind of signatures for, you know, particular family member as well, briefcases suitcases, you know, I have a suitcase for example, that I brought with me when I left home at 17 years old, little lady, Baltimore suitcases red, you know, and for years it just went with me wherever I moved and, and, and it actually made a trip with me my first time going to Africa.
Speaker 2 00:31:14 So when the suitcase began to get a little fragile, normally had I not been in this business of museum work, oh, I would have tossed it, but now I keep it for my children and my grandchildren so that they will, they will know a little bit about my, my journey that this little red lady, Baltimore suitcase represents. So it's things like that. Of course, as we mentioned, the necklace jewelry is another good one. This is a ring that my uncle bill always wore, or maybe a piece of jewelry associated with his, his involvement with the masons or some other group that he was very active in uniforms. Those were the masons, for example, had certain items, uniform items, aprons, and jackets and hats, and, um, military service uniforms, uh, as well. So, so yes, things that certain family members more often, or that came to be associated with their personalities and what they like to do in life.
Speaker 1 00:32:22 I loved hearing the story of your suitcase. Um, cause I, in fact, I w I was going to ask you, what object would you, if you had to choose one object, what object would you say that kind of helps tell your story? That's such a, I hope that people who are listening begin, you know, looking around at the sort of maybe mundane things and start with some intentionality, thinking about what those objects might tell other people about them. And, um, that's such a great way to think about that.
Speaker 2 00:32:54 And of course you want to, you definitely want to interview as you're doing here. And as you're so skilled in doing interview, your family members interview them, you know, while they are still relatively young. And when I say young, I mean in their sixties and seventies where their thoughts and memories are very clear and they're very coherent and, and, and that doesn't mean that in their eighties and nineties, they can't be as well. So anywhere from 60 to 120, you know, um, interview your family members, listen to their stories, ask them questions about their family life, what it was like for them growing up, ask them about their educational experiences, their primary, secondary high, high school and higher educational experience ask them about their career paths or the labor that they did if they didn't have full blown, uh, careers, as we generally think of them, but ask them, you know, about the kind of work they did to support themselves and their families, and then go from there and just listen, listen, well, as they talk, you know, certain things will come forward that are very significant to them that you don't know about.
Speaker 2 00:34:17 So be a very good listener and don't hesitate to do up questions. You may start with a general outline of questions that you want. Um, but as they're talking and you're listening, there may be some other questions that pop up in your mind that you want them to address. You
Speaker 1 00:34:37 Will. You just gave folks a beautiful crash course in oral history. Um, um, and, and, you know, my experience with doing oral histories, and this comes back to the importance of material culture. Sometimes those objects really help people tell those stories, right. Um, so I sometimes ask people to have like a photo album with them during the interview process. And, and people will point at an image and it'll bring them back into the story. It's like, oh, this was when we went on this trip, or this was when this thing happened. And we had this family gathering and, and similarly, you know, with the other objects, right? So it's so important to, to have as much as we can get the stories that accompany these objects, because, you know, that's, that's what gives these, that's what makes, uh, an egg carton more than an egg carton, right? It's the story that accompanies it. And that's what makes the difference between somebody raggedy, suitcase and your raggedy suitcase, right. Um, is, is the story. And so the power of storytelling and story listening in this is so, so critical to preserving and passing on, um, culture inherited.
Speaker 2 00:35:53 And I wrote about what, what you're talking about here is something I had written about for the collections, a scholarly journal for museum and archive professionals talked about how we look at objects. You know, you can look at a museum object as a kind of self enclosed entity, what it's made of how it functions and things of that nature. But there's a point at which you move beyond the object itself and you tie it to events. You tie it to people, uh, you tie it to places and that's where it gets this added value. And so that's primarily what we do at the museum. We move beyond the object itself, beyond its its material, when it's made of what it does, you know, to, to tell those stories. And that's what makes the museum interesting. People love stories, you know, they, they, um, they love to hear about, uh, people's lives and then find certain things that resonates with them in their own life.
Speaker 2 00:37:01 So, yeah, that's what we do. And, and earlier on, you'd said something else that I wanted to follow up on. You talked about when you came to the museum, how you could see this thread, you know, running through the museum, and that is all very deliberate. So I'm glad that you were able to pick up on that. You know, we start this process by writing a script and the script begins with a very centralized thing. You know, it's not this thought here that thought there, this thought over here, but it's a very centralized theme. And then there are sub sub themes. And as we develop those sub themes, we ask ourselves, you know, what are the useful, uh, photographs or graphic images or, um, quotes. And of course three-dimensional objects that we can use to support the broader thing as well as the things. And so that's pretty much how, you know, an exhibition begins and then comes into creation.
Speaker 1 00:38:07 I love hearing about that process. And I think our listeners will too. One of the things that I really appreciated was that the story of Muslims is not siloed in any one corner of the museum, but it's throughout, which is very much what the reality is. Right. Very much integrated into the experience of black people throughout American history. It's not like, oh, here's the little Muslim story we can move on, but it's rather it's woven through quite seamlessly and quite effectively, some really happy to hear how that came together. We've given folks a crash course on my collections on oral history, on museum studies, which is beautiful. So we're going to wrap up, but before we go, we'd like to ask all of our guests, what is your black Muslim theme song? If there was a song that you could point to that you think of, when you think of black Muslim history and culture, what would that song be?
Speaker 2 00:39:06 Oh, that's a very good question. I liked that you had mentioned a lot of the jazz musicians earlier who brought some very, you know, positive music to not just the African American community, but to the United States and to the world, very positive uplifting music. And so I think about this song that was released in 1976 on arranged by Quincy Jones on his album. I heard that, and it's what good is a song. And I love there the reframe, which says, what good is a song. If it can't inspire, if it has no message to bring, if a song can not send you higher and higher, then it's not good enough to sing. And so, yeah, I love that message because Muslims, I know, try to bring forth and share with the world, um, music that takes us higher. And so we listened to the message and we're inspired to do better, to be better, to be our best selves.
Speaker 1 00:40:19 Thank you so much to Lonnie for joining us on this episode. Thank you for tuning into this episode of on the square real talk on race and Islam in the Americas. A special podcast series brought to you by SAP square and the may. Dan, thank you again to Lonnie for joining us. Uh,
Speaker 0 00:40:37 You most welcome, always great to be with you. You can find more information
Speaker 1 00:40:42 About what we discussed, including links and more by visiting Sokolow square.com forward slash on the square or the may dan.com forward slash podcast. Our theme music is provided by fanatic on beats. And again, I am Zahir Ali history editor at Sokolow square signing off on this episode on the square Salaam-Alaikum.
