Muslim, Islam and American culture Essay

The main shoot for of this paper is to explore the watercourse draw of Moslems in the States and the quest for clues as to the future interaction between Islam and Ameri goat last. In bad-tempered, I forget focus on on three argonas Moslem fascinate on the horti nicety of Ameri postfuls with emphasis on how it has affected semipolitical and kindly information the interaction between Moslem traditions and American tillage on the establishment of American Moslem Organization and the social, heathen and educational turn outs among the Moslem youth in America. unveilingWhatever is happening to the Muslim culture in the American fiat and the American society as it interacts with the Islamic culture can still be grok by the archetypeion of culture as a fluid entity that interacts and borrow from all(prenominal) other. It is substantial that any study of Islam in the join States must non issue the interplay between righteousness and culture neither should i t assume that one overwhelms the other. The experience of American Muslims puts into sharp relief matters of identity and soaking up and how they must be distinguished from the concept of set.Even with movements such(prenominal) as the demesne of Islam rejecting identification with the broader culture including near of the accordingly dominant value, it accepted other values such as the work value orientation and entrepreneurship. My argument is that this selective acceptance of American values was a result of a face-off between Islamic values and American culture seen from the perspective of an alter minority group robbed of its identity. The past a few(prenominal) decades leave witnessed the evolution of American Muslim organizations. The studyity of these organizations until 1980s were mosques and even these were in few plays.Today, there exists a number of formal Muslim organizations in different beas of endeavor. The interwovenity of their organizations and the extent of their beguile ar increasing. These organizations be increasingly fitting into the flutter of American culture rather than bring about a bulwark against it. They in tack together influence the ambient culture slightly them. The Muslim Student connective is commonly the root of Islamic organization among the immigrant population. The associations alumni are in closely illustrations found in leadership positions of the current wave of immigrant dominated organizations (Ahmad, 2003).The only Muslim organization with an immigrant composition until the formation of the Muslim Students Association in the 1960s was the Federation of Islamic Associations. This was basically an Arab-American organization founded on traditional culture rather than piety. The histories of Muslims in unify States is wide-ranging with diverse and changing identities. The followers of this major world holiness are not surprised at the processes of various(prenominal) and association iden tity formation and change such as the ones that are macrocosm experient in the United States.There were contending definitions, social groups, and sources of legal authority in spite of appearance a century of the birth of Islam in one-seventh century Arabia. Yet, an identifiable fundamental Islamic way of thinking and acting, founded on the fashion model and teachings of Muhammad developed over time. This core consists of the quin pillars of Islam. With its expansion to unfermented outranks and the subsequent confrontation of older godlinesss, Muslim conquered or coexisted with such religions.Such regional interactions have influenced the slipway in which this de centralized and non-hierarchical religion is full throughout the world. The religion lacks a centralized clergy and mosques operate independently of each other. With this regard, Muslims in the United States comprehend and practice Islam in ways strongly shaped by the American diachronic context. The universal Muslim federation may be the close sought by Muslims but the creation is that their everyday lives are shaped by group solidarity and experience.The United States Muslim alliance has been defined and redefined by voices both k instantaneouslyledgeable and external to Muslim communities. Those definitions reflect the complex relations among members of the ruling class and those being ruled in the American political context among other things. It is important to place Muslim communities in the socioeconomic social organisation of the United States when any analysis of the community is being done. Tracing their transnational networks and affiliations is besides crucial. Muslims now comprises an important part of the United States society.It may be the fastest outgrowth religion in the United States, hover to displace Judaism and pass second only to Christianity in the number of adherents. This growth can be attributed to the rapid influx of immigrants and their comparatively high birthrate. However, it is difficult to know exactly the number of Muslims in the United States. Distinctions An important property is made in Islamic legal philosophy between the basics of fundamental principle of jurisprudence upon which distinction is not condoned, cognize as usul al-fiqh, and the branches or subdivisions in which disagreements and new and original problems and cases are permitted.There has thus far been disagreement concerning what usul is and what furu is in the long memorial of disputation, debate, and disagreement among jurists since the classical period of Islam (Elkholy, 2005).. The historical debate has often been about the usage, authority, and interpretation of different sources of knowledge. In the United States today, the trend among the emerging spokespeople is to allot positive commandments of the law to one or other social class even though they seem to assign more and more laws to usul and to disallow disagreement about usul, thereb y restricting the stage setting for legitimate disagreement and discussion.There is to a fault distinction between culture and religion. This distinction is frequently invoked as Muslims debate beliefs and practices that are accepted or unaccepted in Islam. There have been arguments among lay Muslims concerning the beliefs and practices that are fundamental to the religion and those that have increase to it because of culture in one or another region. This issue has also been increase elsewhere by those individuals who see culture as having absorbed the function of religion such that religious difference now symbolizes basically cultural difference for the absolute majority of Americans.Interaction between culture and religion occurs in every realm of American Muslim world. With regard to Islamic identity, America has come to be an arena for competing ego images where religious authority and cultural preferences are intimatelyly conflated if not displaced and de-territorialize d altogether. Just as some scholars have identified the meshing over usul and furu, the conflict over religion and culture in the United States mainly centers on issues involving women (Waugh, Abu-Laban & Qureshi, 1983).Shared culture is more important than religious or heathenish diversity in determining grammatical gender uses. The conflict between parents and children, and men and women has been heightened up by migration thereby producing a wage increase rate of divorce. Alterations in traditional conceptions of the role of women is taking place faster in women than in men. The issue of dating is the most serious hindrance to the integration of Islamic religion and American culture. Personal relationships are considered highly by all mankind beings.To novel adults, sexual relationships are highly important and they are cancel. Islam has never ratified of sexual activity, always confining it to spousal relationship. The American culture on the other make has never been comfortable with the ideal of sex. The notion of adolescence is one of the most serious flaws in American culture. The American society identifies as children individuals that previous cultures characterize as untried adults (Haddad, 2004).Because of the role played by blanket(a) schooling in training new-fangled individuals for their place in the industrial system, young people of marrying age in the United States are discouraged from marriage. This denial of natural institution has resulted in fornication and undesired mothers. The majority of Muslims have abandoned the marriage traditions of their homelands without embracing the American system, putting children in a difficult position at the time when their hormones are raging. ContributionsThe strength of the American culture lies in its respect for the individual, the flexibility of its civil society, and the restraints it seeks to place on the hauteur of political power. Its weakness lies in its picture to sacrifice fa mily and personal morality to the appetites of commerce. The religion of Islam, founded on the pass oning submission of the individual to the divine will can be an appropriate religion for such a society. The divine will reveals the principles by which the social welfare of the individual and the community are harmonized.Muslims should and so be able to find an important place in the American society using the framework of institution building and for individual advancement to make use of the strengths of the American culture and to help overtake its weaknesses. The major challenge to the integration of Islam with American culture is managing to disentangle scriptural commandments from cultural accretions (Leonard, 2003). This may be achieved by Muslims owe to their diverse community, race, ethnicity and national origin that makes indefensible the confusion of culture and religion that has marked the stagnation of much of the Muslim world.beyond this, the rising number of Mus lims that are natural in America implies that it is only a matter of time forrader the Muslim community becomes dominated by autochthonic Muslims who are already integrated into the American culture. As such, they are likely to have an American understanding of Islam in which case they will further its integration into and influence the American culture or they will lack good understanding of Islam at all in which case they will become secularized as the majority of Christians, Muslims and Jews before them.SummaryThe American society has to some degree been influenced by Islam just as the Muslim society has been influenced by the American values. However, there are no particular aspects of the holistic American culture that can be said to be adversely influenced by Islam owing to the communal temper of American Muslims. The influence of Islam on the Americans can also be analyzed looking for at the various Muslim organizations within the United States as it is through this orga nizations that thoughts and convictions become shaped thereby infiltrating the general American society.References Ahmad, I. (2003). Islamic pietism and American Culture. immunity Institute Elkholy, A. (2005). The Arab Moslems in the United States Religion and Assimilation. New Haven College University get Haddad, Y. (2004). not quite American? the shaping of Arab and Muslim identity in the United States. Baylor University Press Leonard, K. (2003). Muslims in the United States the state of research. Russell shrewd Foundation Waugh, E. , Abu-Laban, B. & Qureshi, R. (1983). The Muslim community in North America. University of Alberta