November 1, 2017
Amy McDowell published “Muslim Punk in an Alt-Right Era” (PDF) in Contexts, a quarterly magazine of the American Sociological Association that makes cutting-edge social research accessible to the general public. The article discusses how a network of punk (and hip hop) artists are making music to fight racial and religious profiling.
Amy McDowell was also recently invited to present her research on Muslim punk rock at the University of Nebraska as part of their Department of Sociology colloquium series. Her talk on November 3, is titled: “Religion and the Struggle for Self-Definition in ‘Muslim’ Punk Rock.” The presentation uses qualitative data on U.S. Muslim ‘Taqwacore’ (taqwa means God consciousness in Arabic) and Christian Hardcore punk rock to examine how structural location shapes the choices Muslim Americans can make about self-definitions in public settings. The comparison shows that while white evangelical Christian punks can decide whether or not to present religion to their audiences, Muslim punks do not have this choice. They are defined by religion by outsiders and consequently must work against religious ascription and stereotypes in their performances.
