Muslim Student organizations across the United States, of which there are roughly 200, are continuing their struggles to form their own identities, including who they accept into their folds.  Some would advocate for only accepting more obedient Muslims into the groups, while others would argue to include all students who self-identify as being Muslim.  The following article briefly reviews this issue...
 
 

 A recent survey released by the Pew Research Center, entitled "American Muslims: Middle Class and Mostly Mainstream," finds that US Muslims have mostly conciliatory attitudes towards American society, and are generally more likely to support the separation of religion from politics than their Christian counterparts.
 

 American academic and convert to Islam David Coolidge emphasizes the essentials of the Islamic message sometimes obscured in an increasingly sophisticated discourse concerning Islam in the West.
 

 Professor Azizah Hibri discusses how Islam has been portrayed and received by both elites and the masses in the early years of the American nation.
 

 African-American convert to Islam Keith Ellison (D-Minnesota) overcomes religious and racial obstacles, embodying the hope for the inclusion of American Muslims in U.S. politics.
 

 The Islamic Society of North America welcomes Ingrid Mattson as its president -- the first female and the first American-born convert to fill the position.
 

 UMMA, the first free standing Muslim Free Clinic in America celebrates 10 years of community service
 

 A call for Muslims around America to participate in the creation of a magazine speaking to the state of Islam in the United States. 

 Dar al Islam Executive Director Anas Coburn interviews Dr. Sulayman Nyang (Howard University) and Shaykh Hamza Yusuf (Zaytuna Institute) about the creation of an anual publication documenting Islam in the United States.
 

 Latino-American Muslim Aaron Siebert-Llera offers some historical and sociological reflections on the growing phenomenon of Latino conversion to Islam.
 

 The topic of Islam in America has been attracting increased scholarly and popular interest, with many new works appearing in recent years. This is an attempt to catalogue what has been written so far.
 

 The divergence between Islamic ideals and practical realities within the landscape of American Islam has prodded American Muslim scholars to address the issue of the "ghetto liquor store", underscoring the importance of Islamic scholars in speaking to larger social issues.
 

 Dr. Abd al-Hakim Jackson, Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies at the University of Michigan, describes the increased tension surrounding Islam within the Blackamerican community. A new "Black Orientalism" has obscured the historical interaction of Islam with "Black" peoples, transposing the experience of racial subjugation in America on the dynamics of racial interaction in Muslim societies. But immigrant Muslims in America have also been insensitive to the history of Blackamerican interaction with and appropriation of Islam, largely as an ideology of protest, contributing to the Islam's increased marginalization among Blackamericans.
 

 Anas Coburn, a marriage and family therapist and long-time Dar al Islam executive, responds to the crisis of community that has become endemic to Western modernity. As Muslims living in the West struggle to maintain their traditional values, Coburn asks a more basic question than whether Muslim communities can safeguard their traditions. Amidst a "nation of strangers," where "the dominant society's organization places impediments on the development of vital communities," the real question is: can Muslim communities themselves be safeguarded? The solution, the author believes, lies in the strengthening of personal relationships, or the accumulation of "social capital," between Muslims.
 

 Cedric Muhammad, prominent intellectual, writer and business leader (the former general manager of Wu-Tang), deplores the prevalence of a dogmatic patriotism that has evolved into a sort of a religion, where it has become blasphemous to investigate injustices perpetrated at the hands of the American government.
 

 When those working to establish Islam in North America meet, among the most frequently mentioned priorities for the Muslim Community is the development of means by which the Islamic Identity of Youth can be preserved as they grow to maturity.
 

 Kenny Gamble, a Muslim activist, is working to revive community in Philadelphia.
 

 Edward Said, writing in Counterpunch, challenges the appropriation of moral language by the Bush administration.
 

 An article covering some of the basics of business-like attire from the perspective of a Muslimah, followed by comments on the article. The piece is interesting as one more example of the way young Muslims are struggling to articulate an identity that is both Muslim and American.
 

 This article gives extended background on Imam Jamil Al- Amin . We certainly don't subscribe to the ideology of this newspaper (Maoist) but it does provide useful background information.
 

 Appearing together in public for the first time in 25 years, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and his onetime bitter enemy, Muslim American Society leader Wallace Deen Mohammed, today celebrated a symbolic reunification of their rival black Muslim factions.
 

 Excerpts from the Wall Street Journal article: "...The growth of Islam in U.S. prisons is creating anxiety among some Christian ministers. While the vast majority of inmates in the federal prison system are still Christian, the number of Muslim inmates has nearly tripled over the last six years to 6,500. During that time, the ranks of federal prisoners grew 50% to 112,000. And in some states, such as Maryland, New York and Pennsylvania, Muslims make up about 20% of the incarcerated population, according to the American Correctional Association...
 

 PARANOIA ABOUT ARABS AND MUSLIMS is not a recurrent theme in American society. But these issues usually only get serious attention when something terrible happens, such as the 1993 World Trade Center bombing or a terror plot discovered by FBI agents last December, when they intercepted alleged bombers on their way into the country from Canada.
 

 Lorenzo Islam looks over the third-floor tower area where he plans to sound the call for Muslim prayer. Islam is turning this house at 633 S. Ohio Ave. into a homeless shelter for women and children of all religions. Some people viewed a boarded-up building in the 600 block of S. Ohio Avenue as an eyesore.
 

 "Most parents send their kids here for reasons other than Islam," lamented the principal of a large Muslim school.
 "A lot of our students have older brothers and sisters who have gone out of control. They smoke, use drugs, sleep around and disobey their parents."
 I knew from my own experience that what he was saying was true. In my first year of teaching I had met the families of many of my students in the Muslim school.
 

 Dow Jones & Co., publisher of The Wall Street Journal and Interactive Journal, is launching a new global equity-benchmark index aimed at investors who follow Islamic investment guidelines.
 The new index -- called the Dow Jones Islamic Market Index, or DJIM -- currently tracks 600 companies whose products and services don't violate Shari'ah law. Companies in the index aren't just from Islamic countries, but from 30 countries around the world, including the U.S.
 

 By arguing that The Quran is a historical document, it is trying to prove that Quran is not the word of God and therefore Islam is nothing but a historical construction that served the political interests of certain vested interests, like Pagan Arabs etc.
 

 Can the clarity of vision brought by novelty outweigh the absence of a Muslim upbringing?  Is adoption a more culturally fertile condition than simple sonship?
 

 This is a New York Times piece by Susan Sachs posted on AMILAnet which covers the growth of Muslim Schools in the US and some of the reasons these schools are seen as attractive to Muslim parents.
 

 According to "The Almanac Book of Facts", the population increased 137% within the past decade, Christianity increased 46%, while Islam increased 235%.
 In a recent pole in the (US), 100,000 people per year in America alone, are converting to Islam. For every 1 male convert to Islam, 4 females convert to Islam, Why?
 

 A good book from the "Muslim Social Service Listserver," a moderated mailing list for Muslims working in social services.
 

 This book is a collection of essays written over several years. Professor Sulayman S. Nyang has collected them to share with the reading public his insights and research findings on the emerging Muslim community in the United States of America.