Aamna Anwer and Usman Mian have heard the stories of the black students who organized a sit-in at the Bursar’s Office in 1968 and the Asian-American students who resorted to a hunger strike in 1995 to make their voices heard.
The Weinberg seniors, who have been key figures in the effort to create an Islamic studies program at Northwestern, said they are ready for the struggle.
“If you look at the history of the university you see the struggle of minority students to create new programs,” Mian said. “For African-American students it was definitely a struggle, but now it’s one of the best programs in the country. You’d think the university would learn from this.”
Anwer and Mian are both members of the Muslim-cultural Student Association, which is hosting its annual Islam Awareness Week. In their eyes, the need for the program isn’t simply a void in the list of NU’s available programs.
“A lot of us have grown up with a skewed perception of Islam,” Anwer said. “We want professors who can tell it like it is.”
This is where religion Prof. Ruediger Seesemann comes in.
Two years ago, Mian and five other students approached Seesemann to talk about creating the program. The professor, who was “impressed by the students’ commitment,” said he thought the idea had merit, although its execution would be difficult.
“It has to be planned carefully,” Seesemann said. “Unless Northwestern puts aside significant resources, it will not be able to compete with programs at other universities.”
Duke University’s program, which Seesemann considers a success, was not the result of students’ demands, but of a parent’s request, said Bruce Lawrence, director of the Duke Islamic Studies Center.
Lawrence said the concept and the funding for the program came in 2004 from “a major donor. Not Muslim, not Arab, not even Duke.” The donor wanted to create DISC in memory of his son, a Duke student who passed away.
Since 2006, the certificate program, which has a particular emphasis on cultural studies, has grown in popularity from no students in its inaugural year to ten in 2008, said Lawrence.
“Cultural Islam exists in tandem with politics and religion, but it is not identical,” Lawrence said. “You cannot ignore culture and cultural differences.”
Although empirical studies of culture are central to the program Mian and Anwer envision, the NU students said they believe a stronger emphasis should be placed on Islam as a religion.
But for Seesemann, the professors who provide this insight would have to steer clear of religious guidance.
“This project has to be established with a clear academic agenda,” Seesemann said.
Although Anwer and Mian support a purely academic approach, they said including elements of spirituality would allow Muslim students to get a more enriching experience from the program.
“The way I see it is for Muslims it could work as a spiritual guide, but I don’t think it would be preachy at all,” Anwer said.
There is a significant amount of logistical work to do before debating particulars of the curriculum. The next step is for a tenured professor to spearhead the project, which Seesemann said would probably have to debut as a minor and grow from there.
“Such an initiative has to be done under the leadership of an established professor,” he said. “These students are aware that it takes time.”
