2024 ISAN Panel Discussion: Muslim Voices: Experiences of Women in Academia

2024 ISAN Panel Discussion: Muslim Voices: Experiences of Women in Academia
March 3, 2024
Panelists:
Noor Ali, Northeastern University (USA)
Fatima Seyma Kizil, Syracuse University (USA)
Fatima Koura, Northeastern University (USA)
Carolyn Lane, California State University Bakersfield (USA)
This panel brings to your four Muslim scholar-practitioners who have all separately embarked on the journey of collecting narratives of the Muslim American educational experience. While defying monolithic understandings of the Muslim demographic, this live discussion panel seeks to explore the lived experiences of female Muslim scholars through the utilization of autoethnography. This work addresses the need for Muslim voices in academia, and focuses on how the panelists each navigate their own intersectional identities as individuals, women, researchers, and community members, while also engaging with the vulnerable narratives of their research participants. This panel provides critical insight at a time when the climate is rife with misrepresentation and misunderstanding of the Muslim demographic. The panelists will share insights they have gained from their experiences, offering an opportunity to increase understanding and connection. Conducting research on those who share identity and experiences of minoritization with the researcher, holds significant value in terms of self-awareness, gaining a better understanding of Muslim experiences, and finding ways to empower community members at a grassroots level. As hijab wearing Muslim women, who attended college in the United States, the experiences of the researchers have defined their own identities and formal and informal educational journeys. Identifiability (Ali, 2022) is a key component of MusCrit, a micro-theoretical framework that proposes counter-storytelling as key to dismantling oppressive and demonizing stereotypes about the Muslim American demographic. In the experience of these four scholar-practitioners, listening to the narratives from Muslim Americans (women and youth) for their research, offers them a distinct yet relatable opportunity of exploration in their work. This panel utilizes autoethnography to deepen the audience’s understanding of the experience undergone when researchers from “inside” feel a deep sense of responsibility to uplift diverse narratives, while also recognizing that a monolithic insider experience shortchanges the vibrant complexity of the narrative at hand. This panel stands at the crossroads of emic and etic perspectives, while providing an autoethnographic account of the researchers engaging with narrative inquiry around their participants’ lived experiences.
• Muslim Voices in Academia