UmmIbrahimIsa
09-08-2004, 08:35 PM
Assalamu alaikum wr wb
wanted to know how the event turned out so i searched for the article online and found this below... im a bit disturbed by it, wondering where some of these ppl *think* that its ok for women to perform in public in front of non mahram men..? err.. read below...
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Festival rules making waves
Views clash on what Islamic culture is
Just call it a Saudi fest, critic says
NICHOLAS KEUNG
IMMIGRATION/DIVERSITY REPORTER
Who is hijacking whose Islam?
That is the centre of a debate between the organizers of a Muslim festival and its critics on the eve of the event in Mississauga tomorrow that bans women vocalists, string instruments and the depiction of human faces in artwork.
While the MuslimFest 2004 organizers — most of them Muslim youth born and raised in Canada — say they only go by their interpretation of the Sharia Islamic law, other argue that those restrictions are the way they see their religion.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
See also: Rallying cry for Muslims in Canada
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The joint event by Young Muslims Canada, Sound Vision and Dawanet, to be held all day at the Mississauga Living Arts Centre tomorrow, includes puppet shows, Islamic art exhibits, workshops, films and two live concerts featuring male Muslim performers such as Dawud Wharnsby Ali, Sami Yusuf, Zain Bhikha and Irfan Makki.
"All the performances will be in English. The youth in our community have a real passion to showcase to Muslims and non-Muslims what the Islamic culture has to offer," said event spokesperson Azhar Qureshi. "They are proud of being Muslim. They are proud of being Canadian. And they want to bring our culture to the mainstream."
Visual artist Asma Arshad Mahmood said she was impressed when she received an invitation.
But then she read the guidelines:
"No hand-drawn faces. Silhouettes may be acceptable in some cases.... Photographs of people will be allowed if they conform to the contents allowed by Sharia."
"Songs performance can be male voices only and include Daff (Arabic camel drum) if needed."
"I was thinking to myself, `You must be joking. That's not my Islamic culture,'" recalled Mahmood, a mother of three girls who has had her multimedia artworks exhibited at the Royal Ontario Museum.
"I feel like my culture and religion are hijacked by people who are trying to define the Arabic culture as the only Islamic culture."
Tarek Fateh, host of the Muslim Chronicle weekly show on Vision TV, said the event excludes the rich cultures of other Muslims from the Persian Gulf, Africa and Asia, who do welcome female vocalists, paintings of human beings and string instruments.
"They (the organizers) have the rights to do what they do, what they believe in, but we also have our rights to tell them that they cannot determine what is a valid or invalid Islamic culture," said the 55-year-old Fateh, who is of Pakistani background. "They should just call the event a Saudi fest, not a Muslim fest,."she added.
Fareheen Chowdhury, chair of the organizing committee for the event, said Young Muslims volunteers have spent eight months putting the festival together in order to "present Islam to Muslims and non-Muslims through artistic medium that can transcend religious and cultural boundaries."
Chowdhury, 23, said there will be 125 pieces of art in the exhibition by more than 30 artists, the majority of them women. Few submissions have been turned away, she said.
"We are using our faith as our guiding principles. All those things come from our holy book of Qu'ran," she said. "We don't want to hide the truth. We are dealing with people from different backgrounds, people from various cultures."
She said the organizers have been criticized from all sides of the community, with the progressives calling them too conservative and the conservatives describing them as being too liberal.
"The fact is there are diverse opinions in Islam. The beauty of Islam is we are a pluralistic religion," Chowdhury said.
Reem Meshal, a former lecturer on Islamic law at the University of Toronto and McGill University, said debates like this are healthy and they simply show the diversity within the Muslim community.
Meshal said the traditional interpretation of Sharia encompasses all five legal schools in Islam: Hanafi, Maliki, Shasi'i, Hanbali and Shia Ja'afari.
The concept of the Islamic law, which is traditionally defined and interpreted by Fuqaha (Muslim intellectuals), is "dynamic, flexible and changing with the times," she added.
"Unfortunately, what is happening today is you have a lot of laypersons informing what the modern conception of the Sharia should be."
The festival runs from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. at the Living Arts Centre near Highway 10 and Burnhamthorpe Rd
wanted to know how the event turned out so i searched for the article online and found this below... im a bit disturbed by it, wondering where some of these ppl *think* that its ok for women to perform in public in front of non mahram men..? err.. read below...
-------------------------------
Festival rules making waves
Views clash on what Islamic culture is
Just call it a Saudi fest, critic says
NICHOLAS KEUNG
IMMIGRATION/DIVERSITY REPORTER
Who is hijacking whose Islam?
That is the centre of a debate between the organizers of a Muslim festival and its critics on the eve of the event in Mississauga tomorrow that bans women vocalists, string instruments and the depiction of human faces in artwork.
While the MuslimFest 2004 organizers — most of them Muslim youth born and raised in Canada — say they only go by their interpretation of the Sharia Islamic law, other argue that those restrictions are the way they see their religion.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
See also: Rallying cry for Muslims in Canada
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The joint event by Young Muslims Canada, Sound Vision and Dawanet, to be held all day at the Mississauga Living Arts Centre tomorrow, includes puppet shows, Islamic art exhibits, workshops, films and two live concerts featuring male Muslim performers such as Dawud Wharnsby Ali, Sami Yusuf, Zain Bhikha and Irfan Makki.
"All the performances will be in English. The youth in our community have a real passion to showcase to Muslims and non-Muslims what the Islamic culture has to offer," said event spokesperson Azhar Qureshi. "They are proud of being Muslim. They are proud of being Canadian. And they want to bring our culture to the mainstream."
Visual artist Asma Arshad Mahmood said she was impressed when she received an invitation.
But then she read the guidelines:
"No hand-drawn faces. Silhouettes may be acceptable in some cases.... Photographs of people will be allowed if they conform to the contents allowed by Sharia."
"Songs performance can be male voices only and include Daff (Arabic camel drum) if needed."
"I was thinking to myself, `You must be joking. That's not my Islamic culture,'" recalled Mahmood, a mother of three girls who has had her multimedia artworks exhibited at the Royal Ontario Museum.
"I feel like my culture and religion are hijacked by people who are trying to define the Arabic culture as the only Islamic culture."
Tarek Fateh, host of the Muslim Chronicle weekly show on Vision TV, said the event excludes the rich cultures of other Muslims from the Persian Gulf, Africa and Asia, who do welcome female vocalists, paintings of human beings and string instruments.
"They (the organizers) have the rights to do what they do, what they believe in, but we also have our rights to tell them that they cannot determine what is a valid or invalid Islamic culture," said the 55-year-old Fateh, who is of Pakistani background. "They should just call the event a Saudi fest, not a Muslim fest,."she added.
Fareheen Chowdhury, chair of the organizing committee for the event, said Young Muslims volunteers have spent eight months putting the festival together in order to "present Islam to Muslims and non-Muslims through artistic medium that can transcend religious and cultural boundaries."
Chowdhury, 23, said there will be 125 pieces of art in the exhibition by more than 30 artists, the majority of them women. Few submissions have been turned away, she said.
"We are using our faith as our guiding principles. All those things come from our holy book of Qu'ran," she said. "We don't want to hide the truth. We are dealing with people from different backgrounds, people from various cultures."
She said the organizers have been criticized from all sides of the community, with the progressives calling them too conservative and the conservatives describing them as being too liberal.
"The fact is there are diverse opinions in Islam. The beauty of Islam is we are a pluralistic religion," Chowdhury said.
Reem Meshal, a former lecturer on Islamic law at the University of Toronto and McGill University, said debates like this are healthy and they simply show the diversity within the Muslim community.
Meshal said the traditional interpretation of Sharia encompasses all five legal schools in Islam: Hanafi, Maliki, Shasi'i, Hanbali and Shia Ja'afari.
The concept of the Islamic law, which is traditionally defined and interpreted by Fuqaha (Muslim intellectuals), is "dynamic, flexible and changing with the times," she added.
"Unfortunately, what is happening today is you have a lot of laypersons informing what the modern conception of the Sharia should be."
The festival runs from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. at the Living Arts Centre near Highway 10 and Burnhamthorpe Rd