The Story of Muslims in the Americas, in Thirteen Mosques
Muslims have lived in the New World for over 500 years, before Protestantism even existed, but their contributions were erased by revisionists and ignorance. In this colorful alternative history o f the Americas, we meet the enslaved and indentured Muslims who changed the course of history, the immigrants who advanced the Space Race and automotive revolution, the visionaries who spearheaded civil rights movements, and the 21st-century Americans shifting the political landscape while struggling for acceptance both within and outside their mosques.
In search of these forgotten stories, Mouallem traveled 7,000 miles, from the northwest tip of Brazil to the southeast edge of the Arctic, to visit thirteen pivotal mosques. What he discovers is a population as diverse and conflicted as you’d find in any other house of worship, and deeply misunderstood.
Parallel to the author’s geographical journey is a personal one. A child of immigrants, Mouallem discovers that, just as the greater legacy of Western Islam was lost on him, so were the stories of prior generations in his family. An atheist since the 9/11 attacks, Mouallem reconsiders Islam and his place within it.
Meanwhile, as the rise of hate groups threaten the liberties of Muslims in the West, ideologues from the East try to suppress their liberalism. With pressures to assimilate coming from all sides, will Muslims of the Americas ever be free to worship on their own terms?
