The Washington Post: Asking U.S. Muslims to choose between faith, nation pushes them away from public life

Surveys that ask Muslims to choose to identify as Muslim or American often serves to make them less politically engaged, writes Brian Calfano, an assistant professor of political science and journalism at the University of Cincinnati, in an op-ed published in the Washington Post.

Calfano, co-author of “Understanding Muslim Political Life in America: Contested Citizenship in the Twenty-First Century,” explains in the story how, while Muslim Americans express a strong commitment to the U.S., surveys that frame identity in terms of faith or nation may unintentionally discourage Muslims from engaging in politics.  

Read the story here.

Featured image at top: Members of the American Muslim community shelter from the sun under a U.S. stars and stripes flag umbrella at a demonstration to protest what they say is the Indian government's occupation of Jammu and Kashmir, a Muslim-majority state within India, outside the Federal Building in Los Angeles on Aug. 10. (Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images)