{"id":106,"date":"2013-12-03T15:59:15","date_gmt":"2013-12-03T15:59:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/?p=106"},"modified":"2015-10-13T19:11:41","modified_gmt":"2015-10-13T19:11:41","slug":"muslim-american-superheroes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/2013\/12\/03\/muslim-american-superheroes\/","title":{"rendered":"Muslim American Superheroes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p dir=\"ltr\">Marvel Comics recently set the comic book world abuzz after announcing the rebirth of Ms. Marvel, one of their most-famed female superheros, as a <a href=\"http:\/\/america.aljazeera.com\/articles\/2013\/11\/5\/ms-marvel-returnsasmuslimteen.html\">16 year old Muslim American suburbanite named Kamala Khan<\/a>. Khan, a Jersey City resident born to Pakistani immigrants, has the power to shapeshift her body. While this isn\u2019t the first time the world has seen a <a href=\"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/girlwpen\/2013\/08\/01\/burka-avenger-pakistans-new-caped-crusader-meets-the-burqa-debates\/\">female Muslim superhero<\/a>, or a <a href=\"http:\/\/theweek.com\/article\/index\/232998\/meet-the-new-muslim-american-green-lantern\">Muslim American superhero<\/a>, it does mark Marvel Comics\u2019 first attempts at a series with a lead Muslim protagonist. This change will undoubtedly be welcomed by many in the Muslim American community given the mostly one-dimensional portrayal of Muslims in mainstream media and art since 9\/11.<\/p>\n<h5>While portrayals of Islam and Muslims have always been rather shallow, research indicates that they have been particularly defamatory and offensive in recent decades:<\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.crmcs.sunderland.ac.uk\/research-staff\/amir-saeed\/\">Amir Saeed<\/a>. 2007. \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1111\/j.1751-9020.2007.00039.x\/abstract;jsessionid=77D5D0F1534FF0678AA44819E75FCA10.f04t01?deniedAccessCustomisedMessage=&amp;userIsAuthenticated=false\">Media, Racism, and Islamaphobia: The Representations of Islam and Muslims in the media<\/a>\u201d, in Sociology Compass 1(2): 443-462<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h5>Research also shows that post 9\/11 discriminatory policy and stereotyping has had a profound negative influence on the identity formation of Muslim American youth and young adults:<\/h5>\n<ul>\n<li>Sunaina Marr Maira. 2009. <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Missing-Youth-Citizenship-Empire-after\/dp\/0822344092\/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1384042100&amp;sr=8-3&amp;keywords=missing+muslim\">Missing: Youth, Citizenship, and Empire after 9\/11<\/a><\/em>. Duke University Press<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.uic.edu\/depts\/wsweb\/people\/faculty\/naber\/naber.html\">Nadine Naber<\/a>. 2012. <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Arab-America-Cultural-Newcomers-Immigrant\/dp\/0814758878\/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1384450371&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=arab+america\">Arab America: Gender, Cultural Politics, and Activism<\/a><\/em>. NYU Press<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Marvel Comics recently set the comic book world abuzz after announcing the rebirth of Ms. Marvel, one of their most-famed female superheros, as a 16 year old Muslim American suburbanite named Kamala Khan. Khan, a Jersey City resident born to Pakistani immigrants, has the power to shapeshift her body. While this isn\u2019t the first time [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1951,"featured_media":503,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,14],"tags":[38543,42],"class_list":["post-106","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","category-race","tag-culture","tag-religion"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/files\/2013\/12\/Kamala_Khan.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1951"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":107,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106\/revisions\/107"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/trot\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}