Rebel Music: Race, Empire, and the New Muslim Youth Culture

Hisham Aidi's new book was a great read, although I can't help but feel that perhaps it was too ambitious or endeavored to cover to many regions and topics. Also, at times I could not find a link to music and popular culture in some chapters, even though they were fascinating nonetheless (I am thinking specifically of the 'not quite white' chapter on Arab-Americans in the US racial order), but Aidi is certainly 'breaking new ground' by linking music and popular culture to these new stages in Muslim identities around the world. Before reading this dense text full of intriguing references, I already knew about the influence of hip-hop and African-American music and social movements on people of color and Muslim youth around the world, but this book goes even further by examining the impact of jazz and African-Americans on the explosion of gnawa music's recognition (thank you, Randy Weston), as well as exploring some of the long-established links between Islam among people of African descent in both the US and Brazil. In addition, Aidi offers an interesting analysis on Arab-Americans and where they 'fit' in the US racial schema, particularly now that there are more 'black Arabs' in the US, and because of the ways in which Westerners racialize Islam and discriminate against Muslims in government agencies and popular culture.

Moreover, the book remains accessible to scholars and the lay public who lack a deeper understanding of the various strains of Islam thought, including Salafism or even the deeper history of Maghrebi immigration in France and how music (particularly gnawa) was reappropriated by North African youths in the diaspora and at home as a result of gaining international attention in the West. It would seem that popular music across much of the Islamic world and its diaspora owes much to immigration, as well as experiences of alienation, racism, and social unrest in Europe and the US, although it clearly reverberates back in the homeland. Although much of popular music among Muslim youth around the world is influenced by African-American music (hip-hop, jazz, rock) and Afro-Caribbean forms (reggae), there also exists the tremendous influence of Islam on African-American musical forms, especially jazz (the Ahmadiyya stand out as one example, as well as other forms of Islam) and hip-hop (Nation of Islam, Sunni Islam). All in all, an enjoyable read full of unexpected facts and details that will have one reading more into Afro-Arab histories and Islamic youth cultures.