"The Taqwacores" on Q TV

www.youtube.com/qtv

The legendary Clash singer and guitarist Joe Strummer famously said, "the future is unwritten". Well, I'd love to hear what Strummer would have to say about Michael Muhammad Knight -- the author of "The Taqwacores", a book that, in many ways, wrote the future of the North American Muslim punk music scene. Knight's book takes us into a vibrant house of aspiring punk musicians living in Buffalo, New York. Like most young punks, the characters in this book live for sex, drugs and rock n' roll. But in this house they also pray to Mecca (denoted by a hole smashed in a wall). The characters in "The Taqwacores" all negotiate their identities - religious, political, cultural and sexual - through the rebellion of punk....from mohawked Sufis to burqa-wearing riot girls and Indonesian skater boys. The book began as a photocopied, spiral-bound zine that Knight distributed out of the trunk of his car in mosque parking lots. In 2005, it was picked up and published by Alternative Tentacles, Jello Biafra's record label, and it's now being re-released in soft-cover by Soft Skull Press. Knight has since written a few books on American Muslim culture but "The Taqwacores" seems to have had the most affect on contemporary culture. He's been hailed by critics as a Hunter S. Thompson, Jack Kerouac or J.D. Salinger for post-9-11 American muslim youth...many of whom were inspired to create bands of their own like "The Komanis" or Vancouver's all-girl punk outfit, "Secret Trial Five". The book has also inspired two films coming out this year -- a dramatic feature film - and a documentary by Montreal-based filmmaker, Omar Majeed. The two sat down in Studio Q to talk about the subject.

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  Music

[DrakarOgro]

Punk is all about creating/wearing/discovering your own identity, in spite of the rest of the world trying to make you in a specific way.

So, if part of your identity is being a muslim... You are a muslim-punk, and fuck it.



[activistapress]

Using Shock-value...bitting off gg allin style and then trying to be muslim is NOT Islamic Punk.

I think it is possible to have Islamic-Punk...but NOT in this way.

So...you Drink, Smoke, F***k, and say blasphamy...yet...its somehow Still "Islamic"....

Why not just Cut-the middle man and just be PUNK? without Islam?

I mean thats the goal anyways...

[Larry Parker]

I am an older adult and I "GOT IT".....Excellent and crazy movie.

[desibhoot]

maybe this maybe that maybe we dont know anything maybe we know everything..maybe we are muslims..maybe we are not. Maybe ok maybe we ok.

[don king]

this guy is a confused media cornball. he's a shia which explains his lack of knowing what islam really is.

[Jamey Fain]

i love the fact that he's wearing a wesley willis shirt.

[politikillpigs]

and if your calling urself punk iam muslim punk iam anarcho punk u probably arnt very punk

[politikillpigs]

fuck upper middle class posers and this bullshit dude. i dont care if ur a muslim christian or nazi i jus hate fake motherfuckers and michael is a fake guy i watch that doc. really fake shit the opposite of punk in my opinion check it you will know what i am typing

[Aicha Lasfar]

I have big issues with the "Taqwacore" movement as it's not simply about using art to better oneself and to get closer to God, it's about twisting and morphing the religion into your own comfort zone and human understanding. It's radicalism on the other liberal extreme. It frustrates me how we fail to see a just balance in the media between the extreme radical left and the extreme radical right.

[Bahariish]

Sweden loves you Michael! <3

[Britishfever456]

Understanding Divine scripture has layers of understanding. There is a basic understanding for the layman. Then there is understanding for more depth.There is also scholarly understanding. It would be wrong for layman to start interpreting God given text to define it. This causes much damage to understanding and public perception of Islam.

[Britishfever456]

The religion doesn't exist to short change people of their desires. It exists to provide guidance (God given Guidance is higher level) for this world and the next. If we believe in the next world, surely its worth taking small sacrifices such as not inventing things within the religion?