On this episode of AMP we are joined by Rabiah York Lumbard, award-winning author of a number of children’s books and a recent young adult novel, No True Believers. This thriller about an American Muslim teen forced to confront hatred, secret conspiracies, and Islamophobia during her senior year of high school draws on Rabiah’s own experiences as an American Muslim at home and abroad.
Though she grew up in a non-practicing Protestant family, Rabiah outlines how a family trip to Istanbul left her captivated by the beauty and intrigue of Islam. Shortly afterward she headed to college in the majestic (if we do say so ourselves) PNW, where, like many young people, she began questioning existence and thinking deep thoughts. Hoping, ironically, that she’d come around to Christianity, her father gave her a book by Karen Armstrong. It was then that she realized the tenets of Islam were the principles she’d always embraced but had no name for. She officially converted to Islam at 18; however, she feels she’s always been Muslim.
As a white convert, Rabiah touches on the phenomenon of racially atypical Muslim erasure. From there we delve into othering, bullying, and Islamophobia, and how they come in many and subtle forms—not just the overt kind from men with tiki torches. Asad relates to the passage about brown-skinned boys feeling like their “survival depends on being as close to invisible as possible.” And Rabiah reveals that writing her debut novel was actually spurred by the Islamophobia her husband faced in academia, driving the family of 5 to suddenly move to the Middle East, where they remain today.
As with fellow guests, we flesh out the danger of misrepresentation (or lack of representation) in media and art. Why it was important that her main character be a very relatable teenage girl with just a bit of an anti-authoritarian streak, who also happens to be Muslim. And why the book uses Arabic phrases both religiously and vernacularly to show that there’s not always a strict rigidity, that most Muslims fall somewhere in between the totally secular nonbeliever and perfect goody-two-shoes tropes usually encountered. Finally, we conclude with the thought that despite all its struggles, with all the work left to be done, the United States will always be our beautiful and resilient home.
Learn more about Rabiah on her website. Get your copy of No True Believers here, or send us your review on Apple podcasts before 3/15 to be entered into our very first giveaway to win a signed copy!
Follow Your Woke Aunty on Twitter, listen to Riada Akyol’s podcast, Dignified Resilience, and pluck up little nuggets of Quran wisdom from a very universal perspective on her husband’s podcast, Quran for All Seasons. Finally, if you need to cry and laugh at the same time (and who doesn’t?), watch Miracle in Cell No. 7 on Netflix.
This episode was recorded in December 2020.
American Muslim Project is a production of Rifelion, LLC.
Writer and Researcher: Lindsy Gamble
Show Edited by Mark Annotto and Asad Butt
Music by Simon Hutchinson
Hosted by Asad Butt