Schools survey: Non-German students more likely to ‘sit next to a …

2023/05/08 Leave a comment

Interesting study:

A study on children’s attitudes toward their classmates resulted in some surprising, and other not so surprising, findings.

Based on surveys of ninth-grade children (aged 14 to 15) in Germany, research led by Zsófia Boda at the University of Essex and Georg Lorenz from Leipzig University has found that classes that are ethnically diverse are more welcoming of refugee students.

That’s the unsurprising part.

What it also revealed, however, was that students who were born in Germany to German-born parents were the most likely to reject their refugee classmates, and the least likely to refer to them as friends.

Would you sit next to a refugee?

The study is based on the results of a national survey of 6,390 children in Germany in 2018, which asked the students who their friends were and who they would not want to sit next to in class. Most of the refugee students involved in the survey came from Syria and Afghanistan — the two main countries of origin of people seeking protection in Germany.

The results, published this week in the journal Nature Human Behaviour, showed that the refugee children had fewer friends and experienced more rejection than their non-refugee peers.

But in a more mixed or ‘high-diversity’ classroom, it was much less likely for a child to say they would not want to share a desk with a refugee or asylum seeker, and more likely that they would name a refugee student as a friend.

The research found that there are two processes at work here: In a classroom with a high proportion of ‘non-German’ children, you are more likely to get people who are accepting of other non-Germans, the researchers explained. But also, ethnic majority (i.e. second-generation German) students are less inclined to reject refugee peers if they are surrounded by diversity.

The study suggests that this finding – that more diversity does not lead to greater rejection by the ethnic majority group – is an important one, because it challenges critical views of multiculturalism.

A large proportion – about half – of refugees and migrants in Germany are under the age of 18.

These young people need more than just access to education. Having positive and supportive relationships with others their own age in turn leads to them achieving better grades at school and results in overall better health and wellbeing for minority students.

The study suggests that if you take these away, the educational success and psychological adjustment of refugee adolescents will likely be put at risk.

Barriers to acceptance

So what is it that is stopping students from accepting their refugee peers?

There are several possible reasons, the researchers behind the study say. One is language, which is often said to be a major barrier to integration. Traumatic experiences can also make it hard for young refugees to adjust.

Other explanations for refugees having lower levels of social integration or acceptance in the classroom include the fact that they are likely to have joined the class later when friendships between other students have already formed. There is also the dynamics of friendship groups, which often grow and develop between people of the same ethnic group.

Moreover, the study also points out that social integration is not a one-sided process: “[T]he attitudes and behaviors of peers [is] crucial,” it notes.

What should policy makers do with these findings which, taken at face value, seem to suggest that refugee students should attend schools that are already ethnically diverse?

If they were to take this approach, it might jeopardize refugee students’ language development, which usually benefits from having a high proportion of majority-ethnic children in the classroom.

Steering refugee children into diverse schools could also lead to segregation instead of integration, and that would not help in promoting positive attitudes between German and non-German students, the study suggests.

There are some concrete steps that could “mitigate the negative consequences of prejudice,” according to the researchers. They recommend that teachers and principals are made aware of the challenges and that they support integration by, among other things, encouraging cooperation and showing support for mixing ethnic groups.

With global forced migration having become a ‘megatrend,’ Boda and Lorenz argue promoting the social integration of refugees, including adolescents, will remain crucially important for the refugees themselves. According to them, it will also reduce negative attitudes and prejudice towards immigrants — a problem which is widespread in Western societies.

Source: Schools survey: Non-German students more likely to ‘sit next to a …

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More Islamic lessons in Swiss schools? – SWI swissinfo.ch

2023/05/08 Leave a comment

Of note:

With a “Salam aleikum”, teacher Nimetullah Veseli greets the pupils of year four in the Kirchacker school building. Veseli stands in front of the six boys and six girls in the classroom in Neuhausen, Schaffhausen. Wearing jeans and a white shirt, he explains the Islamic religious teachings.

Imam Nimetullah Veseli gives confession-oriented Islamic lessons at the public school. Confession-oriented means that the children learn about their own religion, in contrast to the inter-faith lessons in most primary school.

Normally, these confession-oriented Islamic lessons take place in mosques. It is an exception that it is offered in a public school. Only ten Swiss schools offer such lessons.

Religious education with quality control

A recent study by the universities of Lucerne and Fribourg corroborates the advantages of this type of teaching: “The school is a neutral place,” says study director Hansjörg Schmid. This also means that children from different Muslim backgrounds receive lessons together.

In addition, more emphasis is placed on instructive elements of its study at the school. “The Islamic teachers are obliged to present their concepts to the school,” says Schmid. “This makes quality control possible.”

The director of the Swiss Centre for Islam and Society at the University of Fribourg, together with three other researchers, has examined all the Islamic instructions offered at schools. The study shows that once the lessons are up and running, the feedback is very positive. Generally the criticism and resistance comes beforehand.

Expand the programme – but how?

The study also shows that the lessons availability are strongly dependent on individuals. Most of the proposals came about as a result of initiatives by imams or Muslim religious teachers. “More stability would be important,” says study director Hansjörg Schmid.

The classes in Kreuzlingen could be a model for future programmes. There, various mosque associations, an interreligious working group and the local parishes have jointly set up Islamic instruction, and an association has taken over the sponsorship.

The study recommends expanding confession-oriented Islamic instruction in public schools. But who will pay for it? At present, the programme is supported by voluntary work as well as parental contributions or subsidies from mosque associations.

Broad-based teachings with trained teachers are lacking. In addition, there is another hurdle as in most cantons, teaching requires recognition under public law.

“Salam aleikum” in chorus

If a comparable religious education as that of the Christian national churches is to be developed, the Muslim communities would first have to be recognised. This is a lengthy process.

But Hansjörg Schmid says, “A lot is possible at the level of pilot trials.” He therefore advises trying out as much as possible at a low-threshold level – as in Neuhausen. There, Imam Nimetullah Veseli ends the lesson with “Salam aleikum”: “What does that mean?” he wants to know from the fourth graders. “Peace be with you and with you,” they answer in chorus.

Source: More Islamic lessons in Swiss schools? – SWI swissinfo.ch

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Qadeer: Canada needs new immigrants, but must plan for the consequences

2023/05/06 1 Comment

Another good commentary regarding the failures of governments and stakeholders to acknowledge and address the externalities of immigration:

Despite their success, Canadian immigration and settlement policies are producing some unintended negative effects on post-secondary education, housing, the labour market, and visa and immigration processes. Because these areas are interrelated, when one becomes compromised, others are also affected.

The number of scams, false claims and fake documents in the immigration and temporary workers’ permits process points to this issue. While there appear to be no hard statistics, media accounts and government warnings indicate they are an issue.

Canada is a world leader in accepting immigration. In the past few years, it has been adding about one per cent of its population yearly by immigration. In 2022, apart from permanent immigrants (437,000), the number of non-permanent residents increased by a net of more than 607,000, some of whom were admitted as temporary workers and/or international students. Canada’s population increased by more than a million people, largely as a result of a surge in immigration and temporary residents. The federal government is aiming to add 1.5 million more immigrants by 2025.

So far, these policies seem to have worked out. There is strong support for increased immigration among Canadians. Environics Institute’s recent survey shows that seven in 10 support the present level of immigration, though there is some recognition of the challenges arising from it.

One of these challenges is false documents, which tend to follow the priorities of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). For example, if the protection of people persecuted because of sexual orientation in a country is the priority, suddenly claims in that area increase. Some immigrant consultants, as well as human smugglers, tutor and manufacture documents to support such claims.

A recent story in the Toronto Star found that as many as 700 Indian students were admitted to study in Canada on fake admission letters. They lived and found places in different colleges for years before it became known that the letters were bogus. A regulatory body for immigration consultants, the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants, has had limited success in supressing such practices.

The post-secondary education sector’s structure and purposes have been widely compromised by the drive to recruit international students. Universities, and especially colleges, including private colleges, have come to depend on the international student enrolment fees. Access to higher learning may only be partially the motivating factor behind the scramble for foreigners trying to access Canadian post-secondary education.

Being an international student also opens the door to permanent residency in Canada. This is a big draw for students from abroad. It has been turned into a business by some post-secondary institutions. Even Ontario’s auditor general has identified the dependence on these fees as a vulnerable point in post-secondary educational finances.

About 500,000 international students contributed  $16.2 billion in 2017 and $19.7 billion in 2018 to this country’s GDP and supported more than 218,000 jobs in 2018. These international students are also being used as a cheap way to combat labour shortages. Recent rule changes allow some international students to work up to 40 hours a week while attending classes. This is to serve the need of the labour market, rather than advance international students’ education. To accommodate their schedule, institutions are arranging classes in the evenings and on weekends. In Toronto, for example, young South Asians dominate the landscape working as delivery workers and van drivers. If they are students, one wonders how much time they can spend on their studies after working a full-time job.

The enrolment of large numbers of international students affects the quality of educational programs in post-secondary institutions. International students generally add to the quality of learning experiences. Many international students are among the brightest. But the aggressive recruitment — combined with studies becoming a path to permanent residence and employment — have affected the classroom. Classes dominated by students from abroad with wide variations of language skills and motivation inhibit discussion and compromise learning. This is hardly the Canadian education for which they paid.

Immigration is a positive force for the Canadian economy, making up for labour shortages and a potentially decreasing population. Yet it has been used for many unethical ends. The downdraft of capabilities and status that immigrants experience on arrival is well-known. The infusion of hundreds of thousands of new job-seekers a year prompts abuses in the labour market.

Gig jobs rather than careers have become the norm. Foreign workers are hired to replace Canadians whose seniority has raised their salaries. Many economists argue that immigration at least initially affects wages of Canadian workers in the fields where immigrant labour supply increases.

In many professions, anecdotal evidence suggests that Canadians and long-standing immigrants are displaced after they have worked out new initiatives and routinized procedures. Foreign workers and new immigrants are then brought in at lower rates to run the programs. This means new immigrants and temporary workers often compete with second-generation Canadians in the labour market.

This affects the mainstream economy. International students and undocumented workers may be paid below minimum wage and off-the-books. A continual supply of young workers at lower salaries pushes older, more expensive and more experienced Canadians off the job market. It is not a surprise that businesses lobby for more workers from abroad.

The ethical responsibilities of attracting professionals in the fields of health and other critical areas from poor countries does not appear to register in discussions of Canadian immigration policies. The Global South needs professionals for development, yet rich countries such as Canada are attracting them to leave their homes with incentives for immigration.

This brain drain has long been an issue for the poor countries. It is particularly damaging in the case of medical professionals, who are direly needed in those places. The World Health Organization has taken note of the dilemma of health professionals emigrating from the Global South. It has established a global code for their recruitment, balancing individuals’ rights of movement and the social costs borne by poor countries.

Problems of housing adequacy, affordability and availability have buffeted Canada in one way or another for a long time. The demand-and-supply laws tell us that accommodating a million persons a year should exacerbate the housing shortages, particularly in major cities. This strain is expected, but what is of equal public concern are the abuses and illegal practices that the excessive demand is fostering.

Immigration funnels “black” money from abroad into real estate, leaving many housing units vacant for speculative gains. Toronto and Vancouver have lately recognized this problem and are restricting foreign buyers and taxing housing units kept vacant for six or more months.

More egregious is the practice of international students and other immigrants crowding in illegal housing, sharing rooms among many other, with their possessions spilling into the driveways. Neighbourhoods become noisy, choked with garbage and traffic. Brampton and Mississauga have been in news for the illegal basement rentals targeted at international students recruited from India.

Of course, a house is more than just a building. It requires infrastructure, schools, parks, sidewalks and roads. Housing requires major public investments and can result in higher taxes at local and provincial levels. Canadian cities are in a frenzy of increasing densities. Regardless of their success, these measures will change the quality of urban life for everybody. Immigration policies will change the form of our cities, potentially creating even more urban sprawl if there’s no careful planning.

Canada undoubtedly needs immigration, but post-secondary education and labour market policies are so interconnected that attention must be paid to the effect of an increase of a million new permanent residents. More enforcement against immigration scams, particularly aimed at post-secondary students, and the over-reliance of those institutions on foreign students should be deterred. The implications of more migrants on a housing market, particularly in specific cities, means a need for more careful planning. All of this suggests that these new immigration targets cannot be viewed as merely an issue of welcoming more faces. It requires careful planning, which to date does not appear to be happening.

Source: Canada needs new immigrants, but must plan for the consequences

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Paul: A Paper That Says Science Should Be Impartial Was Rejected From Major Journals. You Can’t Make This Up.

2023/05/05 Leave a comment

Agree with the concerns regarding the risks to scientific research:

Is a gay Republican Latino more capable of conducting a physics experiment than a white progressive heterosexual woman? Would they come to different conclusions based on the same data because of their different backgrounds?

For most people, the suggestion isn’t just ludicrous, it’s offensive.

Yet this belief — that science is somehow subjective and should be practiced and judged accordingly — has recently taken hold in academic, governmental and medical settings. A paper published last week, “In Defense of Merit in Science,” documents the disquieting ways in which research is increasingly informed by a politicized agenda, one that often characterizes science as fundamentally racist and in need of “decolonizing.” The authors argue that science should instead be independent, evidence-based and focused on advancing knowledge.

This sounds entirely reasonable.

Yet the paper was rejected by several prominent mainstream journals, including the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Another publication that passed on the paper, the authors report, described some of its conclusions as “downright hurtful.” The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences took issuewith the word “merit” in the title, writing that “the problem is that this concept of merit, as the authors surely know, has been widely and legitimately attacked as hollow as currently implemented.”

Instead, the paper has been published in a new journal called — you can’t make this up — The Journal of Controversial Ideas. The journal, which welcomes papers that “discuss well-known controversial topics from diverse cultural, philosophical, moral, political and religious perspectives,” was co-founded in 2021 by the philosopher Peter Singer and is entirely serious. This particular paper was rewritten multiple times and peer-reviewed before publication. However controversial one judges the paper’s claims, they deserve consideration.

According to its 29 authors, who are primarily scientists (including two Nobel laureates) in fields as varied as theoretical physics, psychology and pharmacokinetics, ideological concerns are threatening independence and rigor in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine. Though the goal of expanding opportunity for more diverse researchers in the sciences is laudable, the authors write, it should not be pursued at the expense of foundational scientific concepts like objective truth, merit and evidence, which they claim are being jeopardized by efforts to account for differing perspectives.

Consider the increasingly widespread practice of appending a “positionality statement” to one’s research. This is an explicit acknowledgment by the author of an academic paper of his or her identity (e.g., “nondisabled,” “continuing generation”). Positionality statements were first popular in the social sciences and are now spreading to the hard sciences and medicine. The idea is that one’s race, sex, relative privilege and “experiences of oppression” inherently inform one’s research, especially in ways that perpetuate or alleviate bias.

But whatever validity “alternative ways of knowing,” “multiple narratives” and “lived experience” may have in the humanities, they are of questionable utility when it comes to the sciences. Some defenders of positionality statements maintain that these acknowledgments promote objectivity by drawing attention to a researcher’s potential blind spots, but in practice they can have the opposite effect, implying that scientific research isn’t universally valid or applicable — that there are different kinds of knowledge for different groups of people.

Another concern is the rise of “citation justice” — the attempt to achieve racial or gender balance in scholarly references. The purpose of a citation in an academic publication is to substantiate claims and offer the most relevant supporting research. Advocates of citation justice say these citations too often prioritize the work of white men. But in a field like chemistry, in which fewer than 30 percent of papers are written by women, according to data from the American Chemical Society, and where the foundational texts are almost entirely written by men, “justice” means disproportionately favoring studies by women, regardless of relevance. Many prominent science journals now recommend that before submission, authors run their papers through software programs that detect any citation bias.

A third worrisome development is the statements that researchers are often required to write in order to apply for faculty jobs (and to advance in those positions) describing their commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion, something my colleague John McWhorter, one of the paper’s authors, has written about in The Times. These are noble goals that in practice, however, can amount to discrimination, and such statements strike many as a kind of political litmus test. At the University of California, Berkeley, for example, in the hiring cycle from 2018 to 2019, three-quarters of applicants for faculty positions in the life sciences were eliminated on the basis of these statements alone. (Grant programs also often require applications for funding in the sciences to include D.E.I. goals.)

Of course, nobody wants to hire a racist. But that’s not what we’re talking about. For a prospective faculty member to say he is determined to treat all students equally rather than to advance diversity initiatives can be enough to count someone out of a job.

Marisol Quintanilla, an assistant professor of nematology at Michigan State University, was required to take a multiple choice D.E.I. test for continued employment, along with all faculty members; she was also asked to write a D.E.I. statement as part of her annual performance evaluations, which weigh heavily in the tenure process. Several designated answers in the test didn’t align with her religious or scientific beliefs, she said. The statement requirement was abandoned in March, but not without a protracted battle. “I’ve heard colleagues of mine saying they need to get rid of white men in academia,” Quintanilla, a Chilean immigrant of mixed ethnicity, told me. “It amounted to clear discrimination. I feel very uncomfortable with this because I think hiring the best qualified candidates would be best for the advancement of science.”

Those are just three troubling practices detailed in the new paper. Sadly, they are part of a much larger set of developments.

“What’s being advocated are philosophies that are explicitly anti-scientific,” Anna Krylov, a chemistry professor at the University of Southern California and one of the paper’s authors, told me. “They deny that objective truth exists.” Having grown up in the Soviet Union, where science was infused with Marxist-Leninist ideology, Krylov is particularly attuned to such threats. And while she has advocated on behalf of equal treatment for women in science, she prefers to be judged on the basis of her achievements, not on her sex. “The merit of scientific theories and findings do not depend on the identity of the scientist,” she said in a phone interview.

It should go without saying — but in today’s polarized world, unfortunately, it doesn’t — that the authors of this paper do not deny the existence of historical racism or sexism or dispute that inequalities of opportunity persist. Nor do they deny that scientists have personal views, which are in turn informed by culture and society. They acknowledge biases and blind spots.

Where they depart from the prevailing ideological winds is in arguing that however imperfect, meritocracy is still the most effective way to ensure high quality science and greater equity. (A major study published last week shows that despite decades of sexism, claims of gender bias in academic science are now grossly overstated.) The focus, the authors write, should be on improving meritocratic systems rather than dismantling them.

At a time when faith in institutions is plummeting and scientific challenges such as climate change remain enduringly large, the last thing we want is to give the public reason to lose faith in science. A study published last month, “Even When Ideologies Align, People Distrust Politicized Institutions,” shows that what we need is more impartiality, not less.

If you believe bias is crucial to evaluating scientific work, you may object to the fact that several of the authors of the study are politically conservative, as are some of the researchers they cite. One author, Dorian Abbot, a geophysicist at the University of Chicago and a critic of some affirmative action and diversity programs, inspired outcry in 2021 when he was invited to speak at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. But to deny the validity of this paper on that basis would mean succumbing to the very fallacies the authors so persuasively dismantle.

One needn’t agree with every aspect of the authors’ politics or with all of their solutions. But to ignore or dismiss their research rather than impartially weigh the evidence would be a mistake. We need, in other words, to judge the paper on the merits. That, after all, is how science works.

Source: A Paper That Says Science Should Be Impartial Was Rejected From Major Journals. You Can’t Make This Up.

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Ivison: Liberals’ passport redesign latest attempt to reshape Canada’s symbols

2023/05/05 Leave a comment

Valid critique: “But the criticism remains the same for the Liberals as it was for the Conservatives — it should not be the sole preserve of political parties to present their own vision of the country as a fait accompli, without consultation or debate with its citizens,” even if some of the proposed changes have merit (while some do not):
The Liberals are engaged in a “radical” redesign of the Canadian passport that is likely to leave it looking very different, including replacing the Royal Coat of Arms on the cover and substituting pictures of the Fathers of Confederation, the National Vimy Memorial, the RCMP and the Stanley Cup with images “more reflective of what Canada is today,” sources say.
The changes will be announced in the coming weeks and be introduced in July, according to one official.The government is obliged to update security features every five years to embed new anti-counterfeit measures, but the Liberals have not modernized the passport since coming to power. The current passport contains a hidden chip to prevent forgeries and officials say the new technology being employed is “world-renowned and state of the art.”

According to a senior government official: “The new passport will feature state-of-the-art security measures that are critical in protecting the integrity of our passport system and in line with best practices and international standards.”

As with past governments, the Liberals are using the security overhaul to feature images that more closely reflect their values, including more prominent representation of women and Indigenous Canadians.

The Trudeau government is even said to have investigated the concept of changing the dark blue passport to Liberal red — an idea that has apparently been put on hold, subject to quality testing.It is the latest example of the Trudeau government making a calculated effort to reshape Canada’s symbols to reflect its own values.

The National Post reported earlier this week that Ottawa is set to unveil a new design for the Canadian Crown that sits atop the Royal Coat of Arms in time for the Coronation of King Charles this weekend. The so-called “Trudeau Crown” removes all religious imagery — crosses and Fleur-de-lis — and replaces them with maple leafs and snowflakes, sources said.

Nothing is new in politics and governments of all stripes have tried to redefine what it means to be Canadian by introducing symbols that more closely reflect their agenda.In late 2009, then Immigration minister Jason Kenney, unveiled a new Canadian Citizenship Guide that he said focused on the history, values and institutions of Canada. The booklet provided detailed accounts of Canada’s wars and emphasized the obligations that come with citizenship.

Kenney was heavily criticized at the time when it emerged he had taken steps to nix references to gay rights and same sex marriage.

The Conservatives also ordered all foreign embassies and consulates to display portraits of the Queen, reinstated the word “Royal” in the titles of the air force and navy, and bankrolled the commemoration of the War of 1812 (while ignoring the anniversary of the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms).

Critics at the time accused the Conservatives of politicizing history and adopting a “Victorian” view that highlighted militarism, monarchism and imperialism. Defenders of the new symbols pointed out that Canada has long struggled with the idea of what it means to be Canadian and the Conservatives’ more “muscular” image was intended to articulate a national identity.

We have not yet seen the Liberal passport or even the redesigned Canadian Crown, so judgment must necessarily be reserved.

But if the Harper government was intent on erasing all symbols introduced by Trudeau senior, it is fair to suggest the Liberals’ co-ordinated campaign is aimed at wiping away all vestiges of the Harper years.

It all smacks a bit of Seinfeld’s George Constanza choosing to do the opposite of his natural inclination — if the Conservatives leaned heavily on the military and the monarchy, the opposite would have to be right.

But the criticism remains the same for the Liberals as it was for the Conservatives — it should not be the sole preserve of political parties to present their own vision of the country as a fait accompli, without consultation or debate with its citizens.

Source: Liberals’ passport redesign latest attempt to reshape Canada’s symbols

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Egypt’s Debate on Music in Islam: Between Religious Austerity and Spiritual Ecstasy

2023/05/05 Leave a comment

Interesting discussion. During my time in the Mid-East (Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Iran) gained an appreciation for the richness of Arabic and Persian classical music:

In Youssef Chahine’s 1997 historical film Al Maseer(‘Destiny’), twelfth century Caliph Yaqub Al-Mansur’s youngest son, Abdallah (Hani Salama) is recruited by Islamist extremists, who launch war on Andalusian philosopher Ibn Rushd (Nour Al-Sherif) and the band of bohemian artists who rally behind him in support.

Amidst the ideological battle, Abdallah finds himself torn between the Islamists’ austere views and his lifelong passion for music and dance — an internal conflict which culminates in the film’s most powerful musical sequence.

The character’s journey points to a larger debate in the Muslim world surrounding the status of music in Islam.

I lived happily indifferent to this debate until last April, when I shared a list of Ramadan concert recommendations, under which several people expressed the view that music was contrary to the spiritual ethos of fasting from drink, food, and activities which are deemed sinful.

A few days later, just before Eid, a widely shared threadon the topic stirred controversy on Twitter. The author voiced her shock at the number of Muslims who attend concerts despite what she perceived as an obvious religious prohibition.

Reading through the replies, I wondered: where did the notion of an inherent opposition between music and Islam come from? Moreover, how have these views made their way to Egypt — a country with a long and rich tradition of spiritual music?

An Age-old Relationship

The relationship between Islam and music is as old as it is contentious. When the Prophet first instituted the call to prayer, adhan, in the early seventh century, he selected the Abyssinian Bilal as the first muezzin, chosen for his beautiful singing voice.

In pre-Islamic times, poet-musicians were revered in tribal society and held a special place in the courts of Arabian kings. Following the advent of the Muslim faith, religious music swiftly grew from the Bedouin tradition of lyrical poetry, which was primarily vocal but occasionally accompanied by instruments.

As such, the first four Caliphs (~632 – 661 AD) were marked by a vibrant cultural life in the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, where wealthy families hosted salons and contests among both locals and foreign converts to crown the most talented musical performers.

As a result of the Islamic conquests, religious music was also influenced by the musical traditions of the conquered territories, leading to the introduction of new instruments, like the oud, a descendant of the Persian lute. Vocal methods inspired by Coptic chanting were also adopted.

In 750 AD, the establishment of the Abbasid dynasty, which ruled for five-centuries, propelled what is now known as the golden age of Islamic music, chronicled in tenth century scholar Abu Al Faraj Al-Isbahani’s Kitab Al Aghani (‘Book of Songs’).

Scholars like Al-Kindi wrote extensively on the theory of ethos (ta’thir) and the cosmological aspects of music. Ibn Sina, meanwhile, studied sound, rhythm, composition, and instruments, laying the foundations of a rich body of Islamic musical theory.

Among the era’s most prominent musicians were Ibrahim Al-Mawsili and his son Ishaq, credited with developing the practices of Ibtihalat and Inshad Dini — two forms of devotional poems recited with musical accompaniment and expressing the believer’s reverence to and love of God and the Prophet Mohamed.

Nowhere was the relationship between music and spirituality more overt than in Sufism, which is said to be as old as Islam itself, but developed into different orders formed around spiritual founders in the twelfth century.

Mass chanting, dance, long instrumental solos, and devotional love poems formed an integral part of Sufi Dhikr (remembrance of God) ceremonies, with music seen to bring its listener into a trance-like state, facilitating internal self-knowledge and unity with God.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Egypt led the revival of these musical traditions with regional icons like Umm Kulthum, Abdel-Halim, and Shadya all performing Ibtihalat throughout their careers. The artforms were further mainstreamed through radio and later television broadcasts in the 1960s, with voices of legendary munshideen like Sheikh Sayed Al Naqshabandi’s coming to form pillars of Egyptian spiritual life.

A Contentious Status 

The Quran makes no explicit mention of music, and yet, throughout history, many scholars have held the viewthat it is prohibited or regarded negatively in Islam. Opponents of the artform base their arguments on hadiths (sayings of the Prophet), and one in particular, reported by ninth century scholar Imam Al-Bukhari.

This hadith reads, “There will be people from my Ummah [nation] who will seek to make lawful the following matters: fornication, the wearing of silk, the drinking of alcohol, and the use of musical instruments.”

People on both sides of the debate have interpreted the saying differently. Followers of more orthodox schools of thought, like Salafism or Wahhabism, understand it as a plain prohibition on music and the use of instruments.

Others, including eleventh century Persian scholar Imam Al Ghazali, have put forward the mitigated view that music in itself is not sinful, but songs which entice their listener to immorality should be avoided — a view echoed by former Grand Mufti of Egypt, Sheikh Ali Gomaa.

In 2017, an article published by Egypt’s Dar Al-Ifta contributed to the now-widespread debate. It argued that reference to music in the hadith was included to paint a clear picture of ‘the licentious night,’ but unlike alcohol and adultery, it is not sinful in and of itself.

Whatever the argument’s merits, it did not gain particular prominence in Egypt nor interfere with the country’s rich musical life until the 1970s, a period which marked an important turning point for Egyptians Muslims’ relationship to their faith.

Egypt’s defeat in the 1967 war against Israel, the contentious signing of the Camp David Accords in 1978, and the spread of Wahhabism among Egyptian migrants returning from Saudi Arabia, were all factors that laid the groundwork for a growing Islamist movement to rise in popularity.

Over the next decades, debates about Islamic morality took center stage in public discourse and cultural life. A study published by the American University in Cairo finds that this surge in piety had a two-fold effect on the relationship between Islam and music in the country.

On the one hand, the 1980s witnessed growing religious animosity towards the arts, and particularly women’s involvement in the musical profession. Figures like Mohamed Metwally Al Shaarawy, Islamic scholar and former Minister of Endowments, advised women artists to renounce their profession and turn to a life of religious devotion.

On the other hand, spiritual and religious music grew in popularity and gained new audiences as proponents of moderate Islam turned to the artform as a means to explore, express, and deepen their faith — or to cope with mounting socio-economic pressures.

The latter trend was reinforced in the 1990s by the emergence of a centrist Islamist movement led by journalists, scholars, and a younger generation of preachers, in response to the parallel rise of extremism. Proponents of centrism encouraged the production of ‘clean art,’ a standard defined by adherence to Islamic morality and the spread of positive socio-political messages.

Those teachings, popular among Egypt’s educated youth, compelled pop artists like Amr Diab, Hisham Abbas, or Aida Al Ayoubi to put out one or more devotional songs; while international artists like the British Sami Yusuf grew to local stardom for their spiritual music.

Conversely, the move to bring music in line with a perceived adherence to religious values also fuelled calls for the censorship or outright banning of works which supposedly did not meet that standard — as seen to this day with purists’ ongoing war on mahraganatmusic, a politically charged and archetypally working class genre, denounced for overstepping moral boundaries in its tackling of socially contentious topics.

Fear of God or a Desperate Bid for Control?

In Chahine’s Al Maseer, the extremists’ bid for power rests on a darkly threatening view of Islam. Citizens of the Caliphate can either abide by their stringen norms, or risk not only the wrath of the extremists, but of God.

Through their practice of music, Ibn Rushd and his companions seek to counter this grim narrative with love, hope, and an unwavering call for freedom. In this way, the film’s central conflict rings true across borders and centuries, shedding a possible light on the source of religious extremists’ opposition to music and the arts.

Contention about the religious status of music is not unique to Egypt. Religiously austere movements in Sudan and Afghanistan have also pushed for or implemented stringent regulations on music as part of broader conservative social policies.

The debate is also not unique to the Muslim world. In the United States, one hallmark of the so-called ‘satanic panic’ of the 1980s — a period of nationwide hysteriaprompted by false allegations of mass satanic ritual abuse — was conservative Christians’ crusade against rock music.

I have neither the authority nor the theological expertise needed to make definitive statements about the status of music in Islam or any other religion. I do, however, believe that austere religious movements have historically opposed music for the same reason that Sufi mystics revel in its practice: because it nurtures a spirit of love, passion, communion, and hope — all things which stand as a direct counter to fear.

Source: Egypt’s Debate on Music in Islam: Between Religious Austerity and Spiritual Ecstasy

Filed under Multiculturalism, Religion Tagged with , ,

Facial Recognition Powers ‘Automated Apartheid’ in Israel, Report Says

2023/05/05 Leave a comment

Of note:

Israel is increasingly relying on facial recognition in the occupied West Bank to track Palestinians and restrict their passage through key checkpoints, according to a new report, a sign of how artificial-intelligence-powered surveillance can be used against an ethnic group. 

At high-fenced checkpoints in Hebron, Palestinians stand in front of facial recognition cameras before being allowed to cross. As their faces are scanned, the software — known as Red Wolf — uses a color-coded system of green, yellow and red to guide soldiers on whether to let the person go, stop them for questioning or arrest them, according to the report by Amnesty International. When the technology fails to identify someone, soldiers train the system by adding their personal information to the database.

Israel has long restricted the freedom of movement of Palestinians, but technological advances are giving the authorities powerful new tools. It is the latest example of the global spread of mass surveillance systems, which rely on A.I. to learn to identify the faces of people based on large stores of images.

In Hebron and East Jerusalem, the technology focuses almost entirely on Palestinians, according to Amnesty’s report, marking a new way to automate the control of interior boundaries that separate the lives of Palestinians and Israelis. Amnesty called the process “automated apartheid.” Israel has strongly denied that it operates an apartheid regime.

“These databases and tools exclusively record the data of Palestinians,” said the report, which is based on accounts by former Israeli soldiers and Palestinians who live in the surveilled areas, as well as field visits to observe the technology’s use in affected territories.

The Israel Defense Forces, which plays a central role in the occupied territories of the West Bank, said in a statement that it carries out “necessary security and intelligence operations, while making significant efforts to minimize harm to the Palestinian population’s routine activity.”

On facial recognition, it added, “Naturally, we cannot refer to operational and intelligence capabilities.”

Government use of facial recognition technology to so explicitly target a single ethnic group is rare. In China, companies have made algorithms that sought to identify minorities as they passed by the country’s ubiquitous cameras. China’s government has also used facial recognition checkpoints to control and track the movements of Uyghurs, Kazakhs and other ethnic minorities.

Israel’s use of facial recognition at checkpoints builds on other surveillance systems deployed in recent years. Since protests in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah over the eviction of Palestinian families in 2021, the presence of cameras has increased in the area, most likely supporting an Israeli government video surveillance system capable of facial recognition known as Mabat 2000, according to Amnesty.

In one walk through the area, Amnesty researchers reported finding one to two cameras every 15 feet. Some were made by Hikvision, the Chinese surveillance camera maker, and others by TKH Security, a Dutch manufacturer.

TKH Security declined to comment. Hikvision did not respond to a request for comment.

Government forces also use the cameras on their phones. Israeli authorities have a facial recognition app, Blue Wolf, to identify Palestinians, according to Breaking the Silence, an organization that assisted Amnesty and collects testimonials from Israeli soldiers who have worked in occupied territories.

Soldiers use the app to photograph Palestinians on the street or during home raids to register them in a central database and to check if they are wanted for arrest or questioning, according to the 82-page Amnesty report and testimonials from Breaking the Silence. Use of Blue Wolf was reported earlier by The Washington Post.

The surveillance is partly an effort to reduce violence against Israelis. This year, Palestinian attackers have killed 19 Israelis. At least 100 Palestinians this year have been killed by Israeli security forces, many during gunfights that broke out during military operations to arrest Palestinian gunmen. Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967 after capturing it from Jordan during the Arab-Israeli war that year.

Issa Amro, a Palestinian activist in Hebron, a West Bank city where there is regular violence, said people are under constant surveillance. He, his friends and family are regularly stopped by soldiers to be photographed using the Blue Wolf app. Surveillance cameras line the streets and drones commonly fly overhead.

Mr. Amro said the Israeli military has become so dependent on the automated systems that crossing the checkpoints grinds to a halt when there are technical problems.

“Everything is watched. My whole life is watched. I don’t have any privacy,” he said. “I feel they are following me everywhere I go.”

Mr. Amro said Palestinians are angry that the surveillance tools never seem to be used to identify crimes by Israeli settlers against Palestinians.

Ori Givati, a former Israeli tank commander who is now the advocacy director of Breaking the Silence, said the new surveillance systems began being put in place around 2020. The technology has allowed the Israeli government to move toward an automated occupation, he said, subjecting Palestinians to constant oversight and supervision.

The facial recognition systems work, he said, “not just as an invasion of privacy but a powerful tool for control.”

Source: Facial Recognition Powers ‘Automated Apartheid’ in Israel, Report Says

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Ismail: Canada welcomes record number of newcomers. Now what?

2023/05/04 Leave a comment

Raises many of the needed issues but remains fixed on current and planned levels as well as uncapped temporary residents. As I have argued before, unlikely that Canada will be able to address its housing, healthcare and infrastructure needs given these numbers.

And it is striking that IRCC has not published any data on the use of settlement services since 2016, even though the government spends over one billion annually. The only semi-public data we have are web enquiries which are low, between 10-15,000 per month, about a third of pre-pandemic levels:

Canada announced recently it had reached a significant milestone: welcoming over 30,000 Afghan refugees to the country since 2021, putting it on track to resettle at least 40,000 by the end of 2023.

Newcomers are critical in shaping the nation’s economy, particularly given the ongoing challenges around an aging population and persistent post COVID-19 labour shortages.

In 2022, Canada welcomed 437,180 immigrants — the highest on record, according to Statistics Canada. Further, the government announced a plan to welcome 1.5 million more by 2025.

Despite the need and the numbers, we continue to hear stories of highly skilled and foreign-trained newcomers facing challenges in transitioning to life in Canada.

The concept of the “Canadian Experience” is still a stereotype for some employers and creates barriers to joining the labour market and expediting the settlement process. Additionally, the costs and availability of housing are major issues — as it is for many Canadians. While efforts are being made by the government and settlement services to encourage newcomers to settle outside of major urban centres, there is a lack of vital support in those areas.

While some may see newcomers as a burden on our system, the numbers prove that to be the opposite. Data from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) shows that refugees join Canada’s middle-class within five years of their arrival and, over time, pay more in income taxes on average than they receive in public benefits and services. 

When it comes to home ownership, 65 per cent of refugee families who have been in Canada for 10 years or more live in homes they own, compared to 70 per cent of Canadian born citizens.

As Canada welcomes more people from around the world, the need for infrastructure to support the growth in our housing markets, schools, and health care systems, is critical. The appropriate funding and management of this growth needs to be considered by all levels of government, and support from various organizations, like Polycultural Immigrant and Community Services, is paramount.

Between 2021 and 2022, Polycultural’s Afghan Initiative Program supported over 7,000 government-assisted refugees who were brought to Canada under the emergency evacuation initiative. And the organization has also provided settlement and housing supports to nearly 1,500 Ukrainian temporary residents under the Canada-Ukraine Authorization for Emergency Travel. Overall, over 30,000 immigrants were supported by Polycultural over the last year.

Polycultural works with Immigration Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), provincial, regional, and local partners to address the needs of the refugees, including providing employment services, language classes, access to health care, and support in finding housing.

By 2036, up to 30 per cent of the country’s population will be immigrants. The government and its partners should continue to aid newcomers and advocate for the funding and investments that enable Canada’s newest citizens to truly thrive in their new home.

Marwan Ismail is the executive director of Polycultural Immigrant and Community Services, a charitable, non-profit, community-based agency.

Source: Canada welcomes record number of newcomers. Now what?

Filed under Immigration, Multiculturalism Tagged with ,

As Canada stays mum, which Commonwealth countries will put the King on their money?

2023/05/04 Leave a comment

Relatively easy change to make, no constitutional issues but likely some will object:

Countries around the world whose currencies pay tribute to the late Queen Elizabeth II now have a new monarch — and a decision to make about whether the King has a place on their money.

Since the queen’s death in September, Canada has stayed mum on whether or not it intends to put the King’s likeness on its coins and bills.

But other members of the Commonwealth have moved more quickly towards enshrining his visage on their cash — or instead moving away from any kind of royal tribute.

Unsurprisingly, the United Kingdom was the first country to move forward with new banknotes that will feature King Charles, unveiling the designs in December.

The Bank of England says the new banknotes will come into circulation in mid-2024.

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand also said after the queen’s death that it would be preparing to change out the image it uses on coins for one approved by the new King. It said the transition would take several years.

Australia went in the other direction, deciding not to place King Charles on its new five-dollar bill. Its central bank announced in February that the country was opting for an Indigenous design instead.

But the King is still expected to appear on Australian coins that currently bear the image of Queen Elizabeth.

The decision to include the portrait of King Charles on banknotes and coins is largely symbolic.

But even symbolic details can reflect the relationship between a country and the monarchy, as well as the level of public support for the institution.

“Different countries are going to approach it differently, depending on the level of attachment to the monarchy and the strength of the republican movement in each country,” said Jonathan Malloy, a political science professor at Carleton University, referring to campaigns that seek to separate countries from their relationships with the Crown.

In the Caribbean, many countries have been contending with conversations on what role the monarchy should play. Barbados, for example, ditched the British monarch as its head of state in 2021.

Other Caribbean nations that still belong to the Commonwealth have said little about whether King Charles will be depicted on their banknotes and coins.

However, the Antigua Observer reported earlier this year that the governor of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, Timothy NJ Antoine, said there may be “no appetite” for that.

In Canada, the federal government has not disclosed whether it plans to move ahead with placing the monarch on Canadian currency, appearing to avoid the conversation altogether.

The Finance Department would only say that “additional details will be forthcoming.”

Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland’s office did not respond to questions on the matter in time for publication.

Malloy said that’s not surprising, noting there appears to be a partisan divide when it comes to the monarchy’s role in the country.

He said the Liberal government may be hesitant to discuss the future of Canadian currency and the monarch because its overall stance on the monarchy has been murky. Meanwhile, the Conservatives have traditionally stood more boldly with the Royal Family.

“I don’t think Prime Minister Trudeau wants to get rid of the monarchy, but he also doesn’t want to call attention to it,” he said.

“Whereas the Conservatives, I’m sure, would put (King) Charles on the money.”

The Royal Canadian Mint and Bank of Canada are waiting for the federal government to make a decision regarding the future of coins and banknotes.

“As always, the minister of finance is responsible for approving the form and material of any new banknote, including the portrait subject, in accordance with the Bank of Canada Act,” Bank of Canada spokeswoman Amélie Ferron-Craig said in an email.

“As such, it would be up to the government to announce if the King’s portrait is going to appear on any banknote.”

According to the Royal Canadian Mint, Canada has included a likeness of the reigning monarch on its coins since it started production in 1908.

Source: As Canada stays mum, which Commonwealth countries will put the King on their money?

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Scholars defend Polish Holocaust researcher targeted by govt

2023/05/02 Leave a comment

Of note and Poland’s struggle to come to terms with its history:

Scholars and historical institutions from around the world are coming to the defense of a Polish researcher who is under fire from her country’s authorities after claiming that Poles could have done more to help Jews during the Holocaust.

Barbara Engelking said in a TV interview last week that Polish Jews felt disappointed in Poles during World War II, referring to what she described as “widespread blackmailing” of Jews by Poles during the Nazi German occupation.

Since then the historian and the independent TV broadcaster have been threatened with consequences by government institutions — turning the matter into a campaign issue ahead of elections scheduled for this fall.

Poland’s conservative government and pro-government media have described the remarks by Engelking, who is Polish, as an attack on the nation. They accuse her of distorting the historical record and not giving due credit to the Poles who risked — and sometimes lost — their lives to help Jews.

It is the latest eruption of an emotional debate that has been going on for years in Poland over Polish-Jewish relations, particularly the behavior of Poles toward their Jewish neighbors during the war — when Germans committed brutal crimes against Poles, whom they considered subhuman, and against the Jews, a population they sought to exterminate in its entirety.

Poles reacted in various ways to the German treatment of the Jews. Some helped the Jews, an act punishable with execution by the occupation forces. Others denounced or blackmailed them, motivated by antisemitic hatred or for personal gain. Many Poles lived in fear and sought to survive the war without getting involved either way.

Even Polish nationalists do not deny that some Poles preyed on their Jewish compatriots, but they say a relatively recent focus in scholarship on that aspect of the war distorts a larger history of heroism by Poles who resisted the Germans. They argue it risks blaming Polish victims for German crimes.

Engelking spoke on the 80th anniversary of the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto. She was being interviewed by private broadcaster TVN about an exhibition she helped create on the fate of civilians in the ghetto, “Around Us A Sea of Fire,” which opened last week.

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki reacted to the interview with a long social media post describing Engelking’s comments as “scandalous opinions” and part of an “anti-Polish narrative.”

Morawiecki referred to the more than 7,000 Poles recognized by Israel’s Holocaust institute Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations. A Polish institute is trying to document cases that have so far not been recorded.

“We know that there could be tens, if not hundreds of thousands, of such cases,” Morawiecki said.

This week Education Minister Przemysław Czarnek threatened the funding of the institution where Engelking works, the Polish Center for Holocaust Research, which is part of the Polish Academy of Sciences.

“I will not finance an institute that maintains the kind of people who just insult Poles,” Czarnek said.

He said that Poles “were the greatest allies of the Jews, and if it had not been for the Poles, many Jews would have died, many more than were killed in the Holocaust.”

According to Yad Vashem, some 3.3 million Jews lived in Poland on the eve of the Sept. 1, 1939 German invasion, and only 380,000 survived the war.

Some 3 million other Polish citizens who were not Jewish were also killed during the war.

Poland’s state broadcasting authority has also opened an investigation into TVN, which is owned by the U.S. company Warner Bros. Discovery. The broadcaster faced government criticism recently for a report claiming that Saint John Paul IIhad covered up cases of clerical abuse in his native Poland before becoming pope.

Government critics see an attempt to exploit the issue to win votes ahead of the election — as the ruling party risks losing votes to a far-right party, Confederation, which has been surging in popularity.

Liberal media and commentators warn that media and academic freedoms are being threatened.

Yad Vashem chairman Dani Dayan said on Twitter this week that he called Engelking to show support for “freedom of expression and of academic research, in the face of blatant and menacing attacks.”

By Friday more than 600 scholars of the Holocaust and related subjects in Poland and abroad had signed a statement expressing opposition to the “political attack” on Engelking.

They said they regard “such censorious tendencies … as extremely dangerous and unacceptable,” adding: “We object to the idea of making a subject that calls for meticulous and nuanced research — as carried out by Professor Engelking — part of an election campaign.”

The POLIN Museum of the History of the Polish Jews, where the exhibition about civilians in the Warsaw ghetto is being shown, also defended Engelking in a statement Wednesday.

The museum argued that the feelings of disappointment expressed by Jews during the war are a “fact,” and that “they appear in almost every account of those who survived the Holocaust, as well as those who managed to leave a record of their fate, but did not survive.”

“The essence of scientific research is a dispute, but a brutal personal attack on a scientist and an outstanding authority in her field cannot be called a dispute,” it said.

Engelking more than a decade ago again angered some Poles by seeming to downplay Polish wartime suffering, saying death for Poles then “was simply a biological, natural matter … and for Jews it was a tragedy, it was a dramatic experience, it was metaphysics.”

Source: Scholars defend Polish Holocaust researcher targeted by govt

Filed under Antisemitism, Holocaust Tagged with ,

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