By Vignesh Ramachandran
(PBS) At the 20th anniversary of 9/11, American Muslims are considering what the last two decades have meant for them and their communities. As part of that ongoing conversation, PBS NewsHour’s Amna Nawaz spoke with Kashif Shaikh, co-founder and president of Pillars Fund, on Sept. 14 about the ways Muslims have been depicted in stories and on screen in the years since 9/11. The fund aims to build up American Muslim civic institutions, and amplify Muslim narratives and leadership.
Watch the conversation in the player above.
Shaikh, who was born to Pakistani American parents and raised in the Cincinnati suburbs, said that as he was growing up, he felt Muslims were often “othered” and portrayed in a negative light in pop culture. Harmful tropes pictured people yelling on airplanes, or portrayed women as needing to be “liberated” from their seemingly oppressive symbols of their Muslimness, like removing a headscarf.
