Essay(Interview a Muslim)
There are many Muslims (native to the U.S., children of immigrants, and foreign born studying here) who attend our campus. There are also many more Muslims who live in our community. You can locate them in many places. Those who live here own a variety of businesses, they work in the health care, tourism, educational, banking, service, agricultural and other fields.
(Attention: If you are Muslim, you have to meet and interview someone from a different belief system: a Christian, a Jewish, a Hindu, a Buddhist, a Sikh, etc. and even Atheist or Agnostic, but if you are NOT a Muslim, you have to interview a Muslim.)
As you meet the person you are interviewing, answer the following questions:
1-What is his/her/their background (name, age, profession, origins)? Is he/she/they a recent immigrant, the son/daughter of an immigrant, are his/her/their parents natives to the U.S., or is he/she/they a convert to Islam? (100-150 words )
2-How does he/she/they go about practicing his/her/their religion in the U.S.? Is it easy? challenging? unique in any particular way? (150–200 words)
3-What are his/her/their aspirations? In YOUR opinion, are they any different from those who are Americans of different faiths or those who don’t affiliate themselves with any particular faith? (150-200 words)
4-What are his/her/their greatest fears? Does he/she/they worry about the political climate in the U.S.? (100-200 words)
5-Has that person faced any religious or ethnic based discrimination or bullying? If so, how did he/she/they deal with them? If not him/her/they, does he/she/they know any of his/her/their Muslim friends who experienced discrimination or bullying? What was the nature of the bullying/discrimination? (100-200 words)
6-If he/she/they or one of his/her/their family/friends had faced religious discrimination, has he/she/they ever reported it to a-his/her/their family, b-to his/her/their administrators (at school or work place) and/or c-official authority (police, FBI, civil rights group, etc.) If yes, how did he/she/they go about it. If not, why didn’t he/she/they report the incident? (100-150 words)
7-What did you learn from this interview? Did it affect you in any way? Is there any reflection you would like to share? (300 words)
Occasionally, you may find that you couldn’t answer a particular question in more than 50-100 words. If this happens, it is not a problem, just expand your answer in another question, however, your TOTAL interview assignment should be around 1,200 words. Please write the total number of words at the top of your paper in stage 3. If you choose to include the questions in your paper, please don’t add them to the total word count.
Occasionally, you may end up interviewing someone who is not 18 years old yet. If that is the case, please make sure to receive his/her/their parents’/guardian’s consent to the interview first.