Last fall Amir Hussain was hired by the department to develop a program on Islam much like the existing interdisciplinary program in Jewish Studies. The success of the program will undoubtedly be measured downstream by the acceptance of these offerings by the students. Amir Hussain is optimistic about its acceptance, not only by the growing numbers of Muslim students on the campus, but also by other students on campus who will become acquainted with Islamic studies through courses being offered in the General Education package for all undergraduates at the University. Amir also plans to work with the Muslim community to show them how they can benefit from his offerings at the University. Many Muslim students are not able to study Islam until they come to university. They can benefit from learning about their own traditions. Non-Muslim students can also benefit from these courses by having their assumptions challenged about Islam and Muslims. The opportunity exists for conferences, colloquia, or visiting speakers that could be sponsored by the Muslim community.

Recently the University received a commitment from Mr. Wilfred Cantwell Smith and his wife Muriel for over 500 books and articles on Islam. Mr. Smith taught Islamic Studies at Harvard University and created the Institute of Islamic Studies at McGill University in Canada. Mr. Smith had initially thought of donating these books to McGill or Harvard. It was Amir Hussain who persuaded Mr. Smith that the books would find a better home at CSUN. The books are to arrive on campus after an independent appraisal has been completed. These books, mostly by Western scholars on Islam, and some by Muslim intellectuals, will provide a source of research for persons interested in learning about Islam.

Last fall Amir joined the CSUN faculty of the Department of Religious Studies and is finishing his doctoral thesis on " Islam as a Canadian Religious Phenomena." He would like to do similar work on the Islamic phenomena in the United States. Amir would like to study the practices of all the people who call themselves Muslims. He plans to include the Nation of Islam, Black Muslims, Sunnis, Shias, Qadianis, and Ismailis in his study. With increasing conversions among the Afro American population, these converts often provide their own form to the practices of Islam.

Hussain feels that lots of Muslims are attracted to medicine and engineering technology but there is a vacuum in the Humanities. Not many Muslim students are encouraged to pursue careers in the Humanities, resulting in a relatively small number of Muslim writers, poets and philosophers.

What got Amir interested in becoming an academician was a desire for independence. Amir feels very lucky to be in this field where he can read and share his enthusiasm with others, especially young adults. He is starting his academic career at a school where he is expected to "publish. or perish." Already he has published an article on "The Concept of Law in Islam." He has co-authored the chapter on Islam in a book called "Faith in My Neighbor: World Religions in Canada."

He thinks that it is through a study of contemporary practices that young people will find contemporary role models.

Amir Hussain admires the work of the Iranian scholar Seyyed Hossein Nasr at George Washington University, Mahmoud Ayoub at Temple University, and Amina Wadud-Muhsin at Virginia Commonwealth University. These scholars are Muslims who are deeply committed to teaching about Islam and changing peoples stereotypes. They are also intellectuals who are reshaping Islamic thought in North America. Amir feels that the form of Islam in the United States has its uniqueness and he tries to bring out the differences as a function of location in this multinational religion. In its early stages the theology of Islam liberated oppressed people, gave women rights and brought laws and justice where there was a void.

What Amir would like to study is the contemporary contributions and practices of the people calling themselves Muslims in the States. Hussain estimates there are about five million Muslims living in the United States and they bring their own ethnicity and lasting values to the American picture of Islam. There are tendencies which push the values of minorities to becoming mirror images of the majority cultural values. As a social scientist he is interested in studying the contributions which come uniquely from people of Islamic heritage.

Amir was four when he came to Canada from Pakistan and was schooled in Toronto. His parents, Iqbal and Feroza Hussain live in Oakville, about 30 miles west of Toronto. He has a younger sister, Lubna, who is an engineer. He did his undergraduate work in psychology and graduate work at the University of Toronto in Comparative Religions. This young scholar suffered the sudden death of his wife by an embolism five years ago.

Amir is looking forward to making the best of the opportunities that have come his way. He hopes that his course offerings will be attractive to other disciplines such as English, Women's Studies and Pan-African Studies at the campus. This year, he is teaching a course on Islam. Next term, he will teach this course, as well as a course on modern Islamic thought. He hopes to develop other courses on the Qur'an, Islamic literature, and Sufism. The community will be looking with interest at what Amir can do for the students at CSUN.