Praying to the West: How Muslims Shaped the Americas

In Praying to the West, Omar Mouallem explores the little-known history of Islam across the Americas, visiting 13 mosques in search of an answer to the question of how this religion has survived and thrived so far from its place of origin. From California to Quebec, and from Brazil to Canada's far north, he meets members of fascinating communities, all offering different perspectives on what it means to be Muslim.
In this lecture based on his book How Muslims Shaped the Americas, Omar Mouallem presents an alternative history of the “New World”, in which Muslims organized slave revolts, integrated with indigenous communities, played a key role in the automobile revolution and spearheaded civil rights movements.