We Are a Muslim, Please

by Zaiba Malik

For Zaiba Malik, growing up in Bradford in the '70s and '80s certainly has its moments - staying up all night during Ramadan with her father; watching mad Mr Aziz searching for his goat during Eid; dancing along to Top of the Pops (so long as no-one's watching). And, of course, there's her mother - whether she's writing another ingratiating letter to the Queen or repeatedly referring to Tom Jones as 'Thumb Jone'. But Zaiba's story is also one of anxiety and seemingly irreconcilable opposites. Growing up she is constantly torn between two 'British' and 'Muslim'. Alienated at school and confused at home, the racism she encounters as a child mirrors the horrors she experiences at the hands of Bangladeshi interrogators as a journalist years later. "We Are A Muslim, Please" is a stirring and enchanting memoir. We see, through Zaiba's childhood eyes, the poignancy of growing up in a world whose prejudices, contradictions and ambiguities are at once distressing and utterly captivating.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography Memoir, Autobiography

280 pages, Paperback

First published June 24, 2010

About the author

Zaiba Malik is an award-winning investigative journalist who has worked on some of the BBC and Channel 4's most acclaimed radio and TV documentaries, including 'Sleepers: Undercover with the Racists', 'Dispatches: Trouble at the Mosque' and 'Killing for Honour'. She writes for newspapers including the Guardian, and was recently named as one of the twenty most influential black and Asian women in the UK.

Reviews

[Sarah Lameche · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another surprising read from a buy on a whim. This book made me laugh, reminisce and towards the end cry. Aged 16 I moved to Blackburn to study at college and it just so happened every one in my class was Asian (I am white). I then spent my teenage years surrounded by asian culture and I soon learned to speak the lingo. However my friends and I mixed easily and didn't have any of the barriers that this author had. It opened my eyes to how hard it really must be to try and fit in when your life is very different. I loved the way so many things in this book were part of my past also (eggy bread, Shirley Bassey and spontaneous combustion!). What really touched me in this book was how every thing changed and hope was lost after the London bombings. The gap is getting wider and it seems will never be bridged. I longer see my Asian college friends. Or speak the lingo. Yet I too feel the sadness, despair and horror, that these so called Muslims are killing in the name of God. Because I too am Muslim and this is the opposite of Islam and what our religion teaches us. Yet its getting more common and each time it happens less people believe us when we say this is not Islam.
Zaiba Malik says in this book what all normal Muslims think about these terrorists. I really hope people read this book and discover how we really feel

[Martha · Rating 4 out of 5]

I learned a lot from reading this book which was passed on to me by a fellow passenger on a recent airline flight. It is an in-depth look at what it means to be a British Muslim girl growing up in Bradford, UK in the 60s and 70s. Growing up in a world filled with prejudice and racism she badly wants to fit in with her peers at school. At the same time, she is very close with her father and her extended family and is expected to follow orthodox Muslim traditions. The world becomes more ambiguous as Zaiba Malik gets older, and we see through her eyes the effects of radicalism and terrorism.

[Clare Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful book that made me laugh out loud as I identified with being a shy, awkward teenager; snort at some of the outrageous and yet ridiculous experiences relayed and cry wholeheartedly for the senseless pain and suffering caused by madmen, criminals and the disaffected. All people who probably would inflict harm in society and on themselves whatever their race, religion, ethnicity or persuasion. And yet sadly the majority ofI in this instance,Muslim people are at times labelled and persecuted for the insanity of a few. At times I feel so helpless and so saddened by this age old problem, all I feel I can do is keep educating myself and books like this are invaluable to me.

[Danial Tanvir · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great read and a memoir , I read it quickly!.
It is actually about a women known as Zaiba Malik , she is a Pakistani Muslim who lives in England.
She is a Muslim and her back ground in Pakistani.
It is based in Bradford.
She is growing up in the 1970's and the 1980's.
She talks about Muslims and various other things.
She then talks about the fatwa against Salman Rushdie etc.
It is actually about what a person feels coming from Pakistan to England. I enjoyed this
I enjoyed this book but it has hardly any reviews on amazon.com,
This book also had several pictures and it was a fun read!.

[Ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

First book-length account I've read of growing up Muslim in Britain. Well written and illuminating, makes me want to know more. Author also tries to understand the mindset of one of the 7/7 suicide bombers who grew up in similar circumstances. That effort gets a little "arty"--took me a little while to catch on to what she was doing, but it's clear by the end. Recommended.

[Leen · Rating 2 out of 5]

a lot of stories and things about Islam is not true has been written here . I like that she try to describe how others think about islam as religion and about Muslims and how its so wrong and not fair

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

i do recommend this as a light read that provides a very rich insight not only into Pakistani culture but the life of a British Muslim.

[Honey Elhamy · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was the most boring book I have read so far!! With so much unnecessary details and events that adds absolutely nothing to the context of the story. Most chapters were vaguely ended up with no cohesion between the different chapters and events. Moreover, Zaiba's life was too monotonous to write about and even the single interesting event in it and that is what happened to her at Bangladesh, she did not resume mentioning what happened with her back then.

Most importantly, I think she was somehow offensive to Islam in a way; picturing god and angles as some people who did not respond to her innocent prayers at the night of power. Whereas actually she did not tell anyone about her prayers for a clarinet so how come she awaited to have one. You see basically, praying is an auxiliary tool to fulfil our dreams and not a magic wand. Zaiba pictured Islam as a mere religion of commandments and obligations and she did not mention that it is a complete way for living a happy, peaceful life; a life that is aligned with the real reason for our creation.
The two stars are for the vivid descriptions here and there and for the smiles that Zaiba drew on my face every now and then.

[Barbara · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a wonderful memoir of being brought up in Bradford in a first generation devout Muslim family and community and then experiencing the culture shock of being almost the only Muslim girl, excused religious studies and assembly and wearing trousers under her skirt at Bradford Grammar School. She drifts away gently and when she returns, has the social sensitivity to see some changes in her home community and she also experiences incarceration in Pakistan and sees a harsh, to her un Muslim, aspect to the faith. What intrigues me is the ongoing control of behaviour with heaven or hell as the results reminiscent perhaps of the Catholic confessional and the hellfire and guilt of Protestant teaching and social control and the difficulty of escape. I would love more.

[Jane Stanley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely brilliant. A moving and thought-provoking memoir about the author growing up in Leeds and, mainly, Bradford and the 'push-pull' (maybe conflict could be the word, but at times it's definitely that, and at others it isn't) she finds between being Muslim and British, born in Britain, as she moves through childhood, teenage, and right into adulthood when she is a successful broadcaster, journalist and writer.
Extremely informative, measured, perceptive and so thoughtful. One not to be missed!

[Louis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This autobiography gave an interesting insight into Islam and what it was like for a British Muslim growing up in Bradford and the conflicts of religion vs English society.
I was disappointed that whilst the book starts about the author being detained in Bangladesh and refers back to this through out, we don't hear what led to her release or any of the lead up. Nevertheless her growing up was interesting enough and worth a read.

[Frances Kapherr · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wasn't sure about this book initially. It was informative and interesting but didn't stand out for in terms of what it seemed to want to achieve. However, the small parts at the chapter ends were intriguing and I wanted to see where they were leading and that for me made the book. The epilogue is sensational and crashlands on you - powerful & brilliant. Thank you, Zaiba Malik.

[Bettie · Rating 2 out of 5]

For Zaiba Malik, growing up in Bradford in the '70s and '80s certainly has its moments - staying up all night during Ramadan with her father; watching mad Mr Aziz searching for his goat during Eid; dancing along to Top of the Pops (as long as no-one's watching). And, of course, there's her mother - whether she's writing another ingratiating letter to the Queen or referring to Tom Jones as 'Thumb Jone'.

But Zaiba's story is also one of anxiety and seemingly irreconcilable opposites. Growing up she is constantly torn between two identities: 'British' and 'Muslim'. Alienated at school and confused at home, the racism she encounters as a child mirrors the horrors she experiences at the hands of Bangladeshi interrogators as a journalist years later.

Five years after the 7/7 attacks galvanized debates about Muslim-British identity, we see, through Zaiba's childhood eyes, the poignancy of growing up in a world whose prejudices, contradictions and ambiguities are at once distressing and yet utterly captivating.

Zaiba Malik is an award-winning investigative journalist who has worked on some of the BBC and Channel 4's most acclaimed radio and TV documentaries, including 'Sleepers: Undercover with the Racists', 'Dispatches: Trouble at the Mosque' and 'Killing for Honour'. She writes for newspapers including the Guardian, and was recently named as one of the twenty most influential black and Asian women in the UK.

Read by Nisha Nayar.

Abridged by Libby Spurrier.

Producer: Joanna Green

[Shabanah · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very absorbing memoir of growing up in 70s/ 80s Bradford by journalist Zaiba Malik. Can see why it was long-listed for the Orwell Prize. This definitely feels like the Bradford I know, but I also learned a lot of new things. She charts the growing tensions within her as she aspires to a life beyond the restrictions of Bradford and is refreshingly honest about her love-hate relationship with her community, telling stories that are both pained and hilariously funny. It’s written in a tone of ironic, loving frustration at what she came to see as a ‘Lost City’ and ‘Lost Generation’, that she feels has lost touch with the struggles of the first, with too many embracing instead drug and gang culture, and extremist forms of Islam so at odds with the gentler version taught her by her parents.(The title is what her ever polite mother used to say - the only English she knew).

It’s as much a record of political and cultural changes during that time, especially for British Pakistani Muslims, but I’m not convinced the framing of the novel by her experience of being interrogated as a C4 journalist in a Bangladeshi prison or the direct address throughout (and in a long final chapter) to 7/7 terrorist Shazad Tanweer really work. She’s more compelling on stories of the family and community, including the extraordinary white gravedigger in the Muslim ceremony that found a special place in their hearts. An easy but thoroughly enjoyable read by a very skilful writer.

[Baljit · Rating 5 out of 5]

Was very attracted to this book in the store as having spent some years in UK during the time of Salman Rushdie's fatwa and having British Asian friends of various religions the oft-asked question of 'Are you Muslim?' by any local has remained etched in my memory. my negative response often meant the conversation moved along to other topics, but left me wondering what if i was a muslim, where would this line of enquiry gone.

Malik trads boldly into a vast and controversila subject, drawing upon her colourful chilhood, which is loving, caring, sheltered and restirctive all at the saem time. She expresses her views of the community of aunties and uncles, as a child fear but as an adults more understanding of theire trials. Her experiences as a journalist has taken her to mnay areas of the muslim community as she probes the cause and effect of the divide between the muslims and caucasians of Uk, and also within the muslim community. She paints a relistic picture of the current problems within the community; drug abuse, povert, crime, poor education and fundamentalism. The issues of them and us seem must bigger and global today, then when she was growing up in Bradford.

[Farhat Baig · Rating 1 out of 5]

a well written account of growing up in bradford in the 80's as a pakistani girl in a conservative religious muslim family. you get the difficulty the author has of trying to maintain a balance between her family life and trying to fit in with her fellow white students at school where she is one of few pakistani girls. the author also gives a good description of the problems the pakistani community faced as a whole in those times like racism, unemployment, new environment etc. the author also tries to comprehend how the 7/7 bombers did what they did coming from a similar background as herself.

i didn't like the cover and the transliteration of the arabic and urdu words was poor.

[Heather Purcell · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book jumps around and isn't quite as good as I thought it might be, but the timeliness of her message right now bumped it up a star for me. The author explores her own identity as a British Muslim, but also shares several important insights about the damage we do by judging and excluding others. Through sharing the struggle to reconcile her devout, peaceful father and what he taught her about the teachings of the Koran with the actions of radicalized groups (who are a small minority of Muslims), she touches on many of the topics in the media at the moment (despite writing it 5 years ago).

[Nura Yusof · Rating 4 out of 5]

I seem to read too many of these kinds of books. Of Muslims conflicted by their Asian culture and Muslim upbringing and the Western, non-Muslim environment that they live in.

An engaging read, nonetheless. But would've like to find out what happened after she told off those cruddy Bangladeshi interrogators.

Also, I do agree with the other reviewer here. What is the purpose of this book?

[Shumoos · Rating 3 out of 5]

A well written description of the life of Asian Muslim families in Bradford but as a Muslim I think this book gives a wrong image of Islam since it talks about the Asian culture and beliefs as part of Islam while it's their traditions and has nothing to with our religion.

[Shatha · Rating 1 out of 5]

Some Islamic facts in this book are false (like the one about Sunnis not covering their heads.) Like, I know you said that a lot of times culture got mixed up with Islam, but it was your job to find out right from wrong. I wouldn't choose this book to represent Islam.

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really interesting book from the perspective of a Muslim woman from Bradford.

[Noordiana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anyone who has ever lived in Bradford, Muslims who grew up as minority, and anyone who has ever lived as a privileged majority should read this book.