Overview

This lesson builds learning resources around a Smithsonian Sidedoor podcast episode (season 2, episode 17), "Enslaved and Muslim in Early America.." The episode focuses on what is known of the life of Omar ibn Said (1770-1864), a man from Senegal, West Africa. Said was enslaved and carried to the United States in 1807. He became the property of a prominent North Carolina family. In 1831, Omar wrote an autobiography. Rare enough as the narrative of an American slave, Omar’s autobiography is rarer still as a source revealing the mind and experiences of a 'founding father' of American Muslims.

This lesson offers students the chance to use different kinds of sources - a podcast episode, two short handwritten sources,  a photograph, a map, a US federal law, two short articles about American history, and a captioned news photograph - and analyze them interactively to answer critical thinking questions. Students should work first with the two handwritten sources and photograph, then listen to the podcast episode in two parts, taking notes to answer content-specific questions concerning the various historical evidence. Finally, they should reflect on guiding questions specified for each class. Students may work with sources individually, but small group and discussion of questions is encouraged

Guiding questions

• What are some possible reasons that the history of early American Muslims is unknown?
• Based on information in this lesson, was there religious diversity in the early United States? Was there religious freedom in the early United States?
• What, in your view, are some popular perceptions of American Muslims today? How might the history of America's first Muslims in this lesson shape or reinterpret those perceptions?

Time 3 classes

Related resources

Smithsonian Magazine article by Brigit Katz, "Only Surviving Arabic Slave Narrative Written in the United States Digitized by Library of Congress," January 18, 2019

National Museum of African American History & Culture exhibit, "African Muslims in Early America," January 11, 2019

Smithsonian Folklife Festival blog by Michelle Mehrtens, "What Does It Mean to Be American Muslim?" August 21, 2017

If you are going to read just one book

Copper Sun,  by Sharon Draper

Glossary of key terms

• mescid - a mosque, or a place of worship for Muslims
• imam - a worship leader of a mosque and/or a Muslim community
• Lord's Prayer - a prayer of Christians, using words taught by Jesus
• Nat Turner – a man enslaved near Richmond, Virginia, who in 1831 led the largest slave uprising in United States history
• Malcolm X - an American Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a popular figure during the civil rights movement
• Muhammad Ali - a famous American professional boxer who gained controversy during the civil rights movement for refusing, partly on the basis of his religious beliefs as a Muslim, to be drafted into the military