The Muslim Journeys fall program hosted a screening of the documentary “Fordson: Faith, Fasting, Football and the American Dream” on Wednesday night. The film follows the 2009 Fordson High School football season while displaying the struggle Muslim Arab-Americans face in post-September 11 society.
Librarian Lisa Klopfer, creator of the Muslim Journeys fall program, hosted the event.
“I am interested in what happens to Muslims when they come to America,” Klopfer said. “After 9/11, Islam became a symbol to a lot of Americans as something frightening.”
Fordson High School is located in Dearborn, Mich., home to the highest concentration of Muslim Arab-Americans outside of the Middle East. The documentary brings to light just how difficult it is to be an Arab-American today.
Many of the children who grow up in the tight-knit Muslim community of Fordson do not want to leave after high school for fear of the hatred awaiting them outside of their bubble. According to the film, very few venture outside of Dearborn, let alone the state of Michigan, to go to college.
Before the documentary started, discussion leader Russ Olwell, a professor of history at Eastern Michigan University, arranged for Fordson High School graduate Ali Elreichouni to speak to the audience via telephone.
Elreichouni explained that an overwhelming majority of the student body at Fordson is Muslim and that this lack of diversity brings the students together. Now an undergraduate student at Harvard, Elreichouni is one of the first in his community to attend college out of state.
“Once you leave the Fordson bubble, you face ignorance,” Elreichouni said.
Elreichouni faced the ignorance of the world outside of his Fordson community when he went on a community service bus trip in high school.
“I was with a friend who wears a Muslim head scarf,” Elreichouni said. “Someone yelled at her and asked her why she was here, insinuating that she did not belong in the country.”
This experience blindsided Elreichouni.
“How do you comfort someone for being who they are?”
Similar examples of ignorance were addressed in the documentary. In 2005, Ali Houssaiky, a former Fordson High School football star, was arrested in Ohio with his friend Osama Sabhi Abulhassan for suspicious cell phone purchases and suspected ties to terrorism.
The boys were buying cheap cell phones in Ohio with the plan of bringing them back to Michigan and selling them for a profit. They had no ties to any terrorist plots.
“It was sad how difficult it was for people to venture outside the community due to prejudice and fear of Muslims and Arabs,” said Marilyn Wedenoja, a social work professor who attended the documentary screening.
Wedenoja attended the event because as a social work professor she is interested in learning about a variety of cultures.
“I also grew up near Dearborn and was interested in what was happening in that area,” Wedenoja said.
Part of Klopfer’s motivation for screening this particular documentary was to give people a look at what this minority goes through.
“I want to give people a chance to understand each other,” Klopfer said.
