Last week, I made a bunch of bean pies for my students and colleagues. This is all that was left of the four pies I made.
This dessert, which is rarely found outside of African American Muslim communities and urban centers like New York City and Boston, is associated with the history of Muslims in the United States. A product originally sold by the Nation of Islam, bean pie can be found online through several Muslim bakeries who specialize in the dessert. A sweet custard made from navy beans, milk, sugar, eggs, and a few other ingredients, it is often served on Muslim holidays like Eid. Here’s a recipe for bean pie by Lana Shabazz, Muhammad Ali’s personal chef, adapted from her 1979 cookbook.
Bean pie is one way we learn about Muslims in the United States in my class and the contributions of African Americans, who are often excluded from public discourse on Islam. Representations of Islam in the United States usually center on immigrant communities, who are an important, but later, part of the history of Muslims in North America. The first Muslims, and for most of U.S. history, the largest number of Muslims, have been African American. One of the most famous is Omar Ibn Said, scholar who, at age 37, was captured in Senegal and enslaved in 1807, and was one of the last Muslims who was brought to the U.S. on a slave ship.
As my students learn, African American communities of Muslims are important in our history, but also in our culture. One place this is especially true is in hip hop, a genre of music that includes members of both the Nation of Islam and the Five Percenters. Phrasing found in hip hop music like “dropping science” comes from the Five Percenters and illustrate how Islam is found in unexpected places.
Black Muslims, Immigrant Muslim communities, white and Latino/a converts, and other Muslim religious movements are all part of the mosaic of Islam in the United States of America.
Dr. Sophia Arjana, Associate Professor of Religious Studies