07. Doaa Ahalabi: Canadian Islamic Schools and The Development of Muslim Youth's Identities

Canadian Islamic Schools and the Development of Muslim Youth’s Identities (Joining virtually)

Parents make choices for their kids every single day, choices about food, clothes, books, sports, screen time, games, etc. One of the biggest choices that parents have to make is which school their children will attend. Schools are the first and most prominent socialization site for children outside of their family unit. It is where children learn to develop their own identity and how to relate to others. In Canada, an increasing number of Muslim parents choose to send their children to Islamic schools. Due to the current political climate and the many stereotypes that Muslims have to challenge and navigate on a daily basis, many parents view Islamic schools as safe spaces where children get to freely explore and construct their own identities.

However, given schools’ importance in children’s socialization, faith-based schools in general and Islamic schools in particular have come under public scrutiny and suspicion as ethnic enclaves that putatively create a ghettoized population. For example, American author Amy Gutmann (1996) argues that all cultural or faith-based schools promote a “separatist multicultural perspective” and that they are “designed primarily to sustain the self-esteem of students on the basis of their membership in a separatist culture” (as cited in Zine, 2009, 42). Meanwhile, Canadian journalist Lois Sweet (1997) argues that most faith-based schools emphasize the differences between religions, which hinders students’ integration into the wider society and accentuates their “otherness.” Popular media amplifies those criticisms where Muslim schools are portrayed as “always already sectarian, partial and exceptional”, in contrast to public schools, which are imagined as “always already universal, impartial and normal” (Kymlicka, 2019, 973).

Despite these fears and suspicions, there are few studies that examine the graduates of Islamic schools. This research examines the outcome of these schools, which is their graduates and the relationship between Islamic education in Canada and Muslim youth identity development and integration into Canadian society. Through the lens of rooted cosmopolitanism, I aim to explore how those Muslim youth conceptualize their multifaceted identities after graduating from the Islamic school system. Rooted Cosmopolitanism as a theory recognizes that individuals have a multitude of overlapping identities that go beyond the traditional understanding of space and nationality. Rooted Cosmopolitanism also acknowledges that attachments to particular communities might be a crucial step in developing one’s sense of morality and responsibility to others.

This study adopts a qualitative approach, where I interviewed 30 Muslim youth aged 18-34, who graduated from Canadian Islamic schools. Through the youth’s sharing of their experience in Islamic schools and the way they currently define their identity, this research will highlight the role that Islamic schools play in constructing their unique Canadian Muslim identities. Analyzing the lived experience of Muslim youth will not only benefit the religious education academic field but also it will teach us much about the integration of religious newcomers and members of minority religious groups in Canadian society and contribute to public debates often dominated by xenophobia.

Doaa Ahalabi is a PhD Candidate at the University of Waterloo. Doaa’s research focuses on faith-based institutions and minority integration in Canada. For her PhD, Doaa is examining the relationship between Muslim schools and the integration of Muslim youth in Canadian society to showcase the complex relationship between religious identity, education policies, and social integration in multicultural societies.