Part 2- Revamping Ground Zero to Spread Awareness
By Elle Mastenbrook
The controversy over the proposed mosque near Ground Zero has been widely publicized, and there are many different opinions surrounding the construction of it. The developer, Sharif el-Gamal, worked with SOMA Architects to come up with the creation of design. According to the project’s website, www.park51.org, their vision is as follows:
“Park51 is a center created to serve the local community through recreational and cultural activities and social programs and to integrate the Muslim-American identity into the fabric of the United States. We are guided by Muslim values, including understanding, mutual respect, service, transparency, peace, harmony, education, health, equality of women, excellence and sensitivity to our environmental impact. Our goal is a self-sustaining, international-standard model.”
This post is created to discuss beneficial aspects of the proposed mosque, and how it is not just an Islamic Center, but also a structure that could be advantageous to all citizens of New York City. According to the website, the facility is intended to be a community center, and is planned to include: recreation spaces, an auditorium, a restaurant and culinary school, cultural amenities, education programs, a library, childcare services, a prayer space open to all members of the New York community, and a September 11th memorial space. What is interesting is that the website does not specifically identify the prayer space, named the Cordoba House, as a mosque. Yet the term mosque is what is highlighted in many of the media reports on this structure. They do acknowledge that the Cordoba House will be developed under the leadership of Imam Feisal Abdul-Rauf, but other than that there is a noticeable lack of any religious connotations the religious space in the community center has.
New York City does not need another gymnasium or restaurant, but Park 51 is going to bring more than that. It is going to be a tranquil space that promotes peace. It is not intended for pushing Islam on its patrons. It is meant as a place of reflection, and is a tribute to the attacks on September 11th. There is still a large amount of public dissent towards the project. This dissent comes from an ignorance of Islam, and an ignorance of what the proposed project would actually bring to New York City. The prayer space is open to all different religious faiths, so it is not strictly restricted to Islam. Unfortunately, due to the essentialist tendencies of the people in the United States, many citizens have associated Islam with terrorism, therefore causing an uproar at the thought of creating and Islamic Center next to Ground Zero. Essentialism is the act of stereotyping a group. For example, there is a stereotype that all Arabs are violent terrorists. Mahmood Mamdani relates essentialism to the phrase “culture talk.” Culture Talk is the assumption that every culture has a substantial essence that defines it, and this essence reflects on the politics of that particular group (Mamdani 17). He specifies this definition by relating it to Muslims, and how Culture Talk for this group focuses on the early history of Muslims, and presently they have no grounds in culture so they are bad (Mamdani 18). This ignorance is perpetuated in wide stream thought, and is why many Americans see the creation of the Park 51 Community Center as an attack on those who died in September 11th.
The creators of the center primarily just want to create a space that would benefit all of New York. The space is not centered on religion, though part of it, the Cordoba House, is. They want the country to see that Muslim-Americans are just like everyone else, which they are. If this community center is successfully erected I think it would open up the world to how peaceful Islam really is. It would also spark constructive conversations around the country about what Islam consists of, and I think this would really help bring closure to the negative feelings that many people have towards the Muslim terrorists that attacked New York City on September 11th.
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