Tag: Islam

  • The Trojan Horse affair

    In 2014, a series of allegations surfaced about schools in Birmingham. The central claim was that a group of Muslim men had conspired to take over governing bodies in order…

  • The Things I Would Tell You

    “The Things I Would Tell You: British Muslim Women Write” is a fantastic anthology, published by Saqi and edited by Sabrina Mahfouz. It contains writing from a wide range of…

  • Britain, women and integration

    This December I wrote a couple of pieces for The Pool, looking at different aspects of integration in Britain. The first dealt with Louise Casey’s government-commissioned report into integration. My…

  • Cuts to ESOL

    In January, David Cameron announced extra funding for English as a Second Language (ESOL) classes, to be targeted at Muslim women in order to counter extremism. It was quite a…

  • Recent work

    I’ve got a column in the latest issue of the New Humanist (out now) following up on the long piece I wrote about attacks on secularists in Bangladesh. The column…

  • Recent work

    Here are a few links to some of the things I’ve worked on recently. “People care about their own rights – it’s other people’s that are more challenging” (New Humanist)…

  • Recent work

    I wrote a piece for Deutsche Welle about the new counter-extremism guidance in schools that was introduced following the “Trojan Horse” scandal. You can read the full piece here. The…

  • The “Trojan Horse” scandal

    Allegations of an Islamist plot to take over schools in Birmingham, which surfaced earlier this year, caused a national outcry. The debate was intensely polarised, with the government sending in…

  • The Ahmadiyya: global persecution

    The Ahmadiyya are one of Pakistan’s most persecuted communities. Legally classed as non-Muslims, this sect is subject to a whole range of persecutions. As such, many have left Pakistan in…

  • Islam and feminism

    Is it possible to be a Muslim and a feminist? That was the central question posed for a panel discussion I took part in at the Royal Court on 31…

  • The “Islamophobia industry”

    I’ve written a long feature for the New Statesman exploring anti-Muslim prejudice in modern Britain. What do we mean when we use the term “Islamophobia”? Has there really been a…

  • France’s trouble with headscarves

    I’m back in London, so have been covering some stories outside Pakistan. This weekend, I contributed to the National, the United Arab Emirates’ leading English language newspaper, for the first…