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At an anti-Muslim rally earlier this year in Toronto, youth filmmaker Eduardo Alves Dos Anjos was searching for something he thought would be hard to find: a positive representation of the Muslim community.
Dos Anjos, a Muslim convert, was skeptical at first, but he managed to find voices against Islamophobia at the rally.
With those voices, he produced a three minute film as a part of a National Council of Canadian Muslims workshop to engage Muslim youth.
“One of the main challenges we face as a Muslim community is outreach to people who believe Muslims are not human,” said Dos Anjos, a volunteer with the NCCM. “It started becoming really important for us to start finding creative ways to communicate with these people.”
And on Friday morning at the Ottawa Mosque, Dos Anjos, along with three other speakers announced the creation of a project meant to foster that kind of communication. It’s a national arts contest called Combating Hate, Advancing Inclusion, in which people ages 16 to 30 submit proposals of digital video artwork exploring ways to confront Islamophobia.
A jury of people selected by the NCCM will judge proposal submissions, ranging from dance, animation, spoken word and visual art. They will award 10 people a $1,000 award, up to $250 to cover the cost of materials they need to create their art and the venues they need to showcase their work in Ottawa and Toronto.
The launch of the project comes on the heels of news last week that hate crimes are on the rise in Canada, something NCCM organizers noted.
According to Statistics Canada, hate crimes in Canada have risen by five per cent in 2015 and a part of the rise is due to an increase in incidents targeting Muslims.
In 2015, police reported 1,362 criminal incidents motivated by hate, 67 more than the previous year, according to the data published last week.
Of them, 48 per cent were motivated by hatred of a race or ethnicity, 35 per cent were motivated by hatred of a religion, and 11 per cent were hate crimes targeting sexual orientation.
The Ottawa Mosque is familiar with hate being directed toward it.
In April, a man was arrested in connection with vandalism at the mosque and the Islam Care Centre. Bricks were used to smash a window in the middle of the night. He was charged with two counts of mischief as well as an assault charge stemming from his arrest.
During Friday’s press conference, Mohamed Shaheen, the executive director of the Silk Road Institute, one of the partner organizations behind the announcement, acknowledged the importance of the mosque’s connection to community, including the church beside it.
“To the left of this building is the Northwestern United Church, whose basement hosted the Muslim community in the 1950s for prayer,” said Shaheen.
“This mosque, where we’re standing right now, is the mosque that that community went on to build.”
He also said although there have been incidents against Muslims in the past, he hopes the Muslim community can come together to counter the narrative around them.
“We hope that Muslim youth are not just countering the narrative but are changing the narrative,” said Shaheen.
For Dos Anjos, he hopes to inspire Muslim youth through his new role leading arts workshops for NCCM.
“It’s important that we use this powerful medium to take back our image of ourselves,” said Dos Anjos.
查看原文...
Dos Anjos, a Muslim convert, was skeptical at first, but he managed to find voices against Islamophobia at the rally.
With those voices, he produced a three minute film as a part of a National Council of Canadian Muslims workshop to engage Muslim youth.
“One of the main challenges we face as a Muslim community is outreach to people who believe Muslims are not human,” said Dos Anjos, a volunteer with the NCCM. “It started becoming really important for us to start finding creative ways to communicate with these people.”
And on Friday morning at the Ottawa Mosque, Dos Anjos, along with three other speakers announced the creation of a project meant to foster that kind of communication. It’s a national arts contest called Combating Hate, Advancing Inclusion, in which people ages 16 to 30 submit proposals of digital video artwork exploring ways to confront Islamophobia.
A jury of people selected by the NCCM will judge proposal submissions, ranging from dance, animation, spoken word and visual art. They will award 10 people a $1,000 award, up to $250 to cover the cost of materials they need to create their art and the venues they need to showcase their work in Ottawa and Toronto.
The launch of the project comes on the heels of news last week that hate crimes are on the rise in Canada, something NCCM organizers noted.
According to Statistics Canada, hate crimes in Canada have risen by five per cent in 2015 and a part of the rise is due to an increase in incidents targeting Muslims.
In 2015, police reported 1,362 criminal incidents motivated by hate, 67 more than the previous year, according to the data published last week.
Of them, 48 per cent were motivated by hatred of a race or ethnicity, 35 per cent were motivated by hatred of a religion, and 11 per cent were hate crimes targeting sexual orientation.
The Ottawa Mosque is familiar with hate being directed toward it.
In April, a man was arrested in connection with vandalism at the mosque and the Islam Care Centre. Bricks were used to smash a window in the middle of the night. He was charged with two counts of mischief as well as an assault charge stemming from his arrest.
During Friday’s press conference, Mohamed Shaheen, the executive director of the Silk Road Institute, one of the partner organizations behind the announcement, acknowledged the importance of the mosque’s connection to community, including the church beside it.
“To the left of this building is the Northwestern United Church, whose basement hosted the Muslim community in the 1950s for prayer,” said Shaheen.
“This mosque, where we’re standing right now, is the mosque that that community went on to build.”
He also said although there have been incidents against Muslims in the past, he hopes the Muslim community can come together to counter the narrative around them.
“We hope that Muslim youth are not just countering the narrative but are changing the narrative,” said Shaheen.
For Dos Anjos, he hopes to inspire Muslim youth through his new role leading arts workshops for NCCM.
“It’s important that we use this powerful medium to take back our image of ourselves,” said Dos Anjos.
查看原文...
