Impacts of Marginalization a Bangladeshi Immigrant Faces a Glance Trough Interview

            My peer for this interview was Asif Haque. Asif is male, 21 years of age and was born in Bangladesh. He is a junior in The City College of New York and commutes from the Bronx by car. In the interview he identified himself by four communities that represent him, one he is Bangladeshi-Sylheti, he is Muslim, and lastly an immigrant of New York. I want to share some parts of all communities, specifically the immigrant community because they all have connections to who Asif is. There was a shift in my perspective because the interview was educational. Learning interesting facts about these communities while interviewing Asif, is my intention for the next reader to see what I found out about these communities.

My interviewee has identified himself as Bangladeshi, and New Yorker immigrant. These communities are based on physical communities. Bangladeshi community is a physical community because he was born and raised in Bangladesh. There are tribes that live in that nation, Asif is from the Sylheti tribe, which is located in the northeast region of Bangladesh. He was part of the community until he was 11 or 12 years of age. Specifically, he lived there until the end of the 5th grade in Bangladesh, later he migrated to New York City with his family. Being an immigrant New Yorker  is a physical community as well, because Asif migrated to New York with his family to live life in The U.S. He moved to New York City at the end of his 5th grade and he was 12 years of age. He now lives in The Bronx, and this marks his 9 years in this community.

The shared traits between all Muslims around the globe are the five pillars of Islam. First pillar is the iman, the faith that there is no god but Allah and his messenger Prophet Mohammad peace be upon him.The second pillar is the salah/namaz, the five daily prayers. Third pillar is the zakat, a mandatory charity for the less fortunate paid once every year. It is 2.5% of all your savings/assets(if it exceeds the price of 85 grams of 24k gold) that isn’t used for your essential expenses. Fourth pillar is fasting, from sunrise until sunset for the whole month of Ramadan.The fifth pillar is the Hajj, pilgrimage to the Holy Ka’ba in the city of Makkah(Asif).

I believe that all of the communities that Asif belongs to have been marginalized to certain extent, especially being part of an immigrant community. I will speak in favor of the statement Asif said during the interview that being an immigrant is a marginalized part. The United States of America is a melting pot to all of the immigrants that migrate here. As they spend years living here, they start to blend with the American culture. Almost all of the immigrants that migrate here regardless of their race, ethnicity, except most whites, get defined by labels. The immigrant community is vastly marginalized as they step into the American Dream land. They are seen as less intelligent because they do not speak the English language fluently, they’ve been seen as poor, they also have been seen as people that do not know their rights. One of the issues that this community faces is that they make fun of you for not knowing about how things are in this country. For instance, not knowing how to speak their language, not having a lot of money as an immigrant make you look poor, like you don’t have enough money to buy a nice pair of shoes, book bag, clothes, will lead to people that got money to make fun of you. Even when you are a undocumented immigrant you will be marginalized. Overall, this leads to you to not have a normal childhood other kids have, and you become more mature which is good in a way, it gives you a different perspective on life that makes you stand out.

These traumatic experiences had taught him a valuable lesson. It made him value food more, and think twice before spending a lot. The not wasting food part overlaps with Asif because remember he is from the Muslim community, and it is a sin to waste food and not having money to buy outside goods everyday like his friends used to made him realize the value of food and how much of a blessing it is and to waste it is not appreciating what God has blessed you with. Even though he is blessed by Allah so much now, he has money for whatever food he wants, his English got perfect. He’s past and present from being part of these communities in a way that will stick with him for the rest of his life.

One of the questions that came to mind during the interview, was there a time he faced Islamophobia and racism and his answer was yes he faced being called racial slurs and Islamophobic jokes were made about him, as he went to middle school and high school. He did not know the language very well, the culture, the people. This is where he transitioned from his own community to another. The struggles that came with going from being a Muslim, in a Muslim country to Muslim in a country where most people dont know what Islam is or think that Islam is a terrorist nation. While islam is being depicted in that way, Islam is different and it certainly doesnt make terrorist out of people rather the opposite. Islam is religion of Peace. So being Muslim  and being brown has led to Asif receiving Islamophobic terrorist jokes and people calling him “Indian” and not in a good way, rather in a insulting way. Despite being in part of Muslim community, his past and present experiences shaped his perspective.

I am a Muslim, Uzbek, New Yorker. Almost the same as Asif you would think. But, my community and perspective has similarities and differences from Asif’s. Some similarities that we have is we both are Muslim and our families came to The U.S. as immigrants. We both have been raised by a traditional religious family, although my family is not strictly orthodox Muslims. We both have friends that are Muslims in our circle. The differences that we have is that my peer speaks Sylhetti with his family. He was raised in a religious environment as a child and learned classic Arabic. While I grew up going to public school where I learned my first three languages, Uzbek, Tajik and Russian. I did not have my parents as a consistent religious influence in my life because of the lifestyle they had during the Soviet Union, they were busy hardworking people. As I arrived in NYC with my family, they put me in a Mosque and there I worked and learned Arabic for nearly 10 years. Another difference we have is that he lives with his community in the Bronx, while my community lives in Queens. The location does matter because the place and the conditions that you live in affects who you are today. I did not have any stereotypes for this community because my path in this life has came across this community more than once, therefore I never judged this community because I know what this community stands together with other Muslim communities. It was very interesting to get to know my peer and we both had dealt with racism and Islamophobic jokes during middle school and high school. Now we both just know how to deal with these stereotypes and play along with the game.