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Considering the experience of Sikhs in America.

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"Urban turban: A model displays a creation for the French designer Jean-Paul Gaultier." (Source: The Daily Mail)

The colonizer’s legacy

October 8, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

On the website The Good Men Project, Jarune Uwujaren of Everyday Feminism considers the blurry distinction between cultural exchange and cultural appropriation, particularly as it relates to clothing and other practices (via @ghazalairshad): This isn’t a matter of telling people what to wear. It’s a matter of telling people that they don’t wear things in a vacuum and there are many social and historical implications to treating marginalized cultures like costumes. It’s also not a matter of ignoring “real” issues […]

Categories: Reflections • Tags: Costume, Cultural appropriation, cultural exchange, Good Men Project, Halloween costume, Jarune Uwujaren

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Prabhjot Singh (left) speaks at a press conference with Amardeep Singh (middle) of the Sikh Coalition and Jasjit Singh (right) of SALDEF on September 23, 2013. (Source: The Sikh Coalition)

Where do we go from here?

October 4, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

It has been an interesting two weeks for the Sikh American community. It was during this time that events came to light that were, in many ways, a microcosm of the Sikh American experience as it relates to prejudice and discrimination. There was, of course, the attack on Dr. Prabhjot Singh almost two weeks ago in New York, in which his attackers hurled upon him slurs of “terrorist” and “Osama” before swarming and assaulting him. The story of Jagjeet Singh […]

Categories: Civil Rights, Hate Crimes, Reflections • Tags: Amardeep Singh, Balbir Kaur Singh, Jaideep Singh, Manan Ahmed Asif, Manmeet Kaur, Prabhjot Singh, Simran Kaur

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"Martin Schoeller’s unexpected portraits illustrate America’s 'melting pot' nature." (Source: National Geographic)

The growth of the multi-racial

October 3, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

In the National Geographic, Lise Funderburg writes about the growth of the “multiracial” in the United States (via @v4vaishali): …for most multiple-race Americans, including the people pictured here, identity is a highly nuanced concept, influenced by politics, religion, history, and geography, as well as by how the person believes the answer will be used. “I just say I’m brown,” McKenzi McPherson, 9, says. “And I think, Why do you want to know?” Maximillian Sugiura, 29, says he responds with whatever […]

Categories: News Bits, Reflections • Tags: melting pot, multi-racial, race

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"Terrorist" spray-painted on a wall at the Sikh Gurdwara of Riverside, in Jurupa Valley, California. (Source: PEBloggers)

The “t-word”

September 26, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

After the apparent hate-motivated attack on Dr. Prabhjot Singh last weekend in New York, I wrote an essay that was published by The Revealer today about the emergence of the word “terrorist” as a racial epithet, but one that carries dangerous consequences for its target: …what is apparent is that the word has now become a racial epithet – it is often directed to innocent people who exhibit certain physical features, rather than used as a descriptor of a person’s […]

Categories: Civil Rights, Hate Crimes, Reflections • Tags: New York, Prabhjot Singh, racial slurs, t-word, The Revealer

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Immigration as art

September 18, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

In an interview with The Atlantic, author Edwidge Danticat offers a perspective on the immigrant experience — that of artistic creation (via @simranik): My parents spent their entire lives in Haiti before they left. They didn’t know much about the United States except that, at that time, there were opportunities there. They basically packed two suitcases and came. That experience of touching down in a totally foreign place is like having a blank canvas: You begin with nothing, but stroke […]

Categories: Art, Reflections • Tags: Edwidge Danticat, Immigration

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The US flag is raised in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks in 2001. (Source: Martin Ramirez)

“Since 9/11”

September 15, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

The neighborhood in which I live is one of those that sprung up during the real estate bubble eight years ago. The houses are, for the most part, very similar. Composed of four or five standard models, the streets offer a consistent character of a typical Californian subdivision. There is one house among the many, however, that is a bit different. It is  unique in that an American flag waves outside its front door. The residents of that house are […]

Categories: Civil Rights, Events, Hate Crimes, Reflections • Tags: 9/11, hate crimes, Islamophobia, Sikhophobia, xenophobia

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Vishavjit Singh dressed as comic book hero Captain America. (Photo. Fiona Aboud. Source: Salon)

When Captain America wore a turban

September 13, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

Earlier this summer, Sikh cartoonist Vishavjit Singh provided a glimpse of his foray through New York City dressed as the superhero Captain America. In an article in Salon magazine published this week, Vishavjit Singh shares more about his experience in challenging stereotypes: I have been skinny all my life, and I felt a stirring of anxiety to be so exposed. Family and friends have pointed out my thin-ness for years, and the self-consciousness has sunk deep into my psyche. Before […]

Categories: Art, Civil Rights, Reflections • Tags: Captain America, comics, Fiona Aboud, hate crimes, Navdeep Singh Dhillon, New York, Sikhtoons, Vishavjit Singh

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"What does a Kaur look like?" (Source: A Kaur's Thoughts.)

What does a Sikh woman look like?

September 10, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

On A Kaur’s Thoughts, blogger Lakhpreet Kaur considers the physical identity that defines or describes the Sikh woman, asking: what does a Kaur look like? …since the Kaur’s physical identity is in constant flux and not universally consistent, it is difficult to say Kaurs are visually different from non-Kaurs. The social category of “Kaur,” is not as solidified as “Singh,” because it is impossible to define what  Kaur physically looks like. What is she not? How is a Kaur visually […]

Categories: Reflections, Sikhism • Tags: A Kaur's Thoughts, Lakhpreet Kaur, physical identity, Sikh women, Women in Sikhism

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Workers install seven domes now adorn the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in Oak Creek earlier this month, as tributes to the lives lost in last year's shooting rampage by a white supremacist. (Source: WISN-TV)

Guru Gobind Singh’s Zafarnama and Oak Creek, Wisconsin

August 27, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

What manliness you have shown by extinguishing a few sparks? You have made the conflagration brighter and more furious. — Guru Gobind Singh to Aurangzeb, Mughal emperor of India, 1705. In 1705, the tenth Guru of the Sikhs, Guru Gobind Singh, wrote a letter in Persian entitled Zafarnama (“Epistle of Victory”) to Aurangzeb, the Mughal emperor of India who engaged in a campaign to eradicate the Sikh people, resulting in the execution and deaths of the Guru’s four young sons […]

Categories: Civil Rights, Hate Crimes, Reflections • Tags: Aurangzeb, Guru Gobind Singh, hate crimes, Oak Creek, Sikh Temple of Wisconsin, Wisconsin, Zafarnama

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