I spoke with Khabeer about the dynamics of “Muslim cool” in American culture and politics. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Green: What is “Muslim cool”?

Khabeer: “Muslim cool” is a term that I’m using to describe a way of being and thinking about what it means to be Muslim in the United States. It’s engaging blackness to counter anti-blackness, as it appears in Muslim communities as well as broader American society.

Muslim cool manifests itself in different ways: conversations and ideas, but also style, fashion, and activism. I worked with young Muslims, ages 18 to 30, who were multi-ethnic. They were black, South Asian, and Arab Americans who were engaged in arts-based activism, and particularly hip-hop-based activism.

I’m also juxtaposing Islam and hip hop. For a number of Americans, that might be unexpected, because they don’t necessarily put those two things together, but I found that looking at those two things together gave me some critical insights into the way race and blackness function in the U.S. today. These young Muslims are resisting anti-blackness in their activism and their style, but they also find themselves reproducing it. And I think that is really key to how race and blackness function in the U.S.

Green: Everything you’re describing—style, fashion, music—are the building blocks of what makes something “cool.” And yet, there’s some cognitive dissonance. One could argue that Muslims in the U.S. are, politically speaking, marginalized and demonized.

In that context, what does it mean for Muslims to be “cool”?

Khabeer: In mainstream U.S. conversations about Muslims, yes, I think “the Muslim” is made into a threat or a terrorist—something really scary. But in the hip-hop community, Muslims are more like prophets. And that’s where the “cool” comes from.

People don’t recognize Muslims right in front of them. Donald Trump wants to ban Muslims and wants [Muslim immigrants] to register [with the government as they enter the United States], and then he’s like, “Muhammad Ali is a great guy.” Muhammad Ali’s greatness is inextricable from his blackness and inextricable from his Muslim identity. The reason we love Muhammad Ali is that he stood up for justice, and the reason he did that was because he was Muslim.

In the United States, we have a mainstream, but we also have multiple streams—we have multiple communities. While the mainstream conversation dominates [culture] and pushes policy on some level, it’s not the only conversation.

Green: In those “mainstream” conversations you describe, whether it’s politicians making speeches, TV news broadcasts, or articles in the newspaper, Muslims are often portrayed in narrow stereotypes: Arab, foreign, immigrant. Of course, this doesn’t reflect reality: U.S. Muslims come from all sorts of ethnic and racial backgrounds, and a large portion are African American, as you point out in your book.