Deltakbar
Samah Mudasar
People react or truly understand something when they feel what another is going through and not just see it. I began with a question of how I could make non-Muslims empathetic towards Muslims who are being discriminated against by feeling like they’re being picked on or targeted when they haven’t done anything to receive that treatment. I created a set of tickets: a parking ticket, a boarding pass and metro card, each written in Arabic on one side and English on the other, to be handed out randomly or placed where selected people would see them, making them feel watched and scrutinized, like they’ve been identified as a threat. I also wanted to make people feel the frustration of being treated differently, so I created an online game where the user never wins—even when they do everything right. I wanted to then create an experience for the non-Muslim to learn about Muslims and show the positive side of Islam: many of the things we use every day, including coffee, algebra, and musical scales all came from the early Muslim world. Deltakbar is a speculative Delta Air Lines alliance airline with a logo that follows geometric Islamic patterns in an American red and blue color palette. Each item in the box of passenger essentials has information about where certain things were invented or created by Muslims. Discrimination against Muslims exists and needs to end because no one in the world deserves to be punished for someone else’s mistakes. Through these projects, I hope to show how all Muslims aren’t evil and to create a conversation about the unjust discrimination they have to face.