“Do-For-Self”:
The Visual Culture of the Nation of Islam
Christiane Gruber
Synopsis:
The Nation of Islam (NOI) was founded in 1930 as a politico-religious movement for Black empowerment in the United States. During the 1960s and 70s, the NOI’s official newspaper, Muhammad Speaks (1960-75) included numerous essays, op-eds, and illustrations promoting the moral and salvific value of the Islamic faith, especially in contradistinction to Christianity. Many of these depictions provide pictorial arguments for conversion to the faith, itself imagined as a rich repository for personal empowerment and freedom—the latter two concepts often referred to in NOI rhetoric as “Do-For-Self.” This talk explores the type of visual culture crafted in Muhammad Speaks to take into account the influence of a modern American racialized landscape on visual expressions that are couched as “Islamic.”
Web Resources:
Black Panther Party’s newspapers 
Muhammad Speaks volumes
References:
Berg, Herbert. Elijah Muhammad and Islam. New York and London: New York University Press, 2009.
Curtis, Edward. Black Muslim Religion in the Nation of Islam, 1960-1975. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2006.
Gruber, Christiane. “Do-For-Self: The Visual Culture of the Nation of Islam,” Jadaliyya, June 29, 2023.
Husain, Khuram. “Muhammad Speaks for Freedom, Justice, and Equality,” JSTOR Daily, May 13, 2021.
Jackson, Sherman. Islam and the Blackamerican: Looking Toward the Third Resurrection. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Ogbar, Jeffrey. Black Power: Radical Politics and African American Identity, updated edition. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2019.
Wilson, Jamie. “‘Come down off the cross and get under the crescent’: The newspaper columns of Elijah Muhammad and Malcom X,” Biography vol. 36, no. 3 (2013): 494–506.
Worksheet:
A worksheet for this video is available here.
Also visit the Khamseen Worksheets page here.
Citation:
Christiane Gruber, “‘Do-For-Self’: The Visual Culture of the Nation of Islam,” Khamseen: Islamic Art History Online, published 15 September 2023.
Christiane Gruber is Professor of Islamic Art and Former Chair in the History of Art Department at the University of Michigan as well as Founding Director of Khamseen: Islamic Art History Online. Her scholarly work (available here) explores medieval to contemporary Islamic art, including figural representation, depictions of the Prophet Muhammad, manuscripts and book arts, architecture, and modern visual and material cultures. Her two most recent publications include The Praiseworthy One: The Prophet Muhammad in Islamic Texts and Images and The Image Debate: Figural Representation in Islam and Across the World, and her public-facing essays have appeared in Newsweek, The Conversation, New Lines, Jadaliyya, and Prospect Magazine, among others. Her current research projects include eco-Islamic art and architecture as well as the visual culture of the Nation of Islam.