In the second article of Bahath’s #BlindBelievers week, Momina Tashfeen (@MominaTashfeen) speaks to Sara Minkara the founder of Empowerment Through Integration.
By virtue of her supportive family, tenacious spirit and steadfast faith in Islam, Sara Minkara, has established a life of empowerment and successful entrepreneurship. She is the founder of the nonprofit Empowerment Through Integration and Sara Minkara LLC, both of which offer direction for disability inclusion and education. Having lost her sight at age seven and being a first-generation American-Muslim, Minkara possesses unique perspectives and insight that has been heard around the world. In 2017, she was included in Forbe’s list of “30 Under 30: Social Entrepreneurs” list.
Bahath had the opportunity to interview her recently. We asked about topics ranging from how her nonprofit came to be, to what the Muslim community can do to become more inclusive.
Societal Perceptions
You often talk about how capable all people are, irrespective of their disabilities. Was this something you had to come to terms with?
Sara: There’s a beauty behind every single creation of God, of Allah. If people see it through that lens, then you actually, slowly over time embrace that and all of your identities in a beautiful way. It’s not a switch of a button, it’s not automatic because, let’s be real: outside of the bubble of “home”, there is that stigma of disability. “You’re less than”, “You're different”, “You’re incapable”, “You’re pitiable”. But my parents and my mom, in particular, brought a certain narrative at home, “you have a purpose in life, you’re going to achieve it, and you’re never allowed to say I cannot do this because I cannot see”. She saw us as individuals with value and potential, and she gave us the space to explore that. So combine that with the imaan aspect, and over time that allowed us to really deal with how society saw us.
I take it a step further though, I don’t like it when people say: “I achieved this regardless of my disability”. When that word “regardless” is spoken that means that you’re seeing disability as a negative. For me, disability is a part of who I am, like anything else. And the greater disability is not the disability of being blind. Blindness, sure, I cannot see, but that’s a technical thing. But to be honest, if that’s all it was, life would be easy. But the greater disability is actually society and the stigmas.
You say it’s very negative to say “overcoming challenges despite my disability”. Could you talk more about the why behind that?
Sara: If you think about it, why do you see me as inspiring if i’m just living like anyone else and getting married and having kids? When this happens, that means there’s an underlying assumption that this person was never expected to achieve those kinds of aspects in life. If you think about it from a surface level, it might be a positive comment, “Oh my God that’s amazing, what you have been able to do''. But the underlying narrative is I’m not expecting people with disabilities to be able to do that. That subtle narrative is very harmful. It’s not intentional with most people, over time the narrative will be engraved in you. For me, I am blind, which means I cannot see. It’s technical, so don’t take it further. Don’t create assumptions towards what that means. Ask, and I’d say be curious through a lens of compassion. Don’t be curious through the lens of an assumption. The assumption is what really hurts and creates social stigma. Whereas if you ask, ask, I'm fine with that. “How do you do this?” ‘Tell me more about your work and how you do it” vs.“Oh my God it must be really difficult for you to do your job”.
Sara riding a bicycle.
Out in the snow.
Can that narrative be a two-way street? In that, society projects these assumptions onto the disabled, and the disabled might subscribe to those assumptions as a result.
Sara: Imagine everyone around you is pitying you, you’re going to end up embracing that and it’s going to become a vicious cycle. And I’ve seen that across the globe through my work. And there’s no blame on them, it’s a cycle. It can reach a point where a disabled might say “Oh I can’t work” or “I need help”. We need to cut that narrative. And the unfortunate part is when we disrupt that narrative we end up only disrupting it on the disability front. “Let’s empower the people with disabilities. Let’s give them the tools to be empowered. Let’s give them the love.” But to be honest, empowering them and then putting them into a really harsh world? That’s not accepting them.
To those in the blind community who don’t have adequate support or education, how different of a life are they living?
Sara: Through my work at [Empowerment Through Integration], where we work with blind kids across the globe on the empowerment and integration aspect, we also work with families and their communities because it’s not enough for a blind kid to be empowered. For example, in Lebanon, blind kids are not given the white cane and that’s because of the stigma. And I’ve seen that even in Thailand and other places. We brought the kids to our program and told them about the white cane, and the younger kids loved it. They said, “Oh my God this is giving me independence, this is amazing!”. But then you have their family coming back and taking the white canes away. You then have the older kids refusing to learn how to use the white cane because they understand the stigma attached to the white cane. We realized that our work has to be the kids, the family, educators, community members, policy members, across the board, all kinds of stakeholders.
Sara with a blind child at an event in Lebanon.
I remember meeting a member of parliament in Thailand who was blind. And he said when he would go back to his village, his mom would tell him not to use the white cane because of the stigma, even though he’s a member of parliament! So, it’s everywhere. Whether you are a successful person or not, it’s there. The saddest part is that I see kids, where their potential is being lost and it’s because they are not being given the space and opportunity to be recognized, seen and heard. But it’s also not fair to say “well, they need to pull their boots up by their bootstraps” either. You can’t expect that from them if they’re not given that opportunity or chance.
Muslim Community
What can you speak to on this topic regarding the Muslim community in particular?
Sara: Does the Muslim community even see the value in including people with disabilities in their community? Or do they see it through a charity lens? I want it to come to a point where the community says, “We want to include people with disabilities because they are valuable”. We need to include them across the entire framework. From leadership to programs to infrastructure, not just putting them in a corner in a special project classroom. I’ve had a lot imams say, “Well, we don’t have a lot of disabeled people here.” You don’t “have” them because you don’t see them because they don’t feel welcomed or valued. But they are there. To be honest, with most imams, it’s not malice, it’s just lack of awareness. 1/7th of the world population is people with disabilities. I’ve been to places in a mosque and I feel like eyes are on me and I’ll hear it, “Ya haram”. If I’m being seen as a charity case always, I’m not going to come back. Seriously, if a person feels like they’re valued, they’re going to be there. How many of our infrastructures are built accessibly? How many of our khutbas have captions or interpretation? How many programs are accessible to the blind? But over time, I have seen the growth.
Sara speaking at an event with a microphone in hand.
Educating ourselves comes first of course, but what’s the next step after that for Muslims to be more inclusive?
Sara: There’s a phrase in the disability world, “not being about us, without us”. Unfortunately, everything about us is created without us. It’s a wide range of aspects. Yes, it’s great you have braille Qurans. That’s a great, amazing thing, but it’s so much more than that. Imagine someone who is hard of hearing or deaf during Ramadan or something, they have to learn through lectures online, especially during COVID, and none of the lectures are captioned. Imagine how isolating that is. The issue is the leadership across a lot of those communities are not even thinking about it, it doesn’t even cross their mind. So, it starts with a) communication, b) recognizing that there’s a disability community that is diverse in terms of who they are and what they need, c) wanting to integrate them and have them learning. Let’s take it a step further, how can we learn from them too?
Nonprofit and Social Enterprise Work
Empowerment Through Integration: How did it come to fruition? What’s the timeline there?
Sara: Sophomore year in college, is when it happened. I was an economics major, and I never thought in a million years that I’d actually start a nonprofit, I was actually on the path of doing a PhD. But then in my sophomore year of college, I got a grant from the Clinton Foundation to run an inclusive summer camp in Lebanon, where my parents are from. We brought together blind and sighted kids. The purpose of the camp was to show the value of inclusion. It was powerful for the kids, for the parents and for the Lebanese community at large. But it was also very powerful for me I feel like that was the first time I ever stood up to my Lebanese community and said, “I’m proud to be blind”. That was an impactful summer, but I didn’t think anything would change. Then in my senior year of college, my thesis advisor told me, “Sara, why are you applying to a PhD program? That summer camp, your eyes sparkle when you talk about that summer. Go pursue that.” I founded EIT when I was a senior in college, and I’ve been running it for the past 10 years.
What can you tell me about your “Discovery in the Dark” event?
Sara: The workshop comes from the point of when you remove the lens of sight, you actually have a greater vision because you’re not able to make assumptions of who that person is. There’s a power behind that because 85% of what we take in is visual. But imagine you’re in a space where you’re meeting someone without seeing them. Our goal is to first, recognize your assumptions, do away with them, and have one assumption of when you meet a person for the first time that this person has something beautiful to contribute. Apply curiosity through a lens of compassion through everything you do and all your interactions. When you start doing that you start moving towards a space of authentic inclusion.
That’s similar to the concept of Hajj. To what extent has Islamic teachings influenced the work you’re doing?
Sara: The workshop isn’t an Islamic workshop but Islam has influenced how I thought about life and the world. And it goes back to this point of, we are created by Allah, Allah is the most loving, there is a purpose and beauty behind how we were created. With that, it begs the questions, how can we see others through this lens of ‘isms’? How? If we see others through a beautiful lens that Allah is the one who created them, there’s power in that. There’s empowerment in that. There’s strength in that.
Sara helping two children at an event in Lebanon.
Allah will never put His servant through evil. But He does have tests. And I truly believe these tests are a way to get closer to Allah. Allah tests those he loves the most, so to be honest, I’m loved by Allah. I’ve always said my blindness has been the biggest blessing and people respond “what?”. I’ve had people say to me, “it’s a curse”, “it’s a punishment”, they’ve said it even to my parents.
Final Thoughts
What’s some of the feedback you tend to commonly hear from people?
Sara: “Wow, I never thought about it like that”. That’s why I say it’s not malice. I do believe that most hearts of people are huge and beautiful and they want to be kind and compassionate. But I also know that we need to recognize that as humans, and I speak even to myself, we’re part of what creates these narratives. I am part of what creates these ‘isms’, we all are. It’s that recognition and being compassionate to yourself and curious with yourself, how am I contributing to this narrative? Whether it’s through the disability narrative or race or gender narrative. I think it’s so important for us to not only see what are the issues in this world but also how we are contributing to these issues. Look within first.
Could you speak to any improvement in society since when you started ETI?
Sara: From what I’ve seen, it’s very gradual. It’s similar to racial or gender conversations, it takes years or decades. Our narrative of inclusion through a value-based lens is not a common narrative even on an international development level. And if you start seeing it from a value-based lens, things shift. You start having corporations that want to include disabilities. You start having schools wanting to include students with disabilities. We’re still far from that narrative.
But we’ve definitely seen it on a smaller, familial level. Last summer, when I was in Lebanon, three volunteers came up to me and they said, “Sara, we used to be participants of the camps and programs years ago, and now we’re back as volunteers. And because of ETI, we’ve been able to go to college and feel empowered.” Seeing it on that level, for sure there’s been a change.
You can check out all the wonderful work being done at ETI over on their website: etivision.org
