Jinn n’ (No Freshly Squeezed) Juice

Abstract

Liquor stores, or more colloquially “corner stores,” in Detroit, Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Washington, and other major metropolitan cities located in economically under-served, urban, majority-black neighborhoods have been purchased by Arab American and Arab immigrants over the last two decades. In order to understand the relationship of place to religion and race, I intend to examine the dynamics of the encounter between African- American Muslims and Arab and Arab-American Muslims (mostly Yemeni) at various liquor stores in Oakland, where, according to the US Census (2000), African Americans compose 64 percent of the population. Complicated by an ethno-religious component, Yemeni Muslim liquor store ownership concentrated in Oakland’s highest density, crime-ridden, black-dominant, and economically poorest neighborhoods, although aided by literature, requires a new theoretical arsenal for approaching the conflict. Little scholarly attention has been paid to the demographic shift in ownership and the resulting relations between the two groups. This essay is by no means an attempt to provide a comprehensive portrait or a theoretical foundation. Better described as a pilot study, my participant observations during ...