Dawud Walid

Dawud Walid is an American imam, author and activist from Detroit, and the executive director of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) — the first African American to hold that post. ¹ Born in Detroit in 1971, he embraced Islam in his late adolescence, served in the United States Navy, and studied Islam and Arabic in Detroit and abroad. ¹ His lectures are carried on Muslim Central, and he is a Senior Fellow at Auburn Seminary and a member of the Imams Council of Michigan. ²

Walid was born in Detroit, Michigan, on 22 November 1971, to parents from Virginia and Michigan, and spent part of his childhood in New Jersey and Virginia — he grew up in Chesterfield County, Virginia, before returning to Detroit as an adult. ^{1 3} Influenced by The Autobiography of Malcolm X and by conscious rap, he embraced Islam from Christianity in his late adolescence; after high school he joined the Navy through the Montgomery GI Bill and served four years, gaining first-hand exposure to Muslim communities in Bosnia, Iraq and Palestine. ¹ Returning to Detroit in 1998, he attended Historic Masjid Wali Muhammad, studied Islam and Arabic with teachers locally and abroad — his learning journey took him to Ghana, Mali and Senegal — and taught at Al-Ikhlas Training Academy and Wayne County Community College while reporting for The Muslim Journal and The Muslim Observer. ^{1 3} By 2010 he was CAIR-Michigan's executive director and assistant imam of Masjid Wali Muhammad, with a national profile in interfaith and media work. ⁴ His books include Towards Sacred Activism, Blackness and Islam, the co-authored Centering Black Narrative volumes, and Futuwwah and Raising Males Into Sacred Manhood. ²

This section should be read as a presentation of what the sources give, not as a verdict of the museum.

Walid teaches extensively on Islamic spirituality: his podcast conversations address the relationship of tasawwuf (Sufism) with sacred activism and anti-racism work, and his writing on futuwwah treats spiritual chivalry as a framework for raising men. ^{3 2} The sources consulted, however, describe his teaching and his teachers rather than naming a personal affiliation: no source names him a Sufi, names an order he belongs to, or names a legal school for him. His executive directorship of CAIR-Michigan is an office, and his attendance at Masjid Wali Muhammad is a mosque affiliation; neither attests a school. No faith value is therefore recorded for him. ^{4 1}

• The defined sources cited above, registered in data/source/.
• Later translations and edits of this article need periodic review with clear update dates.