Abdul-Rehman Malik is an award winning journalist, educator and cultural organizer.
In June 2019 he was appointed Associate Research Scholar and Lecturer in Islamic Studies at the Yale Divinity School. He also serves at the Program Coordinator at Yale University’s Council on Middle East Studies, and is responsible for developing curricula and partnerships with public schools to promote better cultural, language and religious literacy about the Middle East to educators and students alike. Abdul-Rehman also serves as Director of the Muslim Leadership Lab, an innovative project being incubated at the Dwight Hall Center of Social Justice at Yale and remains programs manager for the Radical Middle Way, which offers powerful, faith-inspired guidance and tools to enable change, combat exclusion and violence and promote social justice for all. His work has spanned the UK, United States, Indonesia, Pakistan, Sudan, Mali, Morocco, Singapore, Canada and Malaysia.
Abdul-Rehman is a frequent journalist for BBC Radio, offering contemporary perspectives on contemporary spirituality. Until 2018 regularly presented the popular Pause for Thought segment on Radio 2 and Something Understood on Radio 4. His most recent essay for Radio 3’s Holy Week 2019 was entitled “Behold the Man”.
In addition to providing curation and content guidance to a variety of cultural and literary institutions, Abdul-Rehman works to create platforms at the intersection of arts and social change. He is committed to building Muslim cultural capital, cultural leadership and supporting cutting-edge artistic production. In January 2015, he became director – a voluntary position – of the Insight Film Festival, a unique year-round festival that celebrates the intersection between faith and film. He was creative advisor to English Touring Theatre’s acclaimed, radical reimagining of Othello in 2017/2018 and curated The Othello Project, a multidisciplinary festival of artistic responses to the production.
Abdul-Rehman recently trained over 150 young civil society leaders in Indonesia to use the power of theatre and storytelling to bridge interfaith and intercultural divides against the backdrop of violence and discrimination as part of a Google.org funded initiative called Project Cerita. The “Duta Cerita” – young leaders – have now, in turn, reached over 1500 of their peers. The program is now being piloted in the UK and in the Netherlands.
Abdul-Rehman was artist-in-residence at the Doris Duke Foundation’s Shangri La Museum of Islamic Art, Design and Culture in June 2018. During his residency at Shangri La, Abdul-Rehman curated a series of programs and original performances around the theme, “What is Muslim Culture?”. He serves on the advisory board of the Said Foundation’s Amal Muslim Cultures & Arts programme fund.
Supported by Amal – A Saïd Foundation Programme