Chicago Tribune
‘Takin’ it to the Streets’ expecting 20,000 in Chicago’s Marquette Park
By Noreen S. Ahmed-Ullah
What started as an effort to bring a largely Muslim audience to a Southwest Side park where Martin Luther King was once pelted with bricks and rocks has grown into an international music event that organizers hope will draw 20,000 people Saturday. Read more

CNN Belief Blog
My Take: How a ‘Muslim Woodstock’ turns crisis into opportunity
By Maytha Alhassen
The similarity: As Woodstock defined the hippie generation, so might Takin’ it to the Streets 2010, organized by the Chicago-based group Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN), define a generation of Muslim Americans. Read more

Chicago Public Radio
Worldview: Muslim Engagement through the Arts
The American Muslim arts movement uses a universal language to connect people beyond traditional barriers. From hip-hop to documentary film-making, a young generation of Muslims has spurred a global arts movement. Listen here

Time Out
Music Top Live Show: Takin’ It to the Streets
However, Chicago’s best free summer festival this year is arguably Takin’ It to the Streets (no, it has nothing to do with the Doobie Brothers), a celebration thrown by the Inner-City Muslim Action Network. Read more

America.gov
Major Muslim-Organized Cultural Festival Expands in Chicago
Takin’ It to the Streets is more than just entertainment; it is engaging the community to spread goodwill and to address social concerns through music. Said said the festival aims to express compassion, mercy and solidarity. Read more

Illume
Takin’ It to the Street Was Never So Cool
By Eslam Najjar
The artistic expression will span from hip-hop and Latin ska to world music and spoken word and poetry to comedy. This year’s event will feature Mos Def, Brother Ali, Tinariwen, Outlandish, All Natural, Mo’ Rockin’, Los Vicios de Papa,Azhar Uzman, The Narciyst, Zero Bridge, D-Nick, and Amjad Sabri, to name just some of the artists.  Read more

Time Out
Takin’ It to the Streets Festival at Marquette Park
Billed as a kind of Muslim Woodstock in some corners of the internet and as an “urban international” fest on flyers, this past weekend’s Takin’ It to the Streets festival was surely an intriguing mix of performers, culture and unity politics. Read more

Huffington Post
Islam and the Spiritual Malaise of the Oil Spill
By Sarah Jawaid
Despite the grim picture, many faith leaders and community members are trying to raise the level of conversation on environmental stewardship, both globally and in our local communities. The Inner-City Muslim Action Network is assembling community leaders and activists to talk about ecological crises and our responsibility as caretakers of the Earth. Read more

Examiner
Chicago celebrates Juneteenth with Mos Def and more at IMAN’s ‘Takin’ It to the Streets’ concert
By Shamontiel Vaughn
There was also a Juneteenth Tribute on the Unity Stage. 2010 marks the 145th anniversary celebrating the 1865 announcement in Galveston, Texas that slavery had ended. Although the Emancipation Proclamation was signed on January 1, 1863, Texans still continued to practice slavery. But after the news that General Robert E. Lee surrended in April 1865, slaves were free to go. Read more

ELAN
Walkin’ Through Chi Town’s Muslim Hip Hop Festival
by Nadia S. Mohammad
Muslim Woodstock. Deenstock. Streets. Whatever your fancy, IMAN’s Takin’ it to the Streets event in Chicago last weekend was quite simply awe-inspiring. And we are all still recovering, or rather, re-discovering what it means to be Muslim in America today. Read more

altmuslim
Summer events celebrate Muslim American spirit
By Su’ad Abdul Khabeer
In US popular culture there is one tradition in which those with power use all kinds of artistic expression, from Monet to Mos Def, to articulate a set of cultural standards (conveniently, these power brokers also produce the very commodities through which the average person can aspire to these values). Read more

Examiner
Takin’ it to the streets: a Muslim-led urban international festival
By Sabreena Karim
However, the beauty of the event was not in the food or the festivities, but in the people themselves. The festival resembled a United Nations of sorts with Muslims and non-Muslims alike, rappers of every race, and everyone enjoying the celebrations together with no qualms about who was sitting, dancing, or eating next to them. It was all smiles and laughter. It was unity in the face of adversity – all to support Urban America. Read more

AerosolArabic: Urban Islamic Art
Streets 2010 - Chicago
By Mohammed Ali
As soon as i arrived at the reception, it was quite surreal seeing so many familiar faces, people i have the utmost respect for. Activists, scholars, artists, photographers, film-makers, poets.. all in one place, from all over the globe had come together for this powerful gathering. Creative energy was overflowing, and this was the ULTIMATE gathering of muslim creativeness in the globe, and thats no exaggeration. Read more

The Chicago Blog
Takin’ It to the Streets 2010: In Review
By Gabriela Zecker
I was just another face in the crowd who earned respect like everyone else. Rather than the dirty looks and shoves from people as I made my way toward the front of the crowd for Tinariwen and Mos Def, I instead encountered those who would gracefully move aside and smile when I accidentally bumped into them. I munched on the affordably priced $5 falafel and pita sandwich, grateful that cheap and healthy vegetarian food was not the exception, but the norm. Read More

Did you catch the Twitter live feed of Streets? We had over 600 tweets that used the #streets2010 hashtag. Here’s a visualization of what people were talking about.

Contact Information

For interviews or other media needs, please contact:

Ahlam Said
Communications Manager
ahlam@imancentral.org
773.434.4626 ext 210