Waleed Aly
Over the last decade Monash academic and researcher Waleed Aly has steadily built a reputation as one of the most significant and diverse new voices to emerge in Australian society.
As a Muslim born and raised in Australia, he first rose to media prominence as a young, articulate spokesperson and board member of the Islamic Council of Victoria at the turn of the century (a position he has since resigned). Since then his views on a much wider range of topics have featured across Australia's mainstream media, in print and on radio.
His writing has even appeared in the Australian Football League's official weekly journal Football Record (the confessed Richmond Football Club tragic has worn the Tiger's mascot costume on more than one match day).
But Waleed Aly's underlying interest has always been the cultural, political and racial interaction between different peoples. His first book People Like Us: How Arrogance is Dividing Islam and the West published in 2007 won widespread praise and was shortlisted for the Best Newcomer in the Australian Book Industry Awards and the Queensland Premier's Literary Awards the following year.
Despite the beginnings of his public life he now wants to be seen as an academic who speaks for himself and not as a representative of others.
"I don't feel that I speak for "my people", and becoming involved with Monash University and being seen as an academic has helped relieve a lot of the sense of burden you can feel," Mr Aly said.
His book was released after he joined Monash University's Global Terrorism Research Centre, within the School of Political and Social Inquiry, as a lecturer and PhD candidate.
The Centre is Australia's first state government funded research centre entirely devoted to the study of terrorism, counter-terrorism and political violence.
It concentrates on the study of identity politics, cultural and global dynamics, and the causes and manifestations of what Mr Aly terms "identity violence" where individuals commit crimes against their own society because they do not feel they belong.
He cites the London bombings of July 2005 as an extreme example of the dangers of a multicultural society that does not assimilate a diverse range of cultures.
"You can never ultimately stop people feeling alienated, but one thing that is important about terrorism is that in order for a terrorist attack to occur you do need quite widespread resentment," he said.
"It makes us consider the question of whether our society really is socially inclusive enough."
