American Imam: From Pop Stardom to Prison Abolition

Imam Taymullah Abdur-Rahman's incredible life story weaves the contemporary Black American experience with the Black Muslim American experience and emphasizes the role of interreligious dialogue in the fight for abolition and justice. By the time he was twelve, Taymullah Abdur-Rahman (born Tyrone Sutton) was a rising pop star, recruited as part of the R&B group Perfect Gentlemen, with a top-ten hit, national teen magazine covers, and an appearance on The Oprah Winfrey Show. However, after his music career peaked, Abdur-Rahman found himself back home, with little to show for his success. He became a teen father struggling to survive in Roxbury, MA. Seeing Islam as a way to discipline himself in an unrelenting environment, he converted. He went on to work in a maximum-security prison as a Muslim chaplain, where he became zealously focused on saving souls instead of understanding the outside forces that lead men to prison. Later, in his work as the first paid Muslim chaplain at Harvar