Hamline University in Minnesota, United States has fired a professor, Erika López Prater for showing paintings of the Prophet Muhammad to students during a lecture.
It was gathered that the adjunct professor displayed the images to a global art history class during an online lecture on 6 October 2022.
A student, Aram Wedatalla, president of the university’s Muslim Student Association (MSA), laid a complaint with the university’s administrators, saying she felt disrespected.
The complaint was subsequently supported by other Muslim students who were not in the course but demanded action and said the class was an attack on their religion.
In her defense, she said she had warned in her syllabus that images of holy figures, including the prophet and the Buddha, would be shown in the course. She also said she asked students to contact her with any concerns but no one did.
During the class, she said she had informed the students before displaying the images, requesting that students who would find them offensive should exit the conference call.
The first image was a 14th-century artwork of the prophet receiving his first revelation from the archangel Gabriel by Rashīd al-Dīn, and the second was a 16th-century artwork of the prophet with a veil and halo created by Mustafa ibn Vali.
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