The Old Post Office Folkestone, England
Friday, Apr 3 from 6 pm to 8:30 pm
Overview
SD Projects hosts a keynote lecture by author Tharik Hussain on Muslim Europe: A Journey in Search of a Fourteen Hundred Year History
For over 1,400 years, Muslims have been an integral part of Europe’s story, yet their contributions have been pushed to the margins or erased altogether. In his book Muslim Europe, award-winning author Tharik Hussain restores this forgotten history. Now, SD Projects invites Tharik to Folkestone to share his intriguing findings with the local East Kent community.
Friday 3 April 2026
6pm: Arrival
6.30pm: Talk + Q&A
8pm: Food + Networking
In a revelatory journey across the continent, Tharik tread in the footsteps of the first Muslims who arrived on European soil in 647 AD. He travelled through Cyprus, Sicily, Malta, Portugal and Spain, learning about the continent’s great Caliphate culture and Muslim commonwealth, encountering red-haired European Sultans and Arabic-speaking Christian Kings, the Sufi lodges of Cyprus and the palaces of Sicily.
Forgotten Muslim pioneers like Abbas Ibn Firnas gave us flight, Ibn Rushd gifted us modern philosophy and the cross fertilisation of faiths and cultures birthed Europe’s Christian Renaissance. For twelve centuries, Muslim Europe was also a sanctuary for the continent’s Jews.
Muslim Europe lays bare the cause of our collective Islamic amnesia by mapping Europe’s ‘anti-Muslim DNA’ through medieval Crusade narratives and nation-building myths. But Islam was never a sideshow to Western culture; it was integral to its development for over 1,400 years. In his talk, Tharik dismantles the myth of Europe’s solely Judaeo-Christian cultural foundation and reveals the Muslim Eurocentric history of the continent.
Good to know
Highlights
- 2 hours 30 minutes
- all ages
- In person
Location
The Old Post Office
48 Tontine Street
Folkestone CT20 1JP