Bolstered by immigration and conversion, Islam is one of the fastest-growing religions in the United States. For many people, Islam has been inextricably linked with Arab Americans ever since the attacks of September 11, 2001, but the numbers tell a more complicated story: none of the hijackers was an American citizen (or a long-term resident), most Arab Americans are Christian, and only a quarter of American Muslims are Arab. Estimates vary, but the American Muslim population is thought to be at least 3 million. According to the U.S. State Department, the greatest proportion of practicing American Muslims — approximately a third — are South Asian; another 30 percent are African American. The United States is also home to tens of thousands of sub-Saharan African, European, and white American Muslims, among other groups.

With such ethnic and cultural diversity, the experience of American Muslim women varies greatly from community to community and family to family; many work outside the home and wear the latest fashions, while others live a more traditional Islamic lifestyle. (Some Muslim women who wear the headscarf in public are verbally harassed, a curious twist on the state-enforced dress codes in fundamentalist countries.) Significantly, U.S. laws protect Muslim women in many ways that Sharia law does not. Muslim American women are free to practice their religion, dress as they wish, vote and run for office, and generally enjoy the freedoms of the United States — including divorce, orders of protection, and child-custody rights unavailable to women under some interpretations of Islamic law. As is the case in all American communities, domestic violence often goes unreported.

Geopolitical developments have resulted in a vast increase in media coverage of Islam and Muslims, and many Americans are far more knowledgeable about Islam than they were prior to 2001. Yet awareness does not always equal understanding: the Council on American Islamic Relations has found that reports of discrimination, violence, and harassment against Muslims in the United States have increased by 300 percent since 2000.