Reporters sometimes underestimate the complexities of Islam and Muslims, according to Michigan State University faculty who will use a grant to create a multimedia Web site designed to foster accurate and balanced reporting of the religion and its followers.

If you look at the coverage of Muslims in the press in this country, there are either over- simplifications or distortions such as combining the terms Arab and Muslim despite the fact that only 20 percent of the worlds Muslims are Arabs, said Mohammed Ayoob, director of MSUs Muslim Studies Program and University Distinguished Professor of international relations at James Madison College and the Department of Political Science. This problem has become particularly acute in the wake of Sept. 11.

Add to that commonly misunderstood and misused terms like jihad, militant Islam and Islamic fanaticism. And theres the common belief that all Muslims regardless of location are the same.

So to set the record straight, Ayoob and faculty from MSUs School of Journalism and Muslim Studies Program will soon begin a 15-month project that will yield IMAJE: Islam, Muslims and Journalism Education a virtual hub of information that addresses how Islam and Muslims have been, and should be, portrayed in the media. The site will be fully functional next spring.

While some journalistic Web sites mention how to report on Islam or Arabs, the IMAJE site will focus solely on the reporting of Islam and Muslims. And with MSUs proximity to Detroit which houses the largest mosque in North America and 300,000 to 350,000 Arab-Americans, many of whom are Muslims the university is well-positioned for such a project, Ayoob said.

Islam and how it intersects Detroit, Middle East and international politics is a complicated story to tell, said Geri Alumit Zeldes, MSU assistant professor of journalism. The Web site will offer examples of ideal and poor reporting on stories and a list of best practices on reporting on Islam to help journalists make sense of this subject matter before trying to inform their masses.

Also as part of the project, Zeldes is developing a new masters level course, Reporting on Islam, which will incorporate elements of the site. The course will be offered beginning fall 2009 semester. She and Bob Albers, specialist of telecommunication, information studies and media, are also creating a documentary Arabs, Jews and the News, and some of those interviews may be featured on the Web site.

Other planned features of the site include video conversations and essays by MSU Muslim Studies

faculty on hot-button issues, a weekly media watch blog and a faculty expert list.

But the site also will focus on issues that often dont make headlines.

Part of what well be doing is presenting complex elements of the religion that often are overlooked or neglected poetry, art, architecture, the cultural wealth associated with Islam and especially the diversity among Muslims, said Salah Hassan, associate professor of English and a Muslim Studies core faculty member, who will generate much of the content for the Web site.

In addition to the School of Journalism and Muslim Studies, the $88,000 Social Science Research Council grant was awarded to three of MSUs Title VI centers: African Studies, Asian Studies and the Center for the Advanced Study of International Development/Women and International Development.

MATRIX: The Center for Humane, Arts, Letters and Social Sciences Online, MSUs humanities computing center, will provide the technical expertise for setting up and maintaining the Web site.

For more information about MSUs Muslim Studies Program, visit

http://www.isp.msu.edu/muslimstudies.