Attached to Paper Session
Meeting Preference
Islamophobia vs. Anti-Muslim Racism: Choice, Corporeality, and Culpability in Contemporary Social Justice Rhetoric
Whether Islamophobia or racism should be the lens through which to articulate the persecution of Muslims as well as those perceived as Muslims is one of the most contentious semantic debates of our time (Brown, 2019; Bruckner, 2018; Cheng, 2015; Lauwers, 2019; Meer & Modood, 2013; Richardson, 2012). This issue has resurfaced on the eve of the latest Israeli invasion in Gaza, inspiring questions such as: are Israel’s actions as well as the consistent support it has received from the US and intermittent support from many other Euroamerican countries motivated by anti-Palestinian racism or Islamophobia (Abu‐Laban & Bakan, 2022; Ayyash, 2023)? Considering Islam is not tied to a particular ethnic or racial group, but is rather a religion, what motivates the impulse to characterize the phenomenon as a form of racism instead of as a “sentiment” or “prejudice” against a religious group in the formulation “anti-Muslim racism”? While the discourses on each side cannot be neatly categorized as politically left- or right-leaning, there is a dominant tendency among segments of the Left to articulate Islamophobia as anti-Muslim racism while segments of the Right argue that because Islam is not a race, it is not possible to be racist against Muslims, thus denying the charge of discrimination against Muslims.
This paper contributes to the debates on the use of the terms Islamophobia and anti-Muslim racism in both popular and academic spheres through an examination of how legal categories, biological essentialism, and the logic of dehumanization inform the description and self-description of marginalized groups. I draw connections between a number of seemingly disparate phenomena — that I argue are intricately connected through a scientistic logic — ranging from the controversy on academic freedom and tolerance after a US university fired an instructor for showing Prophet Muhammad’s image in class (Barre et al., 2023), Blackness and Afropessimism, debates about the effect of age on women’s reproductive capacities (Klein & Sauer, 2001), arguments over the existence of “gay genes” in LGBTQ rights discourse (Wesling, 2022), the differential treatment of women and children in media coverage during imperial wars, and the changing definition of disability to highlight the kinds of rationale used by individuals and communities to establish the innocence of certain parties and the violability of others, and thereby illustrate what is at stake in the struggle to articulate Islamophobia and anti-Muslim racism, the distinction between chosen and imposed — or visible and invisible (Alcoff, 2005) — identities, and the politics of translation.
Pathologizing identities, paradoxically, makes possible both liberation and persecution. By rendering one’s identity as pathological, one can make claims to acceptance, accommodation, or tolerance, on the basis that it is not within their power to change themselves, and thus, they have the right to be accepted for who they are. At the same time, it allows the risk to be “treated” or “purified” of such pathology by those not ailed by that identity. I argue that this fundamental issue — defined by a reliance on scientific conceptualizations of what identity means — informs discourses on choice, corporeality, and culpability in contemporary social justice rhetoric.
References
Abu‐Laban, Y., & Bakan, A. B. (2022). Anti‐Palestinian Racism and Racial Gaslighting. The Political Quarterly, 93(3), 508-516.
Alcoff, L. M. (2005). Visible identities: Race, gender, and the self. Oxford University Press.
Ayyash, M. M. (2023). The toxic other: The Palestinian critique and debates about race and racism. Critical Sociology, 49(6), 953-966.
Brown, M. D. (2019). Conceptualising racism and Islamophobia. In Comparative perspectives on racism (pp. 73-90). Routledge.
Bruckner, P. (2018). An imaginary racism: Islamophobia and guilt. John Wiley & Sons.
Cheng, J. E. (2015). Islamophobia, Muslimophobia or racism? Parliamentary discourses on Islam and Muslims in debates on the minaret ban in Switzerland. Discourse & Society, 26(5), 562-586.
Klein, J., & Sauer, M. V. (2001). Assessing fertility in women of advanced reproductive age. American journal of obstetrics and gynecology, 185(3), 758-770.
Lauwers, A. S. (2019). Is Islamophobia (always) racism?. Critical Philosophy of Race, 7(2), 306-332.
Meer, N., & Modood, T. (2013). Refutations of racism in the ‘Muslim question'. In Anti-Muslim Prejudice (pp. 126-145). Routledge.
Barre, B., Berkson, M., Cates, D. F., Clem, S., Ilesanmi, S. O., Lewis, T. A., ... & Wheeler, K. R. (2023). Teaching Religion and Upholding Academic Freedom. Journal of Religious Ethics, 51(2), 343-373.
Richardson, R. (2012). Islamophobia or anti-Muslim racism–or what?–concepts and terms revisited. Şubat, 1, 2020.
Wesling, M. (2022). " Gay Genes" and the Contested Origins of Same-Sex Desire. Feminist Studies, 48(3), 790-805.
Abstract for Online Program Book (maximum 150 words)
This paper contributes to the debates on the use of the terms Islamophobia and anti-Muslim racism in both popular and academic spheres through an examination of how legal categories, biological essentialism, and the logic of dehumanization inform the description and self-description of marginalized groups. I draw connections between a number of seemingly disparate phenomena — that I argue are intricately connected through a scientistic logic — ranging from the controversy on academic freedom and tolerance after a US university fired an instructor for showing Prophet Muhammad’s image in class, debates about the effect of age on women’s reproductive capacities, arguments over the existence of “gay genes” in LGBTQ rights discourse, and the differential treatment of women and children in wars, to illustrate what is at stake in the struggle to articulate Islamophobia and anti-Muslim racism, the distinction between chosen and imposed — or visible and invisible — identities, and the politics of translation.