Experiences of Islamophobia

“My Hijab Is Like My Skin Color”: Muslim Women Students, Racialization, and Intersectionality

“…According to scholars, Muslims are understood as foreign, nonwhite, aggressive, and violent, and Muslim people are considered incapable of upholding democratic ideals, values, and American national security (Bayoumi 2006; Beydoun 2013; Garner and Selod 2015; Gotanda 2011; Love 2009). Therefore, Islam and Muslims become synonymous with a racial threat to American and global Western civilization rather than solely a religious identity (Carr 2015).…”

Adult education responses to the ‘othering’ of Muslim identity: Perspectives from Ireland

“…Trump’s ban on all citizens from Somalia, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Yemen and Sudan, despite no record of any citizens from these countries being involved in terrorist attacks against the US, didn’t create this perspective, but sought to legitimise an existing anti-Muslim discourse that is evident within popular culture (Boyer, 2014; Dodds, 2008; Froula, 2010; Simmering, 2006; Šisler, 2008), through print media (Morey & Yaqin, 2003) and, perhaps most significantly, through political commentary and actions. It isn’t surprising therefore that, increasingly, the daily lives of many Muslims, and those presumed to be Muslim, involves negotiating negative attitudes, discrimination, hate speech and even physical assaults (Alam & Husband, 2013; Ali, 2014; Allen, 2010; Carr, 2015, 2016; Lynch, 2013; Shyrlock, 2010). This is despite the fact that, of the estimated 1.2 billion people of Muslim faith across the globe, there are varying degrees of religiosity, many nationalities and ethnicities, a range of languages, any number of political affiliations and as many interests as you can imagine.…”

“…Amongst colleagues, an alternative perspective can be posed that encourages people to reflect on their presumptions. Addressing racism can be difficult though, especially when working in precarious circumstances and where educators feel unsupported by organisational structures shaped by institutional racism, therefore, under-appreciating the social weight of ‘race’ on the racialised (Carr, 2015, p. 28; O’Connor, 2010).…”

“…In the UK, Brotton (2016) cites Muslims living in 16th century Elizabethan England whilst, in America, Curtis (2009) dates a Muslim presence to the early 1700s therefore many years before the foundation of what we now call the United States. 2 A Muslim presence in Ireland is recorded around the same time (Carr & Haynes, 2015, p. 21). More recently, the Islamic Foundation of Ireland cites Muslims living in Ireland in the 1950s with the first Islamic Society of Ireland established in 1959.…”

“…As with all racism, Islamophobia involves a process of racialisation . This is where a set of socially constructed traits are assigned to a homogenised group in a way that disregards socio-political contexts in determining how each of us make sense of the world (Carr, 2015; Lentin, 2004). Assumptions used to justify racialisation are frequently biological.…”