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Erik Nisbet, School of Communication

Posted on | October 6, 2010 | 1,504 views | Comments Off

What is Islamophobia? Where does the term come from?

The term “Islamophobia” has been applied to many different contexts and situations over the last 30 years. It literally means an “irrational fear” of Islam and Muslims. In Europe during the late 1980s and 1990s the term was prominently applied to the public backlash against Muslim immigration from countries like Turkey, Algeria, Pakistan, etc. However, since September 11th it has been also commonly used to describe prejudice and fears about Islam in the United States. Islamophobia is typically expressed as religious, political, social, and economic intolerance toward Muslims or closely identified ethnic groups (i.e. Arabs), the support and advocacy for restrictions on Muslim rights and civil liberties, psychological or physical violence, and extreme rhetoric.

There is no single, commonly agreed or formal definition of Islamophobia in academic or policy circles. A British report by the Runnymede Trust in the late 1990s attempted to lay out a comprehensive picture of Islamophobia and noted a key aspect was whether individuals had a closed, monolithic view or an open, diverse view of Islam.

However, if you examine the range of research on Islamophobia, and draw upon the comparative academic scholarship on anti-Americanism, some key attributes emerge. First, Islamophobia is not merely having an unfavorable view or dislike for Islam or Muslims. It is a necessary condition, but is not sufficient.  Thus, individuals may have an unfavorable view or dislike of Islam but still remain tolerant and respectful of Islam and Muslims.

Second, a key component of Islamophobia is social identity and distance. The more likely an individual identifies against Islam and employs Muslims as national or religious “others” upon which to differentiate their own national or religious identity, the more likely they may be “Islamophobic.”

Third, apart from fears and prejudice based on the perceived material or physical threat posed by Islam, the collective “symbolic” threat Islam poses toward a group’s values, culture, beliefs, and traditions is often the more prominent driver of Islamophobia.

Lastly, Islamophobia can be best viewed conceptually as a persistent, universally applied interpretative and emotional schema about Islam that shapes public perceptions and opinion.  A schema is the metaphorical term for an inferred system of related ideas about a concept or issue. Activated by political messages and news coverage, schema provide short cuts for reaching an opinion about a complex topic such as Islam, serve as a basis for inference. Across countries, just as there are many different types and flavors of “anti-Americanism” that serve as schema for organizing perceptions of the United States, the same can be argued about Islamophobia among Americans.

What are the factors that contribute to Islamophobia?

Factors that contribute to Islamophobia may vary by context. For example, in Europe, Islamophobia is driven by Muslim immigration and direct intergroup contact since Muslims can be as high as 5-10% of the total population in some countries (in comparison, African-Americans are about 12% of the population in the United States).

However, in the U.S. where the estimated Muslim population is below 2% of the total population, Islamophobia is more often driven by the media and cues from political or religious elites, what scholars call “mediated intergroup contact.” For example, the majority respondents cited the media or religious beliefs as their primary sources of information about Muslims on a 2006 poll conducted by the Pew Center for the People and the Press. In contrast, on a 2007 poll conducted by Cornell University, less than 20% of Americans reported having regular social interaction with a person of the Islamic faith.

Brigitte L. Nacos and Oscar Torres-Reyna’s Fueling Our Fears: Stereotyping, Media Coverage, Public Opinion of Muslim Americans provides a good overview of some of the trends in media coverage and public discourse about Islam in the United States following the September 11th attacks. They find that though elite discourse and media coverage were mostly positive in the year following 9/11, since then elite claims and news portrayals have turned in the opposite direction, emphasizing negative portrayals and stereotypes. Additional research has demonstrated the influence of the media on negative stereotypes of Muslims and public support for restricting Muslim American civil liberties (see Nisbet, Shanahan, and Ostman’s chapter in Sinno’s 2009 Muslims in Western Politics)

Previous research has also found that economic insecurity tends to increase intolerance and negative attitudes toward outgroups in general, such as Muslims or Latinos. Thus, in the current economic and political environment, the recent rise in expressed Islamophobia may be viewed as an synthesis of latent negative attitudes and perceptions of Muslims, economic insecurity, and cues from political and/or religious entrepeneurs who wish to employ Islamophobic orientations as a mobilizing force.

What is the significance of the controversy about the proposed Islamic cultural center and mosque near Ground Zero?

In my opinion, the Islamic cultural center and mosque at Ground Zero is a “focusing event” for political and religious entrepreneurs who wish to employ the proposed project as a mobilizing influence on public opinion and political behavior. Though local groups opposed the construction of the group for some time, the proposed Islamic cultural center and mosque project did gain significant national public attention or opposition until a Republican political action committee distributed a controversial ad about the project via the web and select media channels in July. Since then conservative elites and media have elevated the issue and have attempted to employ it as a political issue in both local and congressional midterm elections.

The controversy over the proposed Islamic cultural center and mosque in New York City is the most prominent, but by no means singular, example of individuals and groups employing the perceived “symbolic” threat of Islam as a mobilizing issue. Mosque projects in California and Tennessee, the targets of protests and vandalism , have been employed as issues in local political contests. Other examples of the intersection of politics and Islamophobia is the elected Texas Board of Education’s recent vote to reduce references to Islam in school textbooks and ban what the board considers “pro-Islam” content.

The negative consequences of Islamophobia are significant. Expressions of Islamophobia in media and political discourse shape how foreign publics view the United States, especially in Muslim countries. Muslim civil, religious, and political liberties may be restricted at the local or national level. Both governmental and non-governmental organizations have reported increases in crimes targeting Muslims as well as workplace discrimination. Discrimination and intolerance toward Islam expressed in media and political discourse, or directly through social interactions or the workplace, combine to socially, economically, and politically isolate Muslim citizens and residents from American society.

Such social isolation, combined with social and cultural stressors, may reduce the assimilation and acculturation of Muslim immigrants within the United States. This trend is especially worrisome as research by the Pew Center has found that Muslim immigrants in the United States are much more culturally and politically integrated into American society in comparison to Muslim immigrants in Europe. However, a continued rise in American Islamophobic attitudes and actions could negatively impact this assimilation, and may even some cases lead to political or religious radicalization among selected segments of the Muslim population.

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