Islamophobia and Anti-Muslim Racism
Islamophobia can be defined as an exaggerated, irrational fear as well as a hostility towards Islam and Muslims that is perpetuated by harmful stereotypes and stigmatization of Muslim culture and belief. Anti-Muslim racism is the construct involving the antagonization of a racialized Muslim figure through their visual attributes, such as phenotype, clothing, and customs. In this sense, Anti-Muslim racism and Islamophobia are related, but not the same.
Although the stereotypes and stigmas are often superficially born out of ignorance, a broader perspective reveals that Islamophobia is a historical construction related to the racialized Muslim figure. Junaid Rana, an expert in critical race studies, traces the development of the Muslim figure and its contribution to the modern race concept of Muslims and, therefore, anti-Muslim racism and Islamophobia. From the concept of Muslims as a race, orientalists claimed that they could explain the Muslim or Arab mind in that all members of the race are alike (Kumar). This leads to dangerous and harmful assertions that one could predict how Muslims think and behave by understanding Islamic ideology.
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The attacks of 9/11 would enter the world into a new era of Islamophobia and anti-Muslim racism where the lines between security and harassment have been blurred. Framed by The War on Terror, we see the collapse of various xenophobic scapegoating and racial categories into a single threat—the Muslim.
Sources:
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“The Story of Islamophobia" by Junaid Rana
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