Islamophobia, a Tool for Fulfilling Political Goals in West
Political concerns play a part in perpetuating Islamophobia. These include politicians and political organizations that use fear of Islam and Muslims to create a sense of unity among potential voters so as to distract them from more pressing and complex issues that they cannot address as easily.
This is according to Peter Gottschalk, Professor of Religion at Wesleyan University and author of "Islamophobia: Making Muslims the Enemy", who in an interview with IQNA answered the following Questions regarding Islamophobia particularly in the US.
Some excerpts of the interview are as follows:
IQNA: When did you decide to write a book on Islamophobia and why?
Gottschalk: My co-author, Gabriel Greenberg, and I were concerned about the enduring Islamophobic sentiment among Americans after the September 11th attacks. While I had been thinking about publishing a book on Islamophobia based on American political cartoons, Gabriel – when he was a student – asked me to advise him on a thesis project about these cartoons. So once he finished his project we decided to join our work and publish a book.
I had been teaching about Islamophobia using political cartoons since I started teaching in 1997. However, the bulk of the work on the book occurred when Gabriel and I did most of the writing between 2003 and 2005. It was published in 2007.
IQNA: Would you please provide us with a brief sketch of the main chapters of your book?
Gottschalk: The book has five parts. First, it offers a brief overview of Western encounters with Muslims, beginning in the seventh century. Second, the book explores how Americans have used particular objects to symbolize and signal the purported differences between them and Muslims, such as the scimitar, the minaret, and head coverings.
Next we examine how stereotypes about Muslims often serve to reaffirm the values, perceptions, and choices that many Americans take as “normal.” This works to position Muslims perennially on one extreme or another, extremes that help define “normal” Americans as “average,” “ordinary,” and “conventional.”
Finally, the book explores four distinct historical moments when Islamophobia flourished in the United States.
IQNA: When did Islamophobia first emerge in Western countries?
Gottschalk: Islamophobia among Westerners developed in the religious, military, political, and economic contests that emerged between them and Arab Muslims from the seventh century onward. It has taken various forms and reached various levels of intensity at different times and in different places over the following centuries, although certain themes often arise repeatedly. The causes of Islamophobia – like most religious intolerance found around the world – do not tend to stem from religious differences alone, although they certainly can play an important role.
IQNA: In your perspective, what is Islamophobia?
Gottschalk: Islamophobia is an unwarranted social anxiety about Islam and all Muslims.
IQNA: Who are behind promoting Islamophobia in the world?
Gottschalk: Islamophobia moves in society in at least three different ways. First, it is part of a social memory that people absorb as part of their upbringing. The attitudes adopted in this way appear as common sense knowledge, unchallenged by most people because folk take these assumptions as a simple, commonly acknowledged truth. In this way, Islamophobia resembles racism, although it usually is not the same as racism.
Second, a small but very adept group of people work as professional Islamophobes. The individuals have systematic strategies for positioning themselves relative to the media, law enforcement, and government in such a way as to appear as both experts and well established. They also know how to raise funding from well-endowed groups and, therefore, can afford doing nothing else professionally except propagate Islamophobic sentiment. Professional Islamophobes may be a handful in number but their impact far outweigh their quantity.
Third, political concerns play a part in perpetuating Islamophobia as well. These include politicians and political organizations who use fear of Islam and Muslims to create a sense of unity among potential voters and supports of other political issue so as to distract them from more pressing and complex issues that they cannot address as easily.
IQNA: How would you describe the current context for Muslims in America, more than 10 years after the trauma of that event?
Gottschalk: The situation is both better and worse for American Muslims since 2001. On the one hand, many American non-Muslims have made an effort to understand more about Islam and reach out to Muslim neighbors and mosques. On the other hand, the damage done by professional Islamophobes and political Islamophobes has made many Americans less certain about Islam and Muslims, if not more hostile. There are reasons for both hope and continued concern.
IQNA: What measures can be taken in order to eradicate Islamophobia and correct misconceptions about a religion many Americans associate with terrorism?
Gottschalk: At least two things can be done – and are being done – to address Islamophobia. First, American Muslims have worked hard to open the doors of their mosques, community centers, and homes to their non-Muslim neighbors. It is in no way their responsibility to prove themselves innocent of the many false accusations made about them. But by doing reaching out, they both put a human face to Islam and help educate other Americans about their lives, faith, and practices. American Muslims have also become increasingly vocal in protesting the language of hate by which non-Muslims demean and slander them and Islam, while also protesting similarly intolerant language used by a small number of Muslims against others.
Second, American non-Muslims also have responded to allegations made against Islam and Muslims in an effort to demonstrate that they will not abide the targeting of all Muslims or the disparagement of the entire tradition of Islam. Many Jews, Christians, and others have acted based on their own religious impulses, while others have been moved by their sense of creating a welcome and pluralistic civic space for everyone. Many Americans recognize that they belong to groups that suffered from ethnic, racial, and religious marginalization in the past, and that Muslims are currently undergoing a similar situation. This is a subject I am investigating in my next book.
Some excerpts of the interview are as follows:
IQNA: When did you decide to write a book on Islamophobia and why?
Gottschalk: My co-author, Gabriel Greenberg, and I were concerned about the enduring Islamophobic sentiment among Americans after the September 11th attacks. While I had been thinking about publishing a book on Islamophobia based on American political cartoons, Gabriel – when he was a student – asked me to advise him on a thesis project about these cartoons. So once he finished his project we decided to join our work and publish a book.
I had been teaching about Islamophobia using political cartoons since I started teaching in 1997. However, the bulk of the work on the book occurred when Gabriel and I did most of the writing between 2003 and 2005. It was published in 2007.
IQNA: Would you please provide us with a brief sketch of the main chapters of your book?
Gottschalk: The book has five parts. First, it offers a brief overview of Western encounters with Muslims, beginning in the seventh century. Second, the book explores how Americans have used particular objects to symbolize and signal the purported differences between them and Muslims, such as the scimitar, the minaret, and head coverings.
Next we examine how stereotypes about Muslims often serve to reaffirm the values, perceptions, and choices that many Americans take as “normal.” This works to position Muslims perennially on one extreme or another, extremes that help define “normal” Americans as “average,” “ordinary,” and “conventional.”
Finally, the book explores four distinct historical moments when Islamophobia flourished in the United States.
IQNA: When did Islamophobia first emerge in Western countries?
Gottschalk: Islamophobia among Westerners developed in the religious, military, political, and economic contests that emerged between them and Arab Muslims from the seventh century onward. It has taken various forms and reached various levels of intensity at different times and in different places over the following centuries, although certain themes often arise repeatedly. The causes of Islamophobia – like most religious intolerance found around the world – do not tend to stem from religious differences alone, although they certainly can play an important role.
IQNA: In your perspective, what is Islamophobia?
Gottschalk: Islamophobia is an unwarranted social anxiety about Islam and all Muslims.
IQNA: Who are behind promoting Islamophobia in the world?
Gottschalk: Islamophobia moves in society in at least three different ways. First, it is part of a social memory that people absorb as part of their upbringing. The attitudes adopted in this way appear as common sense knowledge, unchallenged by most people because folk take these assumptions as a simple, commonly acknowledged truth. In this way, Islamophobia resembles racism, although it usually is not the same as racism.
Second, a small but very adept group of people work as professional Islamophobes. The individuals have systematic strategies for positioning themselves relative to the media, law enforcement, and government in such a way as to appear as both experts and well established. They also know how to raise funding from well-endowed groups and, therefore, can afford doing nothing else professionally except propagate Islamophobic sentiment. Professional Islamophobes may be a handful in number but their impact far outweigh their quantity.
Third, political concerns play a part in perpetuating Islamophobia as well. These include politicians and political organizations who use fear of Islam and Muslims to create a sense of unity among potential voters and supports of other political issue so as to distract them from more pressing and complex issues that they cannot address as easily.
IQNA: How would you describe the current context for Muslims in America, more than 10 years after the trauma of that event?
Gottschalk: The situation is both better and worse for American Muslims since 2001. On the one hand, many American non-Muslims have made an effort to understand more about Islam and reach out to Muslim neighbors and mosques. On the other hand, the damage done by professional Islamophobes and political Islamophobes has made many Americans less certain about Islam and Muslims, if not more hostile. There are reasons for both hope and continued concern.
IQNA: What measures can be taken in order to eradicate Islamophobia and correct misconceptions about a religion many Americans associate with terrorism?
Gottschalk: At least two things can be done – and are being done – to address Islamophobia. First, American Muslims have worked hard to open the doors of their mosques, community centers, and homes to their non-Muslim neighbors. It is in no way their responsibility to prove themselves innocent of the many false accusations made about them. But by doing reaching out, they both put a human face to Islam and help educate other Americans about their lives, faith, and practices. American Muslims have also become increasingly vocal in protesting the language of hate by which non-Muslims demean and slander them and Islam, while also protesting similarly intolerant language used by a small number of Muslims against others.
Second, American non-Muslims also have responded to allegations made against Islam and Muslims in an effort to demonstrate that they will not abide the targeting of all Muslims or the disparagement of the entire tradition of Islam. Many Jews, Christians, and others have acted based on their own religious impulses, while others have been moved by their sense of creating a welcome and pluralistic civic space for everyone. Many Americans recognize that they belong to groups that suffered from ethnic, racial, and religious marginalization in the past, and that Muslims are currently undergoing a similar situation. This is a subject I am investigating in my next book.
