Confronting Islamophobia in the United States: framing civil rights activism among Middle Eastern Americans

Juror perceptions of African American- and Arabic-named victims

“…However, since 9/11, antiArabic sentiment and behavior have perhaps been more prominent in America, and more study of such sentiment is needed. Following 9/11, racial discrimination against Arabic persons proliferated in American media and culture (Love, 2009). There was also a marked increase in anti-Arabic hate crimes, and 10 years after 9/11, such crimes remained five times more common than in 2000 (Disa, Cavedish, & King, 2011).…”

Islamic Organizations in Europe and the USA

“…As I have described elsewhere, race and racism are at work with so-called Islamophobia in the USA because 'physical characteristics are often crude shortcuts used to characterize groups of people' (Love, 2009, p. 403). The vast diversity among and within Arab, Muslim, Sikh, and South Asian groups is lost on many Americans, due in large part to a nebulous but powerful 'Muslim' (or perhaps 'Middle Eastern') racial category (Love, 2009;Rana, 2011;Tehranian, 2008). As a result of racialized conflating, many varied and irreducibly diverse communities have collectively faced the brunt of 'Islamophobia' -the problematic but popular term for racism and discrimination affecting 'Muslims' and similarly racialized groups.…”

“…(Rana, 2011, p. 66) Recognizing that Islamophobia results from racial dynamics -in addition to religiously and ethnically based discrimination -confers certain analytical advantages. The concept of race provides a useful explanation for the apparent conundrum: Islamophobia in the USA does not always target Islam and Muslims per se, but there is a familiar pattern of racism: hatred and discrimination directed toward groups crudely demarcated primarily by physical appearance (Love, 2009). Tehranian (2008) notices slightly different dynamics with regard to race and Islamophobia.…”

“…All of the studies contained in this volume draw on recent empirical research involving a variety of methodologies. With its bottom-up research perspective, it contributes to the emerging literature on the perspective of Islamic organizations vis-à-vis their changing institutional environments, ranging from specific organizational case studies on Islamic umbrella organizations representing local mosque communities (e.g., Allievi and Nielsen, 2002;Love, 2009;Schiffauer, 2010) to empirical studies of Islamic organizations in the context of ongoing integration debates in different countries (e.g., Al-Hamarneh and Thielmann, 2008;Bilici, 2012;Mügge, 2011;Yazbeck Haddad and Esposito, 1998;. One of the major comparative studies on the relationship between Muslims and the state in the UK, France, and Germany is Fetzer and Soper (2005).…”

The Racialization of Islam in the United States: Islamophobia, Hate Crimes, and “Flying while Brown”

“…Racial profiling heightened with the 2001 Patriot Act and associated legislation, which gave the State new powers to categorize Muslims or "Muslim-like" Americans. The Patriot Act legislation not only contributed to social segregation and differential access to resources (Love 2009), but also effectively "securitized" Muslims such that they became defined as a unique security threat (Hussain and Bagguley 2012). To account for these kinds of institutional security measures, Larsson and Sander (2015, p. 16) use the term structural or institutional Islamophobia, that is, something along the lines of the following suggestion by the Commission on British Muslims and Islamophobia:…”