Islamophobia/Islamophilia: Beyond the Politics of Enemy and Friend

by Andrew Shryock

Overview

"Islamophobia" is a term that has been widely applied to anti-Muslim
ideas and actions, especially since 9/11. The contributors to this provocative
volume explore and critique the usefulness of the concept for understanding contexts
ranging from the Middle Ages to the modern day. Moving beyond familiar explanations
such as good Muslim/bad Muslim stereotypes or the "clash of civilizations," they
describe Islamophobia's counterpart, Islamophilia, which deploys similar oppositions
in the interest of fostering public acceptance of Islam. Contributors address topics
such as conflicts over Islam outside and within Muslim communities in North America,
Europe, the Middle East, and South Asia; the cultural politics of literature, humor,
and urban renewal; and religious conversion to Islam.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780253004543
Publisher:	Indiana University Press
Publication date:	06/30/2010
Series:	Indiana Series in Middle East Studies
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	NOOK Book
Pages:	260
File size:	430 KB

About the Author

Andrew Shryock is Arthur F. Thurnau Professor of Anthropology at the
University of Michigan. He is author of Nationalism and the Genealogical Imagination
and co-author of Arab Detroit and Citizenship and Crisis: Arab Detroit after
9/11.

Read an Excerpt

What is most problematic about Islamophobia is its essentializing and
universalizing quality, which casts Islam itself and all Muslims as real or
potential enemies.... What is harder to assess is the challenge of countering
Islamophobic impulses in ways that do not simply invert or reinforce them by
cultivating their opposite: the image of the Muslim as "friend," as a
figure identified with the Self, characterized as familiar, and with whom legitimate
conflict is not possible.... When 'friendship' is subordinated to the demands of
sameness... it can be just as coercive, just as prone to misrecognition, as the
sentiments of hostility it is meant to correct.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Islam as an Object of Fear and Affection: A Problem for Critical Analysis / Andrew Shryock

Part 1. Continuities and Transformations
1.
Western Hostility toward Muslims: A History of the Present /
Tomaž Mastnak
2. The Khalil Gibran International Academy: Diasporic Confrontations with an Emerging Islamophobia / Naamah Paley

Part 2. Modern (Self) Criticism
3. The God That Failed: The Neo-Orientalism of Today's Muslim Commentators / Moustafa Bayoumi
4. Gendering Islamophobia and Islamophilia: The Case of Shii Muslim Women in Lebanon / Lara Deeb
5. Bridging Traditions: Madrasas and Their Internal Critics / Muhammad Qasim Zaman

Part 3. Violence and Conversion in Europe
6. The Fantasy and Violence of Religious Imagination: Islamophobia and Anti-Semitism in France and North Africa / Paul A. Silverstein
7. German Converts to Islam and Their Ambivalent Relations with Immigrant Muslims / Esra
Özyürek

Part 4. Attraction and Repulsion in Shared Space
8. Muslim Ethnic Comedy: Inversions of Islamophobia / Mucahit Bilici
9. Competing for Muslims: New Strategies for Urban Renewal in Detroit / Sally Howell

List of Contributors Index

What People are Saying About This

Duke University - Engseng Ho

Islamophobia/Islamophilia is a spirited volume that takes aim at the confining but dominant debate on Islam, 'for or against.' Its eye-opening cases demonstrate just how much opposed sides share, and reveal surprising alignments and crossovers that happen beyond the binary. Politically astute, analytically acute, and pervasively humanistic, this is a rare contribution that brings clarity to an ideologically charged and muddied field.

Rice University - Ussama Makdisi

Very timely. An excellent contribution to humanistic scholarship by a number of leading scholars. The disciplinary range and nuance of the individual essays in this volume do a great job to illustrate and analyze how ahistorical, demeaning, or apologetic views of Muslims and Islam function and circulate.

Editorial Reviews

In all, this work is a rich and varied fare. What is welcome is the book's developed insight that Islamophilia can also be an act of wishful thinking and fantasy as much as Islamophobia. Morever, the latter can be propagated by Muslims. In all, this is a plea for a grown up engagement with Muslims who are as diverse as Christians and Jews. 31:4, 2011

The Muslim World Book Review

. . . a collection at once serious and sensible in its scope, ambitions and outcome.

Religion Dispatches - Bruce B. Lawrence

'Islamophobia' is an often used term in debates relating to Muslim minorities in Europe and the US post 9/11. The aim of this edited volume by Andrew Shryock is . . . to investigate the background of the term and reach a more thorough understanding of what it could entail and how it could be used and applied.38.3 2011

British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies

Overall, the volume is an impressive collection of serious discursive analyses that heighten our sensitivities to the forms arguments about Islam take; while always indexes of power, it is clear that the shared terms of global debates about Islamic reform do not always correspond to shared meanings.

American Ethnologist

"‘Islamophobia’ is an often used term in debates relating to Muslim minorities in Europe and the US post 9/11. The aim of this edited volume by Andrew Shryock is... to investigate the background of the term and reach a more thorough understanding of what it could entail and how it could be used and applied." —British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies

"... a collection at once serious and sensible in its scope, ambitions and outcome." —Bruce B. Lawrence, Religion Dispatches

"Overall, the volume is an impressive collection of serious discursive analyses that heighten our sensitivities to the forms arguments about Islam take; while always indexes of power, it is clear that the shared terms of global debates about Islamic reform do not always correspond to shared meanings." —American Ethnologist

"In all, this work is a rich and varied fare. What is welcome is the book's developed insight that Islamophilia can also be an act of wishful thinking and fantasy as much as Islamophobia. Morever, the latter can be propagated by Muslims. In all, this is a plea for a grown up engagement with Muslims who are as diverse as Christians and Jews." —The Muslim World Book Review, 31:4, 2011

From the Publisher

"Islamophobia/Islamophilia is a spirited volume that takes aim at the confining but dominant debate on Islam, 'for or against.' Its eye-opening cases demonstrate just how much opposed sides share, and reveal surprising alignments and crossovers that happen beyond the binary. Politically astute, analytically acute, and pervasively humanistic, this is a rare contribution that brings clarity to an ideologically charged and muddied field." —Engseng Ho, Duke University

Engseng Ho

"Very timely. An excellent contribution to humanistic scholarship by a number of leading scholars. The disciplinary range and nuance of the individual essays in this volume do a great job to illustrate and analyze how ahistorical, demeaning, or apologetic views of Muslims and Islam function and circulate." —Ussama Makdisi, Rice University

Ussama Makdisi

"... a collection at once serious and sensible in its scope, ambitions and outcome." —Bruce B. Lawrence, Religion Dispatches

— Bruce B. Lawrence

Religion Dispatches

Read More