Muslim Minorities

La sharía y el derecho islámico son dos referentes fundamentales para la organización y supervivencia de las comunidades musulmanas en los países occidentales. Les han permitido configurar de una manera informal, pero decisiva, los márgenes de actuación y de buenas prácticas para el cumplimiento de los preceptos del islam en la diáspora. Este libro ofrece un estudio de las demandas de autorregulación jurídica de las minorías religiosas en Occidente. Una voluntad de autorregulación que surge de la necesidad de contar con un sistema normativo propio basado en la cultura y la religión de sus miembros, y que se enmarca en el denominado pluralismo jurídico de base religiosa, que aborda la posible coexistencia de dos o más sistemas u ordenamientos normativos. A través de estas propuestas y las controversias a las que ha dado lugar, se manifiesta la implosión jurídica que la diversidad cultural y religiosa ha provocado en las sociedades occidentales y la necesidad de comprenderla para, quizá, aceptarla y, en su debido momento, incluirla.

Theorizations on Western Muslim identity that are multi-layered and
grounded in actual Western Muslim experiences are hard to find.
Two exceptions to this are The Road to Mecca by Muhammad Asad
(1954/2005), and Islam is a Foreign Country by Zareena Grewal
(2014), rich texts that span across six decades. Asad’s classic account
of a European convert’s nested journeys and Grewal’s historical
ethnography of American Muslim student-travelers offer readers an
opportunity to examine how theorizing Western Muslim identity
has changed and to ask: How does theorizing Western Muslim
identity construct itself? What does it construct itself against? What
are some of the assumptions and contradictions that it tells us? In
this essay review, I look at how travel, particularly travel as a quest
for knowledge, has served as a way of becoming a sovereign
human subject at home in the West through travel to the East. I
argue that, paradoxically, Western Muslims may retrieve sovereignty
through a process of becoming Western constructed against an
Eastern Other. Juxtaposing Asad’s and Grewal’s writings shows
conceptually similar blind spots that reveal the paradox of this
pursuit of subjecthood. I argue that the strategies illustrated by the
protagonists in the two texts utilize an Orientalist gaze within a
framework of a Western human subject that entrenches the eternal
Otherness of Western Muslims, even as it secures a Western
selfhood for its individual subjects. In doing so, I seek to contribute
to a broader debate in curriculum studies on anti-racism,
decolonization and racialized minorities by complicating the frame
of inclusion for equality.

Racial profiling is a unique regime of social control specifically due to its reinvention of blackness as a signifier to criminality. The author argues that the ‘new black’ (or new non-white) is reconstructed under this regime when previous regimes did not necessarily criminalize whole groups. This study employs panopticism, and its critique by Foucault, to argue that racial profiling as dressage aims to increase the visibility of black people – control minorities. Its different practices (like Driving While Black) aim to normalize, assimilate, and rehabilitate everyone to one centre. It is done by means of penetrating the consciousness through continuous surveillance, thereby making the black individual an obedient citizen. The article argues also that the expression of social control in the racial profiling regime is spatial too. This means that space is classified so that some activities are criminal only if they occur in the ghetto, or at the borders of white neighbourhoods. Racial profiling serves as a reminder of the black people’s ‘place’. Thus, it is all about the perpetual visibility of the modern individual. The author argues that racial profiling is designed to enhance this visibility. Racial profiling is not the first regime to occur; it succeeded three preceding social control regimes: slavery, Jim Crow, and mass imprisonment. All these regimes are a manifestation of a fundamental structural fault of modern society: racism and inequality. That is the modern state surveillance function. So, the question addressed here is: how does surveillance through police practices shape the modern subject (how is the subject socially produced)?
Keywords: racial profiling; surveillance; Driving While Black; disciplined space; ‘new black’; modern individual; panopticism

Denne artikel udforsker mulighederne for at udtænke et begreb om fællesskab inden for et poststrukturalistisk paradigme. Der er skrevet meget om relationer, grupper og inklusion, men fælleskab er i mindre grad et teoretiseret og analyseret begreb. Ambitionen er teoretisk at arbejde mig frem til en poststrukturalistisk informeret konceptualisering af fællesskab på basis af en empirisk interesse i at undersøge unge muslimers deltagelse i religiøse fællesskaber i København. Fem dimensioner identificeres som særlig vigtige i denne forbindelse: 1. Fællesskab som proces, 2. Fællesskab som noget, man kan tale om, og som noget, der konstant forhandles, 3. Fællesskab som situeret og forbundet med subjektivering, 4. Fællesskab, som hverken overindividuel eller subjektiv bevægelse og 5. Fællesskab som forbundet med belonging. Artiklen bevæger sig imellem teoretisk og empirisk analyse og inddrager et fokus på belonging som en central dimension i forståelsen af konstruktionen af fællesskaber.

In the current context of generalized Islamophobia and the proliferation of anti-discrimination organizations, this article aims to analyze the willingness of Muslims to participate in some kind of common initiative, focused or not on the fight against discrimination. The objective is to find out if among Muslims in Madrid a common awareness of subalternity exists, based on their Muslimness, which structures any expression of claims-making, whether collectively organized or not. We investigate the nature of such claims by applying Fraser’s status model (2000) to the materials obtained from six discussion groups held in October 2016.

Mensen met een beperking krijgen van moslimgemeenschap in Nederland en (in het Westen) niet de aandacht die zij vanuit religieus, historisch en maatschappelijk oogpunt verdienen. En meer nog dan materiële zorg hebben zij behoefte aan geestelijke zorg, aldus de auteur Tijani Boulaouali.
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People with disabilities do not get the attention of Muslim community in the Netherlands and (in the West) that they deserve from a religious, historical and social perspective. And even more than material care they need spiritual care, says the author Tijani Boulaouali.
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الشريحة ذات الاحتياجات الخاصة لا تتلقى الاهتمام الكافي من المجتمع الإسلامي في هولندا والغرب، الذي يضمنه لها الدين الإسلامي. وأكثر من ذلك فهي لا تحتاج الرعاية المادية فقط، بل العناية الروحية أيضا، حسب التجاني بولعوالي.

Islamophobic sentiments in the Western world have gained scientific attention, particularly after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. However, the effects of religious stigma on Muslim minorities’ identity formation have rarely been studied. Using structural equation modeling, this cross-sectional study examined direct and indirect effects of different forms of religious stigma on the national affiliation of 210 Norwegian-Pakistani and 216 German-Turkish Muslims. Furthermore, the study examined the mediator role of religious identity. Our results suggest that being a Muslim in Norway is more reconcilable with affiliating with the nation than being a Muslim in Germany. However, across the samples, the results indicated that various forms of religious stigma affected Muslims’ national identity and engagement in the public and private sphere in distinct ways. These effects were both positive and negative, differed between the two samples, and in Germany, were mediated by the participants’ religious identity. The findings indicated that the ways in which religious stigma influences Muslims’ national affiliation is context and culture bound.

Building on an ethnographic study of American Muslim undergraduate women at two universities in Washington, D.C., I examine undergraduate Muslim women’s construction of gendered discourses. Stereotypes feed into both majority and minority constructions of Muslim women’s gendered identities. I highlight Muslim women’s resistance to and adoption of such stereotypes as they construct various modalities of interaction with men on cam- pus. [higher education, gender, Muslim women, ethnography, sexuality]

Issues that are prominent within the anti-Muslim hate discourse that pervaded Sri Lanka in recent years are the speed at which the Muslim community is increasing its numbers—they are said to become a majority in a few decades; as well as Muslim women’s dress- the hijab nikab and abhaya. Certain Muslim interlocutors’ own responses have included defending the hijab as protecting women from violence, and urging that the state institute measures to increase the Sinhalese population. Ironically the latter was also the position of the Bodu Bala Sena the group propagating anti- Muslim sentiment; and the government responded to the position and institutionalized it by way of a health ministry circular banning NGO programs in reproductive health. I look at the manner in which gender orders became reorganized in the aftermath of the state’s military victory over the rebel group the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in 2009 as a consequence of militarism. This reordering is reflected both in th...

The Trojan Hose Affair scandal alleged that there was a hardline extremist Islamism plot to take over British state schools in Birmingham. While commu- nity groups and government officials battled to take control of the narrative, the pupils who were ultimately at the center of the scandal, were not con- sidered. This paper is based on research conducted in 2015, with students at one of the schools implicated in the Trojan Horse Affair. Through seven one-to-one interviews and a group discussion, the research finds that students portrayed their selves in a state of constant psychological reconciliation due to the heightened mediatization, racialization, and securitization of Islam and Muslims, during and after the Trojan Horse affair. This caused increased levels of anxiety in students, which peaked around the constant surveillance through the gaze of the media, teachers, and Ofsted inspectors, creating a double-edged Panopticon. The paper particularly underscores student concerns for potential social exclusion and discrimination they may experience as a result of the school affiliation.

Mark Curtis is an outspoken British journalist unafraid of the disquiets of the establishment as he embarks on his goal to expose the fallacies of British foreign policy in the Middle East, especially during the twentieth century and beyond. This review essay explores these issues as identified and studied in his 2018 book, Secret Affairs.

Eine Idee kann mehr als einen einzigen Anfang haben, genau wie
viele Wege zum gleichen Ziel hinführen können. Ein Ziel ist in mancher Hinsicht mehr ein dynamisches Befinden als eine konkrete statische Ziellinie. Davon leben Ideen und gewinnen Nachhaltigkeit, wie der Wald seine Seligkeit in der Vielfalt findet.
So ist die Umwelt als Bewandtnis und Begriff. Einerseits spricht
man von der Umwelt und meint dabei seine enge Umgebung. Andererseits spricht man von der Umwelt und meint hier das ganze
Universum.
Spricht man von der Umwelt im Islam, so reicht es meines Erachtens
nicht aus, danach zu fragen, wie oft oder in welchem Kontext
dieser Begriff in dem Koran oder der Sunna vorkommt. Es ist
mehr von Bedeutung zu erfahren, wie die Muslime vor dem Hintergrund
ihrer religiösen Überzeugung in der Gegenwart mit dem Thema „Umwelt und Umweltschutz“ umgehen. Es stellt sich die Frage, welche Handlungswege die Muslime begehen, um das Leben auf diesem Planeten zu bewahren und welche Rolle dabei religiöse Argumentationen spielen.
Wege zu begehen sind Anstrengungen, wozu Muslime verpflichtet
sind. Jeder Muslim und jede Muslima ist nach dem religiösen
Konzept der ḥisba aufgefordert, entsprechend seiner/ihrer Mögichkeiten (wusʿ) und Fähigkeiten (qudra) zu handeln, um das Gute auf dieser Erde zu fördern und das Verwerfliche zu unterbinden.
Dies gilt auch für die Umwelt und den Umweltschutz. Als engagierte
kreative Anstrengungen kann man sie als eine Art iğtihād verstehen
und als Förderung des Guten kann man sie außerdem islamisch
theologisch als ḥisba erkennen. Iǧtihād bedeutet sprachlich
„Anstrengung, um ein Ziel zu erreichen“. Es wird auch als terminus
technicus der islamischen Normenlehre verwendet. Damit ist die
Findung von Normen durch eigenständige Urteilsbemühung gemeint,
was eine gewisse Kreativität implizit.
An dieser Stelle handelt es sich beim Begriff iğtihād mehr um die
kreative Umsetzung von Normen und zwar beim Umweltschutz.
Gleichzeitig bedeutet der Begriff Dschihad etymologisch ebenfalls
die Anstrengung und Bemühung, ein Ziel zu erreichen. Auch wird
darunter eine individuelle Bemühung um den Glauben (großer
Dschihad) oder zum moralischen Handeln und Mission verstanden.
Der Umweltschutz gehört zweifelsohne zum edlen moralischen
Handeln und aus islamischer theologischer Perspektive des
Verhältnisses zwischen Mensch und Natur – wie es später erläutert
wird – zur islamischen Mission. Daher spricht man nicht nur vom
Öko-Islam, sondern auch vom Öko-Dschihad als eine Selbstbezeichnung
einiger muslimischer Öko-Aktivistinnen und -Aktivisten vor allem in Großbritannien, wo der Begriff Öko-Dschihad zum ersten Mal als Slogan für eine Kampagne der Islamic Foundation for Ecology and nvironmental Sciences (IFEES) in Birmingham verwendet wurde. Der Slogan der Kampagne lautete „It’s a campaign! It’s a film! It’s Jihad!“.

In this book I offer a critical, comparative and empirically-informed defense of Islamic schools in the West. To do so I elaborate an idealized philosophy of Islamic education, against which I evaluate the very different empirical situation in the Netherlands, Belgium and the United States. I examine in detail notions of cultural identity and cultural coherence, the scope of parental authority v. a child's interests, as well as the state's hypothetical role in regulating religious schools.

This article provides an analysis of the concerns in relation to citizenship and multicultural reforms in Europe. It examines the implications for the social integration of Muslims, who seemingly face insurmountable constitutional hurdles notwithstanding liberal institutional attempts, in accommodating a religion that, judged by its global politicisation, may pose more a challenge to multicultural societies than to others. While shedding light on recent developments concerning a wide-ranging panorama of the socio-legal dynamics of integrating Muslim communities in Europe, the article provides an overview of the multicultural idea, focusing on how some European countries address multicultural claims swiftly while others lag behind, busy with more basic issues of immigrant assimilation and integration. It is argued that while attempts are being made to improve Muslim integration, the rising tide of Islamophobia (political and media-manufactured), anti-terrorism legislations and security policies serve to provide a multi-pronged attack on civil liberties and freedoms of Muslim groups. In the concluding section, there will be general remarks concerning the future of Muslims in Europe and the commendable and realisable aim of Muslims to construct an inclusive national identity and find partners who will, like them, be determined to approve what Western culture produces in terms of its positive contributions and resist its deleterious effects on the human, societal and environmental levels.

Towards a Fiqh for Minorities is an important subject and a much-needed contribution to an area of ‎Fiqh that has become essential for the wellbeing and development of Muslim communities living in the ‎West. The author stresses that the problems of Muslim minorities can only be tackled with a fresh ‎juristic vision based on the principles, objectives and higher values of the Qur’an in conjunction with ‎the ultimate aims and intents (maqasid) of the Shariah. In essence Dr. Al-Alwani’s paper is a call for ‎Muslim minorities to have a sense of themselves as citizens and develop a positive, confident view of ‎their place and value in society, moving away from notions of immigrant status and governed by a ‎humanistic vision focusing on the betterment of society.‎

How do ‘new’ and ’old’ Islamic actors in contemporary Albania define religious legitimacy, the nation and religious otherness? This chapter uses Olivier Roy’s analytical distinction between accommodationism and neo-fundamentalism as a compass to navigate through Albania’s complex religious landscape by exploring different sets of beliefs promulgated by a selection of Islamic groups (2010).  These are the Muslim Community of Albania, which represents ‘official Islam’ , and ‘mainstream’ Sunni Muslims, who are typically accommodationist. I also analyse a Sufi subgroup thereof, which is equally accommodationist, but in a slightly different manner. As a neo-fundamentalist counterpoint, I explore the ideas of a competing organisation composed of Salafi imams.

Accommodationism means that the bond between religion and a specific territory and culture of origin is tight. In this context, ‘culture’ refers to Albanian historical tradition and the language-based, secular nation-building project engineered by modernising state elites since the early 20th century. Neo-fundamentalism, conversely, is a globalised form of religion that emphasises the gap between faith and culture. As such, it represents a reformatted, exportable form of religiosity, which stands in contrast to cultural ethno-national ways of being Muslim. Neo-fundamentalist religious identity is faith-based, and seeks to ground itself solely upon explicit religious norms, at least in principle. Accordingly, these believers make their religiosity visible through a global uniform of religious markers detached from the surrounding culture.

In the Albanian Islamic context, the theoretically informed labels, neo-fundamentalist and accommodationist, roughly correspond to the ‘Albanianist’ versus the ‘Salafi’ forms of Islam. To some extent, this resonates with mainstream distinctions adopted in Albania and in the Balkans. A popular Albanian term for Muslims associated with neo-fundamentalist forms of Islam is ‘fanatic’ (fanatik). Accommodationism is commonly related to ‘old’ forms of Islam, which many be deemed as local, rooted, and European as well as tolerant and moderate. Neo-fundamentalism, conversely, refers to certain ‘new’ forms of Islam, i.e. those perceived to be imported, transnational, alien, ‘fanatic’ and a threat to local religious customs. This cultural distinction between what are deemed acceptable and unacceptable forms of Islam is often politicised and securitised. As I will show, the association between neo-fundamentalism and violence is not necessarily correct, and the Salafi community under scrutiny here can be defined as pacifist and purist (Wiktorowicz 2006). These two formats, moreover, clash and merge together as different local actors seek to recast and legitimize their respective positions.

Muslim parents share many of the same ideals that other religious
parents do when considering comprehensive religious schools. For
those who see Islamic schooling as a viable option, supporters claim
that these schools help to (1) preserve the culture and customs passed
down from generation to generation, and (2) provide Muslim children
with a proper identity consonant with one’s home environment,
thereby ensuring a positive sense of self. In this article the author
will explore the role that Muslim parents play in Islamic schooling;
in particular the author will examine the reasons why those parents
who favor Islamic schools do, and what they hope to gain either for
themselves or their children by enrolling them.

The religio-cultural community of minority ethnic migrants can strongly affect post-migration adaptation. Whilst religion itself may influence resilience, the social support network it provides may also play a role. Extant literature on resilience and migrant communities has largely focused on refugees whilst the experience of younger voluntary migrants and second-generation immigrants, who may experience “acculturative stress”, has been overlooked. This study examines 18–25 year old diasporic and post-diasporic Ismaili Muslim youth in Australia. Of the 11 youth respondents, five were Australian-born/raised (“post-diasporic”) and six were recent immigrants (“diasporic”). Five community leaders were also interviewed for triangulation. Respondents were obtained using purposive and convenience sampling in two Australian cities. Results demonstrate how faith engagement and civic participation were utilised in developing resilience when facing mental health stressors encountered during the migratory and acculturative processes.

Рецензия на монографию С.М. Червонной «Современная мечеть.
Отечественный и мировой опыт Новейшего времени» (Торунь, 2016) / The Architecture of the Contemporary Mosque: an Experience of Systematization (A review of “Contemporary Mosque. Domestic and International Experience in the Recent History” by S.M. Chervonnaya. Тoryn, 2016)

Islam in Israel is being treated in public and research discourse with general and unfocused terms. However, an in-depth study reveals a large Muslim community organized by religious, civil and political organizations, such as the Islamic Movement, the Sharia courts, the Sufism orders, Shiite associations and associations of Bedouins, women, young people and educators. Together, they create a fascinating mosaic of multi-faceted leadership that draws its path between tradition and Western modernity, thereby creating a multi-voice Islamic discourse.
This Book offers new insights into core issues concerning the status of the Muslim community in Israel, and presents the challenges and dilemmas facing it. The articles in the book deal with several key questions, including: Is there a local model of Islam with unique characteristics? Is it possible to identify elements of original religious thought? What is the reality of the life of the Muslim community in Israel and the reality of the lives of Muslim communities in Europe? The discussion of these and other questions provides some answers to the research lacuna and sheds light on how Muslims in Israel cope with life in a Jewish majority country and in the shadow of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The expression of an Islamic political radicalism in Britain has been one of the most dramatic developments in recent decades. Islamic Radicalism and Multicultural Politics explores the nature of this phenomenon by analysing the origins of Islam and its historical contact with Western Europe and Britain, and the emergence of Islamic political radicalism in the Muslim world and in the West.

Tahir Abbas draws on historical analysis and contemporary case studies to explore the post-war immigration and integration of Muslim groups, the complex relations that exist between a secular liberal Britain and a diverse but multifaceted Islam, and the extent of social and economic inequalities that affect Muslims as individual citizens and in local area communities. He shows how violent extremism among British Muslims is in reality influenced by a range of issues, including the factors of globalisation and contemporary politics, media and culture. Analysing and dissecting public policy, Abbas offers suggestions for tackling the major social, political and economic questions facing British Muslims in the post-7/7 era.

An important contribution to the study of religion, ‘race’ and ethnicity in modern Britain, this accessible work will be of interest to anyone working in the field of Islamic studies, sociology and political radicalism.

Reviews

‘Much of the commentary on Islam today is shrill and one-dimensional which further widens the gap between Muslims and non-Muslims. Because Tahir Abbas’ Islamic Radicalism and Multicultural Politics is reasoned, scholarly and aims to provide historical context it is a powerful corrective. Being both British and Muslim allows him to present us with a truly insider’s account.’ - Professor Akbar Ahmed, Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies, American University

‘In the face of so many superficial denunciations of radical Islam in Britain, Tahir Abbas provides an account that is both broad in its historical coverage and profound in its social analysis. In his sweep of several centuries of South Asian Islamic thinking, Abbas includes the conflicts engendered by British colonialism, and the complex processes of immigration and settlement in Britain. He is especially good in his own speciality, the patterns of inequality in education and in the labour market, through which he shows how the global growth in radical thinking can articulate with domestic social disparities. Here is a distinctive voice entering the debate.’ - John R. Bowen, Washington University in St. Louis.

‘Terrorist incidents have created controversy about Islam and Muslims, and British Muslims have been part of this debate. Media and lay people take a very superficial view and blame Islam and Muslims for radicalisation. This book is an in-depth study of the causes of radicalisation of a section of British Muslims. It is a very useful study indeed and all those who want to understand this complex phenomenon should read the book: Dr Abbas has done a good job!’ - Dr. Asghar Ali Engineer, Centre for Study of Society and Secularism, India

‘A remarkable book, well researched, comprehensive in its coverage and highly relevant to contemporary British political concerns.’ - John Rex, Professor Emeritus, Department of Sociology, Warwick University"

The cases of Israel and Palestine offer a particularly interesting vantage point for analyzing ‘uses of the past’. Both states’ legal trajectories follow from developments in the late Ottoman and British Mandate (1922–1948) periods, and their legal frameworks are characterized by an interesting overlapping of legislations and legal traditions. At the same time, the different political and social contextual frameworks in which Palestinian Muslims operate (living in Palestine, i.e. West Bank and Gaza Strip, or inside Israel) have a profound impact on legal debates and the practical solutions devised by judges and practitioners. This poses unusual challenges to Palestinian Muslim legal theorists and practitioners about how to face modernity and social change, leading to an interesting debate among scholars of legal pluralism, legal anthropology and Muslim law.
The book Uses of the Past focuses on the relationship between Gender and Sharīʿa, aiming at analyzing how the past of Muslim tradition is invoked when dealing with gender issues and family law and how it is used to support legal change and reform in contemporary Muslim discourse. This edited volume is one of the outcomes of the HERA (Humanities in the European Research Area) project “Understanding Sharīʿa: Past Perfect, Imperfect Present” (US-PPIP) and includes eight articles by international scholars and practitioners.

This new series provides a forum for exchange on a myriad of alternative histories of marginalized communities and individuals in the Near and Middle East and Mediterranean, and those of Middle Eastern or Mediterranean heritage. It will highlight thematic issues relating to various native peoples and their narratives and – with particular contemporary relevance – explore encounters with the notion of ‘other’ within various societies. Often moving beyond the conventional state-centred and dominant monolithic approach, or reinterpreting previously accepted stories, books in the series examine and explain themes from inter-communal relations, environment, health and society, and will explore ethnic, communal, racial, linguistic and religious developments that go beyond geopolitical compositions.

Building on the foundations of scholarship within an interdisciplinary framework, this series spans the continuum of Near Eastern and Mediterranean traditions extending from the fourth millennium B.C. to the present – bridging previous fields which originally had little connection with each other. The aim is to enhance perspectives by applying various methodological approaches to dilemmas that have in the past been treated as the exclusive concern of a single given discipline.

Key Features

Creates a forum for marginalized and/or indigenous communities to engage with the ‘accepted past and present’ and to challenge previously accepted truths
Opens a dialogue for alternative intellectual histories/narratives
The first series to focus on indigenous and minoritized related narratives from the understudied and often marginal perspective
Covers cultural, linguistic, ethnic, gendered, political, numerical and economic communities in the Near and Middle East, the Mediterranean and its extended environs
Engages with all periods of history from the ancient world to the present day, especially in terms of continuity of culture, cultural heritage and heritage preservation
Communities studied may include Alawites, Alevis, Armenians, Assyrians, Christians, Copts, Druze, Jews, Mandaens, Maronites, Palestinians, Pontian/ Anatolian Greeks, Samaritans, Shabbaks, Yezidis and Zoroastrians among others

Ghazalan tum to waqif ho, kaho Majnoon ke marney ki
Diwana mar gaya aakhir ko, weerane pe kya guzri
(Oh gazelles! You certainly know – tell us of the death of Majnoon.
The frenzied lover died at last, but what befell the wilderness?)
Raja Ram Narain Mauzun’s couplet, quoted by A. G. Noorani in The Destruction of Hyderabad (2013) (http://www.amazon.com/TheDestructionHyderabadAGNoorani/
dp/1849044392/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1397533210&sr=81&
keywords=ag+noorani+the+destruction+of+hyderabad), fully embodies the spirit of the book. While Mauzun lamented the tragedy of the Battle of Plassey (1757), Noorani relates the couplet to the Sepoy Mutiny (1857), the tragedy of Partition (1947), and, also, to the 1948 military invasion of Hyderabad. The book is an addition to the already existing body of scholarship on historical dialogues between the newly Independent India and the Princely State of Hyderabad; more specifically on the latter’s accession by the former. Noorani, an advocate by profession and a prolific writer, has previously written on various other political issues. This book is part of a trilogy consisting of Jinnah and Tilak: Comrades in the Freedom Struggle (2010) and The Kashmir Dispute: 1947-2012
(2013).

News articles about Islam and Muslims are frequently featured in all kinds of media outlets, and this trend has increased dramatically ever since the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City. Studies have shown that from that time on, reports featuring Muslims have been predominantly negative: Islam is portrayed as a primitive and violent religion, Muslim men as “terrorists”, “fundamentalists” and “radicals”, and Muslim women as “oppressed”. This paper aims to explore the kinds of Muslim stereotypes presented in the media.

Key words: Islam, Muslim, Stereotype, Media.