‘I will Blow your face off’—Virtual and Physical World Anti-Muslim Hate Crime

Anti-Muslim hate crime is usually viewed in the prism of physical attacks; however, it also occurs in a cyber context, and this reality has considerable consequences for victims. In seeking to help improve our understanding of anti-Muslim hate crime, this article draws on the findings from a project that involved qualitative interviews with Muslim men and women who experienced both virtual and physical world anti-Muslim hate, and reported their experiences to the British government-funded service Tell MAMA (Measuring Anti-Muslim Attacks). In doing so, this article sets out the first ever study to examine the nature, determinants and impacts of both virtual and physical world anti-Muslim hate crime upon Muslim men and Muslim women in the United Kingdom (UK). Correspondingly, we found that victims of both virtual and physical world anti-Muslim hate crime are likely to suffer from emotional stress, anxiety and fear of cyber threats materialising in the ‘real world’

Muslims are leaving football, they think ‘what is the point?': A qualitative study on Islamophobia in grassroots football in England and Wales

This paper explores Muslim players’ experiences of Islamophobia at grassroots football. It employs Critical Race Theory (CRT) as a theoretical framework to interpret Islamophobia as a form of anti-Muslim racism in football. The paper considers the complexities of intersectionality in terms of race, religion, gender, and the ‘space’ where Islamophobia is manifested, both online and offline. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with 40 British Muslim footballers, findings show that Islamophobia in football is intersectional, yet it is normalised and understood as ‘part of the game’. Participants’ race coupled with religion was also a key trigger for the hate that they received both online and offline. It will be concluded that grassroots football could be understood as a ‘racial project’ whereby Muslims are stigmatised, oppressed and excluded. To this end, grassroots football becomes a mirror of Islamophobia in wider society

‘It's a part of me, I feel naked without it': choice, agency and identity for Muslim women who wear the niqab

In the context of heightened suspicion and anti-Muslim stereotypes in a post-9/11 and 7/7 era, Muslim women who wear the niqab (face veil) are stigmatised, criminalised and marked as ‘dangerous’ to British/Western values. Several countries have imposed bans on the wearing of face veils in public places based on the premise that the niqab is a ‘threat’ to notions of gender equality, integration and national security. While the wearing of the niqab has elicited a good deal of media, political and public debates, little attention has been paid to the opinions of Muslim women who wear it. Drawing on individual and focus group interviews with Muslim women who wear the niqab in the United Kingdom (UK), this article places at the centre of the debate the voices of those women who do wear it, and explores their reasons for adopting it. The findings show that the wearing of the niqab emerges as a personal choice, an expression of religious piety, public modesty and belonging to the ‘ummah’. It is also perceived as a form of agency, resistance and non-conformity to Western consumerist culture and lifestyle. It will be concluded that wearing the niqab empowers women in their public presence and offers them a sense of ‘liberation’, which is associated with the notion of anonymity that it provides them

Doing ‘dangerous’ autoethnography on Islamophobic victimization

This article draws on our different experiences of employing autoethnography when researching Islamophobia, using two independent research projects. In particular, we reflect upon our experiences of Islamophobic victimization as a result of being ‘visibly’ Muslim in public spaces in the UK. We discuss our motivation for employing autoethnography and the role of our insider/outsider status in adopting the role of the Muslim ‘other’ in public spaces. Additionally, we consider the nature, extent and impact of Islamophobic victimization upon ourselves, and the coping mechanisms we employed to deal with it. The article concludes by reflecting upon the advantages, ethical challenges and limitations of using autoethnography when researching Islamophobic victimization

Misogyny, racism, and Islamophobia: street harassment at the intersections

Veiled Muslim women are at an increased risk of street harassment in the current political and economic climate. Their visibility, combined with their popular portrayal as culturally dangerous or threatening means that they are vulnerable to receiving verbal and physical threats, which can be misogynistic and Islamophobic in nature. Drawing on 60 individual and 20 focus group interviews with Muslim women in the United Kingdom who wear the niqab (face veil) and had experienced harassment in public, this qualitative study details their lived experiences. It argues that an intersectional analysis is crucial to understanding the nuances of their lived experiences and the impact street harassment has on their lives. The findings demonstrate that street harassment can produce a hostile environment for veiled Muslim women, which can have a terrorizing effect, limiting their full participation in the public sphere

Veiled Muslim women's views on law banning the wearing of the niqab (face veil) in public

In August 2018, Denmark became the latest European country to ban the wearing of the niqab (face veil) in public. Indeed, several European countries such as France, Belgium and Austria have already imposed a national ban on the wearing of the niqab in public on the grounds that it is a 'threat' to gender equality, integration and national security. While the wearing of the niqab has elicited a good deal of media, political and public debates, little attention has been paid to the opinions of Muslim women who wear it. Drawing on individual and focus group interviews with Muslim women who wear the niqab in the United Kingdom (UK), this article places at the centre of the debate the voices of those women who do wear it and, under the lens of Critical Race Feminism, explores their views on legislation banning the wearing of the niqab in public

Veiled Muslim women’s responses to experiences of gendered Islamophobia in the UK

In a post-9/11 climate, Islamophobia has increased significantly in the UK and elsewhere in the West. ISIS-inspired terrorist attacks in the UK as well as in France, Belgium, Germany and, more recently, in Sri Lanka have triggered an increase in verbal and physical attacks on Muslims. Drawing on intersectionality (as a nexus of identities that work together to render certain individuals as ‘ideal’ targets to attack), veiled Muslim women are likely to experience gendered Islamophobia in the cyber world but also in ‘real’ life due to the intersections between their ‘visible’ Muslim identity and gender performance. In the British context, although Islamophobia is recorded as a hate crime nationally, and misogyny as a hate crime locally in some police forces, veiled Muslim women are unlikely to report their experiences to the police. Drawing on qualitative interviews with Muslim women who wear the niqab (face veil), the purpose of this article is to examine the ways in which they respond to experiences of gendered Islamophobia as well as their reasons for not reporting their experiences to the police. </jats:p