Microaggressions and Islamophobia: Experiences of Muslims Across the United States and Clinical Implications

This mixed methods exploratory study illustrates the influence of pervasive misconceptions about Islam on the experiences of 314 adult Muslims across the United States. Quantitative results suggest that Muslim stress levels are comparable to the stress levels of other marginalized groups in the United States. Qualitative analysis revealed four themes that highlight the challenges faced by Muslims as well as their resiliency in the face of microaggressions and marginalization. Family therapists may utilize these personal accounts to expand their understanding of Muslim experiences, and to reflect on their own implicit biases toward Muslims in order to reduce chances of premature termination. Clinical implications include using resiliency‐based models and creating collaborative partnerships with community leaders when working with this religious minority group.     

Perceptions and Experiences of Marriage Preparation Among U.S. Muslims: Multiple Voices from the Community

Although Muslims in the United States are a growing population, there is limited research on their relational patterns and how they prepare for marriage. We conducted in‐depth interviews with 32 members of the Muslim community in Southeast Michigan including married individuals, divorced individuals, therapists, and imams (Muslim religious leaders) to explore their perceptions and experiences of marriage preparation. Our analysis revealed that marriage preparation varies but is less likely to involve a requirement of premarital counseling, with imams being the primary providers, not therapists. Barriers to participation include stigma, lack of awareness, logistical and financial challenges, and parental influence. Partnerships between imams and therapists, and family and community efforts are necessary to address barriers and increase participation in premarital education programs.     

Visibility as Resistance by Muslim Americans in a Surveillance and Security Atmosphere

Based on ethnographic data on South Asian Muslims in Los Angeles and analysis of publications of the largest Muslim organization in North America, this article shows how Muslim Americans manage their hypervisibility in the post‐9/11 security atmosphere, which has intensified after ISIS terrorist attacks at home and abroad. At the individual level, Muslim Americans try to distance themselves from the “Muslim” label, which associates them with “terrorists.” Instead, many self‐categorize into the seemingly more favorable “moderate” identity, which could sometimes render Muslims politically passive. Contrastingly, Muslim organizations strive to construct a “Muslim American” identity that can allow Muslims to engage in mainstream politics by reframing Islam as compatible with American values. Theoretically, this article engages with the scholarship on security, surveillance, and visibility to show how the observed's visibility is not always only repressive but can also be used to resist imposed categories. However, findings reflect how the racialization of Muslims and the security regime give these strategies a double edge—while providing some advantages, these do little to dismantle Muslims’ hypervisibility and the security atmosphere. Overall, findings shed light on the contemporary issue of Muslim identification—not just in terms of how others see Muslims but also how Muslims see themselves.     

Social Studies as Social Reconstruction

Research indicates that most American citizens know little about Islam and, specifically, the major differences between Sunni Muslims and Shiite Muslims and why this matters to the United States. Although the two major Islamic factions share many common core beliefs and practices, there are some significant religious and political differences dating back to the disagreement over the succession of leadership in the Muslim community after the Prophet Muhammad died in 632. Indeed, sectarianism has played a pivotal role in the turbulent geopolitics of the Middle East for centuries. Islam must be studied for its contributions and role in world history. Therefore, it is crucial that social studies educators teach not only the core beliefs, rituals, and history of Islam but the differences between Sunni and Shiite Muslims. This knowledge is vital if Americans are to make prudent decisions regarding support for specific foreign policy positions and decisions regarding Islam and Muslim countries. This article describes and explains the differences between Sunni and Shiite Muslims and discusses the implications for the United States and social studies education. Finally, the article shows how Islam can be implemented in the NCSS C3 Framework.     

Divine Development: Transnational Indian Religious Organizations in the United States and India

This article examines how Indian Americans’ religious organizations send not only financial remittances to India, but also social remittances that shape development ideologies. Comparing Indian‐American Hindu and Muslim organizations, I find both groups draw from their socioeconomic experiences in India and use their position as elite immigrants in the United States to identify and empower their respective religious constituencies in India and overturn different social relations (not just religious practices). Hindu Americans draw from their majority status in India to overturn India's lower position in the world system and support poverty alleviation efforts within a neoliberal development framework. Indian‐American Muslims draw from their poor status in India to overturn economic inequities within India by shifting India's development rhetoric from identity to class. Collective religious identities (expressed through organizations) not only affect the intensity of immigrants’ development efforts, but also their content and ideology. These findings urge us to fold transnational religious organizations into contemporary discussions on migration and development.     

A Chronological Bibliography of the College Novel

Abstract

Although Muslims in the United States are highly assimilated into American society, they represent less than 1 percent of the total population. Therefore, most of the information Americans receive about this group comes from secondary sources. Two theoretical perspectives of opinion formation—image of God and low information rationality—shed light on the subject of trust in this marginalized group. For highly religious Americans, nearly two-thirds of the 2005 Baylor Religion Survey's national sample, Muslims may represent the ultimate outsiders. We compare the effect of the central religious narrative, or an image of God as creator or judge, to the effect of political ideology, or the likely exposure to forms of low information rationality such as framing, spinning, and buzzwords. We use indicators of these concepts in a multivariate analysis of trust in Muslims as a test of these competing perspectives of opinion formation. Using the 2005 Baylor Religion Survey data, we find that not only does trust in Muslims decrease with both a more conservative political ideology and a stronger view of God as vengeful and angry but that these effects interact to produce individuals who are far less likely to trust Muslims compared to their Democrat, Independent, and “loving God” counterparts.     

John Porter Book Prize Lecture: Bringing the Social Back In—On the Integration of Muslim Immigrants and the Jurisprudence of Muslim Minorities

In much of the academic debate on the integration of Muslims into Western liberal democracies, Islam is often treated as one or the sole independent variable in the lives of Muslims. Offering to view Islam—or the understanding of Islam among Muslims—as the dependent variable, The Muslim Question in Canada discusses the influence of socioeconomic forces in shaping the Muslim immigrants’ opinions, modes of thinking, and even interpretations of their faith. Drawing on this general approach, which is introduced and developed in the book using a variety of both quantitative and qualitative data, this article focuses on a school of thought within the Islamic jurisprudence known as fiqh al‐aqalliyyat al‐Muslema (the jurisprudence of Muslim minorities). The premise of the jurisprudence of Muslim minorities is that the lived realities of Muslims who reside in non‐Muslim countries are so fundamentally different from those of the Muslim‐majority nations that traditional Islamic jurisprudence cannot offer meaningful solutions for their problems. Therefore, there is a need to establish an entirely different jurisprudential approach centered around the lives of the Muslim minorities. The purpose of the bulk of jurisprudential theorization efforts in this line of reasoning is to facilitate the lives of the Muslim minorities; as well, they aim to create a foundation for the moral obligations of Muslims toward non‐Muslims in such environments. I argue that a crucial element that triggers such a development is the existence of a positive relationship between Muslims and non‐Muslims in immigrant‐receiving countries. Souvent au sein des débats sur l'intégration des Musulmans dans des démocraties libérales de l'Ouest, l'Islam est traité comme un ou le seul enjeu dans la vie des fidèles. The Muslim Question in Canada examine l'Islam ou la compréhension de l'Islam chez les Musulmans comme un enjeu dépendent et aborde l'influence des forces socio‐économiques sur les opinons des immigrants musulmans ainsi que sur leurs modes de pensée et même sur la manière dont ils interprètent leur foi. Inspiré par cette approche, que l'on présente et développe dans le livre, et qui se sert de données à la fois quantitatives et qualitatives, cet article se concentre sur une école de pensée à l'intérieur de la jurisprudence islamique, connue sous le nom de fiqh al aqalliyyat al‐Muslema (la jurisprudence des minorités musulmanes). La prémisse de la jurisprudence des minorités musulmanes est que les réalités vécues par les Musulmans qui vivent dans des pays non‐musulmans sont au fond tellement différentes de celles de la majorité musulmane que la jurisprudence traditionnelle ne présente pas de solutions pertinentes pour résoudre leurs problèmes. Ainsi, il faut établir une approche jurisprudentielle totalement différente, axée sur la vie des minorités musulmanes. L'objectif de la plupart des efforts au niveau de la théorisation de la jurisprudence qui adoptent cette vision est de rendre la vie des minorités musulmanes plus facile. Ces efforts tentent aussi de faire en sorte que les Musulmans ressentent une certaine obligation morale envers les non‐Musulmans dans ces environnements. J'avance ici que l'aspect qui déclenche un tel développement est le rapport positif entre les Musulmans et les non‐Musulmans dans les pays qui reçoivent des immigrants.     

Between Two Cultures? Muslim Children in a Western Liberal Society

SUMMARY: The experiences of Muslim children in Britain highlight some, of the complexities in the nation of cultural development. Their main problem is often described in terms of being trapped between the traditional Islamic values of their parents and the liberal and often secular values of the school. Multicultural education has not been able to resolve this problem fully, but as young Muslims themselves seek far creative ways of combining full British citizenship with their own distinctive religious commitments, there are signs that a new British Muslim cultural identity is gradually emerging.     

The Polls-Trends: Arab and Muslim Americans and Islam in the aftermath of 9/11

The terrorist attacks against the United States on September11, 2001, fueled widespread concern and speculation about mountingIslamophobic sentiment among Americans in response to the events.To monitor developments in opinions about Muslims and Arabs(both living in the United States and abroad) and attitudestoward the Islamic faith, survey organizations began to assessmore regularly Americans’ attitudes on these topics. Ianalyze developments in public sentiment about Arab and MuslimAmericans and Islam in the age of the war on terror using availablepublic opinion data. The data analyses in this study suggestthat Americans possess lingering resentment and reservationsabout Arab and Muslim Americans. The evidence also reveals lowlevels of awareness about basic elements of Islam but growinganxiety about Islam’s (especially Islamic fundamentalism’s)compatibility with Western values of tolerance, acceptance,and civility. Some of the sharpest movement in opinion dynamicswe observe is in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks,but opinion levels stabilize shortly thereafter. Monitoringthese developments as the war on terror continues is crucial.     

Quantifying the Muslim population in Europe: Conceptual and data issues

A review of the growing literature on the Muslim population in Europe shows that it remains poorly captured in official statistics. There is no authoritative map of the distribution of Muslims in Europe, and little quantitative evidence on their demographic, social or economic characteristics. This paper undertakes a systematic review of the conceptual and methodological issues surrounding the quantification of Muslim populations. With few countries routinely collecting data on religious affiliation, this is generally based on an estimation of the association between religion and some other measure of identity, such as country of birth or nationality. The rationale for the various 'religiousproxy' methods, and their limitations, is discussed in relation to the range of different data regimes observed across the region. The paper argues that changes in the political status of Muslim populations (following naturalization) and the manner of their growth (increasingly driven by natural increase) have meant that in statistical terms, they represent a disappearing target. The paper concludes that meaningful statistics on the Muslims in Europe will increasingly depend on the direct measurement of religious affiliation.     

Exploring How National Politics Influences the Outcome of Intergroup Contact among Muslim Minority Members

This article adds to the existing research in intergroup contact among ethnic minority members by hypothesizing that national political debate has the capacity to enhance the positive outcomes of cross‐group interaction. Analyses show that the capacity of intergroup contact to reduce prejudice toward majority members is disproportionately stronger among Muslims than among non‐Muslim minority members. Specifically, at the time of data collection, the two categories—Muslims and majority members—were highly salient in the public debate, whereas the non‐Muslim minority member category was not primed as a contrast to the majority culture. The political debate most likely stimulated Muslims to generalize their positive contact experiences to the entire majority group. The analysis contributes to the theoretical refinement of the so‐called categorization model by focusing on politically induced reactions among contacted ethnic minority members toward majority members. The analysis utilizes a tailor‐made national sample (fielded during the Mohammad Cartoon Crisis in 2006) among ethnic minority members in Denmark (N  = 3,272).     

Exploring the role of faith in resettlement among Muslim Syrian refugees

ABSTRACT

Over 95% of the refugees from Syria who have resettled in the United States are Muslim. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the role of the Islamic faith in contributing to resiliency among recently resettled refugees from Syria. Ten in-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with Syrian adults who had arrived in the United States between 3 months and 2 years prior to the study. Findings emphasized the primary role of the Islamic faith in the lives of participants. For participants in this study, identifying as Muslim was an essential part of their identity and served as a source of comfort, strength, pride, and humility. Parents in the study expressed fears that their children would lose their connection to their culture and would grow up to devalue the Islamic faith and traditional religious practices due to their exposure to American values which they viewed less strict regarding dress, alcohol consumption, and faith practices. Understanding the important role that the Islamic faith can have in providing a source of comfort, strength, and empowerment for Syrian refugees, and working to build infrastructure to support and sustain these faith traditions is an essential component of refugee resettlement in the United States.     

Muslim women between secular state and religion

The main thesis of this paper assumes that, while we are not arguing for a full-fledged personal law system in Italy (which provides Muslims with different legal systems), we assume that diversity-conscious respect for difference and its legal recognition is a better strategy for achieving justice than a blindfolded Eurocentric vision, based on uniformising secular methods. This paper suggests the adoption of a model of legal intervention for integrating Muslims into Italian liberal democracy. I will call this model a ‘pluralistic institutional approach to integration’, based on a ‘a joint governance approach’. It requires a conceptual break with absolute, unlimited and undivided sovereignty and jurisdiction. Such a pluralistic institutional approach to integration encourages the accommodation of some of the most pressing minority demands in some limited areas. In family law – as we will see – there can be different possible solutions available to conduct their private relationship compatible with their understanding of Islam. However, any policy of accommodation needs to pay special attention to the fact that traditional religious Muslim norms contain practices that may cause harm to vulnerable subjects. Therefore the advocacy and introduction of a plural legal order must be based on respect for key liberal values. In this paper I will not use the generic term sharia (Islamic law) but the term Muslim norms, because I would like to underline the fact that some Muslims are calling for accommodation of norms that derive from their understanding of their religion, including not only standards based on or derived from sharia or fiqh (jurisprudence) but also general ethical principles derived from Islamic religious culture (see Nasir 2002). The focus on religious norms or values makes it clear that the main motivation for the accommodation of Muslim norms would be to maximise individual autonomy and minority protection. In this sense, the accommodation of Muslim norms is subject to the ultimate regulation of the Italian constitutional and legal system. The paper is structured in the following way. Section I of the paper deals with the ‘myth of legal centralism’ and presents a general overview of the empirical situation created by the troublesome Muslim integration in Italy. We will provide some quantitative data on Muslim immigration in Italy. Since ‘Muslim’ is a broad category, it needs to be given as much specificity as possible in order to avoid producing images of a monolithic and undifferentiated religious community. Section II sets out the model of what I have labelled ‘a pluralistic institutional approach to integration’. The substantive claim is that this pluralistic institutional approach to integration provides promising options for the incorporation of cultural and religious minorities, challenging the assumption that it is impossible to grant consideration to religious diversity and gender equality at the same time. Of special interest here are those situations in which claims for so-called ‘Muslim Sharia Arbitration Councils’, religious-based arbitration tribunals, interact with public concerns about power disparities between men and women in the resolution of family law disputes. We will demonstrate the possibility of implementing such a vision by reference to a recent decision by the Supreme Court of Canada, Bruker v. Marcovitz (2007), which breaks new ground.     

Reactive transnationalism: homeland involvement in the face of discrimination

In this article we examine whether migrants' perceived discrimination in the country of settlement leads to an increase of their transnational involvement. So far, this so‐called ‘reactive transnationalism’ has not been studied extensively. Based on literature on discrimination and transnationalism, reactive transnationalism is expected to be most prominent among socioeconomically successful migrants, particularly among males and those who consider themselves Muslims. Our research among middle‐class migrants in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, indeed shows that the more respondents experienced discrimination, the more transnationally involved they are, both regarding transnational identifications and transnational activities. While no gender difference was found regarding reactive transnational activities, for women perceived discrimination proves to lead to stronger instead of weaker transnational identifications than for men. The fact that no difference was found between Muslim and non‐Muslim respondents regarding reactive transnationalism suggests that, despite heated public debates about ‘Islam’, in the Netherlands, ethnic divides – being considered as ‘Dutch’ or ‘non‐Dutch’ – are even more prominent than religious ones.     

Is Islam in Western Europe Like Race in the United States?

Asking whether Islam in Western Europe is like race in the United States is, to a large degree, to ask whether Muslims in Europe share the same fate and face the same barriers as blacks in the United States. The article considers (1) the nature of the hostility to Islam in Western Europe and why it is a greater barrier to inclusion for immigrants and their children than in the United States; (2) the dynamics of color‐coded race in the United States, comparing, on the one hand, the severe barriers confronting individuals and groups with African ancestry in the United States with the barriers facing Muslims (as well as black immigrants) in Western Europe and, on the other hand, considering certain advantages available to immigrants of color in the United States that Muslim and other immigrants lack in Europe; and (3) whether the boundary based on religion will prove more permeable for the descendants of Muslim immigrants in Western Europe than the racial boundary in the United States for those with visible African ancestry.     

Is organizational behavior in U.S. Muslim nonprofit institutions religious?

Several researchers argue that religion influences organizational behavior in nonprofit institutions (Lotfy, 2004; Brinckerhoff, 1999). This article examines this claim by outlining major organizational values embraced by the leadership of twenty‐eight American Muslim nonprofit institutions. Two surveys were distributed to a random sample of 224 board members and 416 constituents in the southern and southeastern United States. Findings indicate that American Muslim nonprofit institutions remain religious even when they provide nonreligious services. Exhibiting religious organizational behavior is not random or accidental. Rather, it can be a reflection of the role of faith in nonprofits. Exploratory factor analysis reveals nine religiously important values that characterize managerial leadership in American Muslim nonprofit institutions. These values and their implications are discussed.     

Gender relations,transnational ties and rituals among Bosnian refugees

In this article I show how Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) refugees reproduce, contest and construct their ethnic and religious identities. Using ‘ritual’ in a broad sense to refer to everyday routinized activities and practices that characterize family hierarchies and gender relations, as well as more easily identifiable religious rituals, I show that rituals assert belonging to a community and an identity, but are also, in the process of construction and contestation, selectively evoked and ignored. ‘The Other’ constructed through certain rituals is not merely the non–Muslim Bosnian (Serbs and Croats), but also, for refugees, other Bosnian Muslims who stayed behind. Moreover, engagement in secular and religious rituals, and the wider issue of identity constructions cannot be understood fully without exploring the dynamics between refugees and people who have remained in Bosnia. Competing constituencies claiming ‘Bosnianness’ and ‘Muslimness’ can be found across national boundaries and complicate the attempt to construct a community of believers or nationals, or both.     

The Criminalization of Muslims in the United States, 2016

The criminalization of Muslims—framing an Islamic religious identity as a problem to be solved using state crime control logic—is undeniably in process in the United States. Local, state, and federal statutes target Muslims for surveillance and exclusion, and media sources depict Muslims as synonymous with terrorism, as others have shown. This paper analyzes the public’s role in the criminalization of Islam, which I call “cr-Islamization.” Drawing on in-depth, qualitative interviews in a major Southwest city during the lead-up to the 2016 presidential election, I detail how the majority of 144 politically, racially, and economically diverse interviewees talk about Muslims as a potential “racial threat,” using “fear of crime” language indicative of the mass incarceration era. This suggests that criminalization theory should be central to sociological studies of Muslims in the contemporary United States, and that criminalization rhetoric remains powerful, despite mainstream enthusiasm for criminal justice reform. I argue that criminalization’s power might reside in its ability to mutate in the “post-racial” era. The mechanisms supporting crimmigration, the criminalization of black Americans, and cr-Islamization are related but not identical. Muslims are religiously and racially subjugated, but more economically secure compared to other criminalized groups. This paper’s findings should prompt scholars to re-examine the relationships between racialization, criminalization, religious subjugation, and economic exploitation in the twenty-first century United States.

     

Religious Microaggressions: A Case Study of Muslim Americans

ABSTRACT

The increasing population of Muslims in America faces challenges not uncommon to other faith and immigrant communities. One particular challenge is Muslim experiences of various forms of discrimination, prejudice, anti-Muslim bigotry, and microaggressions, especially in post-9/11 America. While microaggressions have been discussed in the social sciences literature, religious microaggressions have not been clearly addressed in the social work literature. This article aims to fill this gap in the literature by examining the connections among racial microaggressions, the racialization of religion, and ultimately religious microaggressions. The article concludes by presenting implications for social work policy, practice, and education in the area of religious microaggressions.     

Military Brides and Refugees: Vietnamese American Wives and Shifting Links to the Military, 1980 – 2000

Since the immigration legislation of 1965, marriage to American citizens and resident aliens has been one of the primary paths for migration to the United States. Despite the rapid growth of the Asian American population over the course of the late twentieth century, Asian Americans had still reached only 3 per cent of all Americans by 2000, meaning that Asian marriage migration to the United States has been largely through marriage to non‐Asians. In this study, we look at exogamy among Vietnamese Americans using U. S. Census data (1980, 1990, and 2000) from 5 per cent PUMS sets made available through the IPUMS project. We ask: (1) What are the predictors of exogamy among Vietnamese Americans? (2) How do the rates of exogamy of Vietnamese American women compare to those of Vietnamese American men? (3) How have the predictors of exogamy and the apparent characteristics of the exogamously married changed over the decades of refugee movement from Vietnam to North America? We review data from the years 1980, 1990, and 2000. In the assimilationist view of immigration associated with the classic work of Milton M. Gordon, exogamy is the final stage of immigrant incorporation into a host country. Migration through marriage, which has become a major source of immigration to the United States since the Immigration Act of 1965, reverses this assimilationist pattern, placing marriage before immigration and incorporation, or at the earliest stages of immigration and incorporation. Our findings are relevant to understanding the specific Vietnamese experience in the United States. They highlight the continuing but declining importance of the Vietnam War in creating close connections between Vietnamese and other people in the United States, even after the war had ended. The findings also suggest how these connections changed as a result of Vietnamese mass migration to America.