This inaugural edition of the peer-reviewed Islamophobia Studies Journalis an attempt to forge the bonds for strengthening our commitment to justice, to be accountable and responsible for the work that we produce, and more importantly, to focus our passions – the basis of the human condition – as we strive to work in our collective and related projects for justice.
EDITORIAL STATEMENT
The cover of this inaugural issue of the Islamophobia Studies Journal features a photograph taken at the Al-Alhambra Palace in Granada, Spain with text that translates into “No One is Truly Victorious Except God!” This inscription is found almost everywhere on the palace complex. It is more than just an aesthetic motif or an archaeological artifact. It is a philosophical, spiritual, and Islamic declaration rooted in the idea of governing oneself with humility and justice. It is both a historical reminder from the period that power is divinely inspired, and a call for self-reflection on the nature of power, our humanity, and the conditions that make domination, subordination, and dehumanization possible. It is about committing to our deepest sense of justice, and it speaks to the eternal demands for our individual and collective perseverance.
We found the inscription appropriate for the cover of this issue as a call to historicize and transform the ways in which constructions of the “Other,” both Muslim and Jewish, and the “West” as a geographical and epistemological space, ushered in the modern world. In 1492, Granada and Spain sat at the crossroads of the “new world,” and its consolidation of social, political, economic, and religious power through new modes of racial formations that constructed the Black, White, African, Muslim, Arab, Jewish, and Orient as the “inferior” global other. We believe that studying Islamophobia in our contemporary moment should not be done at the expense of a deeper and more historical engagement with Othernesss in European and American contexts. But studying Islamophobia is also a complex project that requires multidisciplinary, innovative methodologies, and collaborative partnerships in order to deconstruct a vast global network of institutionalized and interconnected power relationships.
This inaugural edition of the Islamophobia Studies Journal is an attempt to forge the bonds for strengthening our commitment to justice, to be accountable and responsible for the work that we produce, and more importantly, to focus our passions – the basis of the human condition – as we strive to work in our collective and related projects for justice.
This issue presents our first step in defining not only a field of study, but also a critical engagement in the historical, economic, cultural, social, and political production of Islamophobia in the context of the reproduction of Otherness in history. We endeavor to produce quality works that reflect and puts forward the needs of the community – domestic and international – and to place them at the center of our discourse. We hope to articulate a vision of justice and praxis at a time when the will to speak power to truth is most needed.
On behalf of the Editorial Board and the Advisory Committee, we are deeply grateful to all the contributors to this inaugural issue. The journal is in its infancy, and we solicit and encourage engagement from scholars, activists, and members from the community on this project as our work continues to improve and evolve. Thank you.
Hatem Bazian
University of California, Berkeley
Maxwell Leung
California College of the Arts
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
- Editorial Statement
Hatem Bazian and Maxwell Leung - The Multiple Faces of Islamophobia
Ramon Grosfoguel - For “Jewish” Read “Muslim”? Islamophobia as a Form of Racialisation of Ethno-Religious Groups in Britain Today
Nasar Meer and Tariq Modood - Beyond Islamophobia and Islamophilia as Western Epistemic Racisms: Revisiting Runnymede Trust's Definition in a World-History Context
Mohammad H. Tamdgidi - Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear: Islamophobia in the United States and British India, 1687–1947
Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg - Islamophobia and the Time and Space of the Muslim Other
Khaldoun Samman - The Wall Street Journal's Muslims: Representing Islam in American Print News Media
Suad Joseph and Benjamin D'Harlingue - Muslims – Enemies of the State: The New Counter-Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO)
Hatem Bazian