Affect, Animality, and Islamophobia: Human-Animal Relations in the Production of Muslim Difference in America
Issued Date: 21 Dec 2017
Abstract
American internet Islamophobia is fascinated with Muslim attitudes towards animals – especially pigs. Through an examination of internet memes found on right-wing and white supremacist websites and social media groups, this essay argues that affective relations to certain animals are part of what mark the Muslim as other and worthy of hate in American Islamophobic rhetoric. More importantly, this Islamophobic pig imagery, which often mischaracterizes or willfully misrepresents Muslim dietary restrictions, reveals that Islamophobic internet memes are not primarily aimed at Muslims nor are they first and foremost an expression of fear of Islam. Instead this Islamophobic rhetoric takes the form of an inside joke, affectively linking those who are “in” on the joke, uniting them in a jovial transgression of “politically correct" norms. This form of Islamophobia might be better termed “Islamophobophilia,” since it marks some Americans as insiders and others as outsiders. It is a method for non-Muslim Americans to signal to other other non-Muslim Americans that they are the right kind of American.
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DOI: 10.1558/bsor.33901
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In Middle East Studies for the New Millennium: Infrastructures of Knowledge,
edited by Seteney Shami and Cynthia Miller-Idriss, 320–48. New York: NYU
Press.
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Obama Is a Muslim.” Vox, February 25.
http://www.vox.com/2015/2/25/8108005/obama-muslim-poll.
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Blood’ Story on Early Terrorism.” The New York Times, February 20.
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Facebook About Peppa Pig.” Buzzfeed News, December 8.
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Stereotyping and Out-Grouping of Muslims in the United States.” In Islamophobia
in America: The Anatomy of Intolerance, edited by Carl W. Ernst, 53–74.
New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137290076.
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Terrorism and Contraceptive Nationalism in Not Without My Daughter.” The
Muslim World 106: 759–80. https://doi.org/10.1111/muwo.12169.
Gore, Leada. 2015. “Alabama KKK Recruiting to ‘Fight the Spread
of Islam.’” AL.com, December 5.http://www.al.com/news/index.ssf/2015/12/alabama_kkk_recruiting_to_figh.html.
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the Enemy. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield
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West. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.
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A Process Model.” Islamic Studies 49: 81–101.
Islamophobia Is Racism. 2017.
https://islamophobiaisracism.wordpress.com/.
“Islamophobia Studies Journal | Center for Race & Gender.” 2017.
http://crg.berkeley.edu/content/islamophobia/islamophobia-studies-journal.
Jacobson, Louis. 2016. “Donald Trump Cites Dubious Legend about Gen. Pershing,
Pig’s Blood and Muslims.” Politifact.com. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/feb/23/donald-trump/donald-trump-cites-dubious-legend-about-gen-pershi/.
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The Atlantic, October 12.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/10/male-trump-voters-masculinity/503741/.
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Media. Portland: Vallentine Mitchell.
Kruger, Steven F. 1997. “Medieval Christian (Dis)identifications: Muslims
and Jews in Guibert of Nogent.” New Literary History 28 (2): 185–203.
https://doi.org/10.1353/nlh.1997.0024.
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than Muslims: Poll.” Salon, March 10. http://www.salon.com/2017/03/10/white-evangelicals-say-christians-face-more-persecution-than-muslims-poll/.
Liptak, Adam, and Peter Baker. 2017. “Trump Promotes Original ‘Travel
Ban,’ Eroding His Legal Case.” The New York Times, June 5. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/05/us/politics/trump-travel-ban.html.
Lundberg, Christian. 2009. “Enjoying God’s Death: The Passion of
the Christ and the Practices of an Evangelical Public.” Quarterly Journal
of Speech 95: 387–411. https://doi.org/10.1080/00335630903296184.
Mamdani, Mahmood. 2005. Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War, and
the Roots of Terror. New York: Harmony.
McAlister, Melani. 2005. Epic Encounters: Culture, Media, and U.S. Interests
in the Middle East since 1945. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Pardo-Kaplan, Deborah. 2016. “Anti-Semitic Sculpture Outside Luther’s
Church Creates Controversy.” ChristianityToday.com. http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2016/october-web-only/anti-semitic-sculpture-on-luthers-church-creates-controvers.html.
“Peace Through Pork: Jihawg Defensive Ammunition.” 2013. AmmoLand.com
Shooting Sports News, June 10. https://www.ammoland.com/2013/06/peace-through-pork-jihawg-defensive-ammunition/.
Prager, Denis. 2014. “The Winooski Syndrome.” National Review, September
2.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/386836/winooski-syndrome-dennis-prager.
Rana, Junaid. 2007. “The Story of Islamophobia.” Souls 9 (2): 148–61.
https://doi.org/10.1080/10999940701382607.
Said, Edward. 1998. “Islam Through Western Eyes.” The Nation, January
2. https://www.thenation.com/article/islam-through-western-eyes/.
Schaefer, Donovan O. 2015. Religious Affects: Animality, Evolution, and Power.
Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822374909.
Shachar, Isaiah. 1974. The Judensau: A Medieval Anti-Jewish Motif and Its History.
London: Warburg Institute.
Shaheen, Jack. 2014. Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People. Northampton,
MA: Olive Branch Press.
Sommers, Samuel, and Michael Norton. 2016. “White People Think Racism
Is Getting Worse. Against White People.” Washington Post, July 21. https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/07/21/white-people-think-racism-is-getting-worse-against-white-people/.
Supp-Montgomerie, David. 2013. “Speaking from the Heart: Mediation and
Sincerity in U.S. Political Speech.” PhD diss., University of North Carolina,
Chapel Hill.
Svrluga, Susan. 2017. “‘Unprecedented Effort’ by ‘White
Supremacists’ to Recruit And Target College Students, Group Claims.”
Washington Post, March 6. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2017/03/06/unprecedented-effort-by-white-supremacists-to-recruit-and-target-college-students-group-claims/.
Sykes, Charles J. 2017. “If Liberals Hate Him, Then Trump Must Be Doing
Something Right.” The New York Times, May 17. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/12/opinion/sunday/if-liberals-hate-him-then-trump-must-be-doing-something-right.html.
Taylor, Matthew. 2008. “BNP Seeks to Bury Antisemitism and Gain Jewish
Votes in Islamophobic Campaign.” The Guardian, April 10. https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2008/apr/10/thefarright.race.
Wolff, Michael. 2016. “Ringside With Steve Bannon at Trump Tower as the
President-Elect’s Strategist Plots ‘An Entirely New Political Movement.’”
The Hollywood Reporter, November 18.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/steve-bannon-trump-tower-interview-trumps-strategist-plots-new-political-movement-948747.
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