ISLAMOPHOBIA The Ideological Campaign Against Muslims

$10.00$16.95


Back Cover

“…the value of this book is incalculable, and Stephen Sheehi is due our deepest thanks and admiration for his courage in writing it.”
from the Foreword by WARD CHURCHILL

Islamophobia: The Ideological Campaign Against Muslims examines the rise of anti-Muslim and anti-Arab sentiments in the West following the end of the Cold War through GW Bush’s War on Terror to the Age of Obama. Using “Operation Desert Storm” as a watershed moment, Stephen Sheehi examines the increased mainstreaming of Muslim-bating rhetoric and explicitly racist legislation, police surveillance, witch-trials and discriminatory policies towards Muslims in North America and abroad.

“[A] brilliantly synthetic work; a gift to all who struggle to understand the anti-Muslim sentiment so pervasive in contemporary America. In a richly detailed yet accessible manner, Sheehi tackles post-Cold War American Islamophobia in all of its complexity, weaving together its liberal and neoconservative strands, and illustrating that we must interrogate it not as a problem of “prejudice” or “misunderstanding,” nor as a debate about Islam itself, but as an ideological paradigm used to structure and justify U.S. policies, both domestic and international.”

NATSU TAYLOR SAITO, author of Meeting the Enemy: American Exceptionalism and International Law

 

 

A discount of 40% (plus shipping) will automatically be applied to the purchase of 10 or more copies of any Clarity Press titles when acquired directly from

Description

Islamophobia: The Ideological Campaign Against Muslims examines the rise of anti-Muslim and anti-Arab sentiments in the West following the end of the Cold War through GW Bush’s War on Terror to the Age of Obama. Using “Operation Desert Storm” as a watershed moment, Stephen Sheehi examines the increased mainstreaming of Muslim-bating rhetoric and explicitly racist legislation, police surveillance, witch-trials and discriminatory policies towards Muslims in North America and abroad.

The book focuses on the various genres and modalities of Islamophobia from the works of rogue academics to the commentary by mainstream journalists, to campaigns by political hacks and special interest groups. Some featured Islamophobes are Bernard Lewis. Fareed Zakaria,Thomas Friedman, David Horowitz, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Irshad Manji, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, John McCain, Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama. Their theories and opinions operate on an assumption that Muslims, particularly Arab Muslims, suffer from particular cultural lacuna that prevent their cultures from progress, democracy and human rights. While the assertion originated in the colonial era, Sheehi demonstrates that it was refurbished as a viable explanation for Muslim resistance to economic and cultural globalization during the Clinton era. Moreover, the theory was honed into the empirical basis for an interventionist foreign policy and propaganda campaign during the Bush regime and continues to underlie Barack Obama’s new
internationalism.

If the assertions of media pundits and rogue academics became the basis for White House foreign policy, Sheehi also demonstrates how they were translated into a sustained domestic policy of racial profiling and Muslim-baiting by agencies from Homeland Security to the Department of Justice. Furthermore, Sheehi examines the collusion between non-governmental agencies, activist groups and lobbies and local, state and federal agencies in suppressing political speech on US campuses critical of racial profiling, US foreign policy in the Middle East and Israel. While much of the direct violence against Muslims on American streets, shops and campuses has subsided, Islamophobia runs throughout the Obama administration. Sheehi, therefore, concludes that Muslim and Arab-hating emanate from all corners of the American political and cultural spectrum, serving poignant ideological functions in the age of economic, cultural and political globalization.

Book Details

ISBN

0-932863-67-1
978-0-932863-67-6

Pages

283

Year of Publication

2011

Options

eBook, Paperback

Author

Stephen Sheehi

Reviews

2 reviews for ISLAMOPHOBIA The Ideological Campaign Against Muslims

  1. MARK LEVINE

    “Sheehi’s analysis of Islamophobia as an ideological formation brings a much needed dose of fresh air, and analytical clarity… A worthy update of Said’s seminal discussion of Orientalism and one that leaves few players in the contemporary foreign policy establishment, in particular so-called liberals, unscathed.”
    MARK LEVINE
    author of Why They Don’t Hate Us and Heavy Metal Islam

  2. NATSU TAYLOR SAITO

    “[A] brilliantly synthetic work; a gift to all who struggle to understand the anti-Muslim sentiment so pervasive in contemporary America. In a richly detailed yet accessible manner, Sheehi tackles post-Cold War American Islamophobia in all of its complexity, weaving together its liberal and neoconservative strands, and illustrating that we must interrogate it not as a problem of “prejudice” or “misunderstanding,” nor as a debate about Islam itself, but as an ideological paradigm used to structure and justify U.S. policies, both domestic and international.”
    NATSU TAYLOR SAITO
    author of Meeting the Enemy: American Exceptionalism and International Law

Only logged in customers who have purchased this product may leave a review.