Islamophobia vs. Anti-Muslim Racism: Choice, Corporeality, and Culpability in Contemporary Social Justice Rhetoric

This paper contributes to the debates on the use of the terms Islamophobia and anti-Muslim racism in both popular and academic spheres through an examination of how legal categories, biological essentialism, and the logic of dehumanization inform the description and self-description of marginalized groups. I draw connections between a number of seemingly disparate phenomena — that I argue are intricately connected through a scientistic logic — ranging from the controversy on academic freedom and tolerance after a US university fired an instructor for showing Prophet Muhammad’s image in class, debates about the effect of age on women’s reproductive capacities, arguments over the existence of “gay genes” in LGBTQ rights discourse, and the differential treatment of women and children in wars, to illustrate what is at stake in the struggle to articulate Islamophobia and anti-Muslim racism, the distinction between chosen and imposed — or visible and invisible — identities, and the politics of translation.