Anglo-American observers explained Muslim expansion as caused by inherent religious fanaticism.

Evidence

One answer that most Americans and Britons seemingly accepted was that the inherent fanaticism of (male) Muslims produced their violent success. According to the well respected and widely read Briton Claudius Buchanan (1807), Muslims were a “dagger-drawing people” who maintained a “vindictive spirit.” Smith, in 1835, opined that religious fanaticism was “the strongest principle of obedience in the Turkish citizen, and of bravery in the Turkish soldier.” — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 85

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Edward Said’s Orientalism and the long history of ‘fanatic’ tropes about Islam circulating in Western discourse. — connects to: Most Americans and Britons seemingly accepted that the inherent fanaticism of (male) Muslims produced their violent success.; Americans derived much of their Islamophobia from British colonial sources. — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear:…, 40; Nineteenth-century Anglo-American observers feared a globally unified Islam centered on the Ottoman caliph — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear:…, 67 (+9 more)
• SEED: A potential essay tracing how the ‘Muslim fanatic’ trope crossed from missionaries’ lived frustration into political rhetoric from Jefferson to Roosevelt.

Broader Connections

• Although Britons in India differed from Americans because of the active (if exaggerated) threat to their political order, both shared a conviction regarding two alleged qualities of Islam that… #expands (0.80)
• Anglo-American discourse framed Islam as Christianity’s inherent and inexorable nemesis. #expands (0.70) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 95
• British census data on Muslim numbers amplified Anglo-American fears. #corroborates (0.55) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 90
• American society explains rare Muslim terror through religion itself #corroborates (0.50)
• American society uses religion to explain crimes committed by a tiny fraction of Muslims. #corroborates (0.50)
• Direct contact with Muslims shaped imperial perceptions of Islam. #qualifies (0.40) — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 118