Colonial-era differentiation of Muslims preceded and enabled present-day racialization.
Evidence
For Islam to emerge as a race in the present, the differences between Muslims and Europeans, and the purported Islamic world and Europe, had to be made meaningful and clear as a precursor. This is where the history of Europe and America’s encounter with Islam becomes important. Differentiating Muslims and Islam is one of the colonial and capitalist racial practices that has formed the substratum of modern Islamophobia and Islam-as-race. — Cyra Akila Choudhury, Racecraft and Identity in the Emergence…, 112
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Economic transition to capitalist imperialism produced Muslims as a racial category — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 83; Pre-1970s Muslim-targeted discrimination belonged to older white-supremacy systems; The racialization of Muslims was anchored in Enlightenment-era colonial ideologies — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 185 (+15 more)
Broader Connections
- European colonial racial practice of differentiating Islam preceded and enabled modern Islamophobia
#corroborates(0.93) - Muslims were racialized through cultural signifiers rather than phenotype alone
#expands(0.85) — Junaid Rana, Terrifying Muslims, 106 - The racialized content of the Muslim category persisted across changing labels
#expands(0.75) — Runnymede Trust (ed. Farah Elahi & Omar Khan), Islamophobia, 163 - Muslim racialization developed relationally with other minority racializations.
#expands(0.72) — Sahar F. Aziz, The Racial Muslim, 833