Political crisis inclusion simultaneously mainstreams and marginalizes Arab-American communities
Evidence
The answer to this question is that the two trends—the positive and the negative—are part of one process. Over the years, I have given this process several names: mainstreaming, disciplinary inclusion, crisis identity formation. In each case, the central idea is the same. As political constituencies and as sites of local community formation, Detroit’s Arab/Muslim populations make substantial gains during times of political crisis in the Middle East, especially when the United States is directly engaged in violent conflict with enemies defined as Arab, Muslim, or both. These gains are possible only to the extent that (and only because) local Arab/Muslim communities are seen as ambiguously American, and ambiguously Other. Attempts to remove this ambiguity in moments of crisis generate mainstreaming effects that are also, of necessity, marginalizing effects. The process is traumatic and empowering; it already has a long history; and the 9/11 attacks were rapidly assimilated to its logic. — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 670
Categorization
Category: Causal Relationships
- XREF: The ‘ambiguously American, ambiguously Other’ dynamic resonates with Grosfoguel’s work on the mapping of ambiguous racial and colonial categories.
- DEFINE: Introduces the chapter’s core conceptual framework — disciplinary inclusion and crisis identity formation as names for one process.
Related
- Islamophobic crisis produces simultaneous mainstreaming and marginalization of Arab American communities (similarity 0.94)
- Anti-Muslim crisis periods simultaneously empower and marginalize Arab American communities (similarity 0.89)
- Muslim American communities joined progressive movements only after being targeted (similarity 0.83)
- Crisis-time scapegoating of religious out-groups masks political and economic causes (similarity 0.82)
- Anti-Arab racism in the US is rooted in the Palestinian struggle. (similarity 0.79)
- Arab American political inclusion was purchased as geopolitics demanded (similarity 0.78)
Broader Connections
- Support of Muslims during crises doubles as repressive behavioral control of them
#corroborates(0.65) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 678 - Categorical whiteness excludes Arabs and Muslims from the benefits of racial remedy in America
#expands(0.60) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 664 - Muslim inclusion in American civic life comes at the price of disciplined loyalty
#expands(0.60) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 717 - Crisis-time scapegoating of religious out-groups masks political and economic causes
#complicates(0.55) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 301 - Islam in America operates as a political identity of otherness beyond religion
#expands(0.55) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 69 - Muslim citizenship in America is negated by religious identity after crises
#corroborates(0.55) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 340 - Structural Islamophobia and structural racism share embedded institutional stereotypes
#expands(0.50) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 130 - Bush-era discourse gendered Muslim others as incapable of self-determination
#expands(0.45) — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 47