The thriller genre can challenge rather than merely reinforce Islamophobia

Evidence

This reading therefore stands in opposition to conventional perspectives that identify an inherent conservatism in a genre that relies to a large degree on linearity—the deferred but ultimately guaranteed revelation of secrets—and that pits the agents of the nation-state against forces that often have apocalyptic designs on its citizens, drawing the reader into an imaginative complicity that in the war-on-terror context is often overtly Islamophobic. However, I would argue that it is the thriller’s inevitable and inherent juxtaposition of contending ideologies that gives it the potential for a dialogic engagement that moves beyond the reductive binaries of war-on-terror discourse and that, within its limited means, exposes and challenges Islamophobic assumptions. — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 315

Categorization

• XREF: This is the key contesting-vs-reinforcing distinction the reader wants — it directly parallels how Hamid and Naqvi wield genre conventions against themselves.
• DEFINE: Morey introduces the analytical criterion: juxtaposition of contending ideologies enables dialogic engagement that moves beyond war-on-terror binaries.