Language:
English
Year of publication:
2023
Titel der Quelle:
Antisemitism, Islamophobia and the Politics of Definition
Angaben zur Quelle:
(2023) 235-257
Keywords:
Islamophobia Terminology
;
History
;
Antisemitism Terminology
;
History
Abstract:
Islamophobia and antisemitism are two forms of racism that have much in common. The racialisation targets not just a religion or religious group but what is better understood as an ethnoreligious group. The ways that Jews and Muslims oppose such racism increasingly involves the building up of an identity which, like most contemporary equality movements, does not simply reject the one attributed to them by their enemies but a positive replacement. Such positive conceptions can become oppressor identities, as is the case of certain Islamist identities fostered by the likes of Isis or with a Jewish identity centred on Israel. Moreover, the politics of defining these racisms is tied to competition about prioritisation between anti-racisms. This should be based on an empirical evaluation of the scale of the respective racisms (and not on an essentialised hierarchy). Unfortunately, in the case of Islamophobia and antisemitism today, there is a wilful empirical blindness, and the prioritisation is taking place on the basis of which victim group is more influential and has more influential friends. Finally, we must be able to critically talk about groups like Muslims and Jews, about Islam and Israel, without being dismissed as Islamophobes or antisemites. For this to be the case, ‘talk about’ must become ‘talk with’: the character of the criticism must take a dialogical form. I conclude by including a sketch of five tests for distinguishing racialisation from dialogical criticism.
DOI:
10.1007/978-3-031-16266-4_11
URL:
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