Media Portrayal of Muslims in the UK

Introduction

The negative portrayal of Muslims in the European society is not a new concept as historic evidence indicates that there was alienation of Muslims in historical Europe as well, where the Crusades became a manifestation of the negative perceptions of Muslims in the European consciousness (Rohloff, Hughes, Petley, & Crichter, 2013). The events of September 11, 2001, which saw major terror attacks against the US and the subsequent terror attacks in European cities, saw the shifting of negative perceptions once again to the Muslims in the Western world (Jaspal & Cinnirella, 2010). The 2004 London Underground bombings have only strengthened the negative perception around Muslim communities in the UK as well as increased negative media reports (Jaspal & Cinnirella, 2010). This dissertation examines the role played by the media in the UK in portrayal of Muslims.

Research questions

The research questions posed in this dissertation are as follows:

How does the media portray Muslims in the UK in general?

Do the Media portray Muslims in a negative or a positive manner?

How far does the media portrayal of Muslim impact popular perceptions of the community in the UK?

Significance of the research questions and the topic of research

The questions raised in this dissertation are important because how Muslims are portrayed in media and the link between Islamophobia and media may lead to an understanding of the growing negative perceptions about Muslims in different countries of the world. This negative perception of Muslims is borne out in the following excerpt from a report:

“Muslims and Islam have occupied a central role in the British media following the Salman Rushdie Affair, the 2001 riots, conflicts in the Middle East and the global war on terror. Featuring also in issues surrounding multiculturalism, crime, education and faith schools, immigration, and oppressed women linked to the Burqa debate, Muslims have been the focus of numerous public issues and denunciations. The portrayal of Muslims has been largely negative and stereotypical informed often by a virulent, racialised Islamophobic discourse. This concern has been vocalised by many Muslim advocacy groups, organisations, academics and activists who argue that representations of Muslims in the British media are persistently negative, unfair and discriminatory and have subsequently contributed to establishing a climate of fear or a moral panic‘ with the Muslim folk devil‘ at its heart” (Sian, Law, & Sayyid, 2012, p. 230).

As the report cited above notes, there is an increase in negative and stereotypical portrayal of Muslims in media and this portrayal may to some extent be responsible for the creation of moral panic with relation to Muslims in the UK. Moral panic may be created using the media and the popular discourse, where the constant focus on some select events and their disproportionate coverage by the media may lead the formulation of a general popular opinion of the veracity of the media reports and the extent of threat posed by the event of the people involved in the event (Cohen, 2011). Mass media and the recent technologies of Social Media have the advantage of speedy reporting of events and dissemination of information amongst significantly large groups of people, which may be used to create images and a repertoire of events that lead to the formulation of negative perceptions about a community without actually reflecting the truth about the community (France, 2007). Moral panic amongst the users of multimedia, and those who use internet to read news and related analysis has been reported in literature already (France, 2007, p. 105). Literature also points at the capacity of the media to shape the understandings of events and people and drive public discourse whether or not based on realities (Critcher, 2003). This has implications for communities like Muslim communities in the UK, which may be portrayed negatively to the point of creating moral panic around them and this may be the reason for increasing Islamophobia. Indeed, Islamophobia or the negative media portrayal of Muslims is not unique to the UK, as many countries in the Western world has seen a growth in Islamophobia and negative media portrayal of Muslims to some degree, irrespective of these countries having an actual negative event in their history which may justify Islamophobia, as there are many countries that have seen as rise in Islamophobia without actually being targeted by Jihadi terrorists; Canada is a case in point, where growing Islamophobia is reported although the country has not experienced a Jihadi terror attack (Zaman, 2010). The interrelationship between Islamophobia and media is worth studying in this context as well, because the role of media may explain the reasons why there are growing negative perceptions about Muslims in different countries of the world where media reports in one country may impact the perception of Muslims in other countries as well.

Research Methodology

The dissertation has used a qualitative, desk-based research method to collect the data for this dissertation. Using the qualitative method, the dissertation notes the findings of the data analysed in a thematic manner, revealing the trends in the media portrayal of Muslims in the UK. The research uses a Critical Discourse Analysis method. The Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) is a method that critically analyses discourse. It is defined as “a programme of social analysis that critically analyses discourse, that is to say language in use, as a means of addressing problems of social change” (Scollon, 2001, p. 140). The relevance of CDA in studies such as the one undertaken in this research, is that it allows the researcher to analyse social problems in the context of texts. As noted by one scholar:

“From television and newspaper stories about unemployment, international military interventions, or the restructuring of identities in nations undergoing sociopolitical change to public discourse campaigns promoting safe sex or discouraging drug use, social problems are couched in public and private discourses that shape the definition of these problems as well as inhibit productive social change. Our actions are frequently accompanied by language and, conversely, much of what we say is accompanied by action.” (Scollon, 2001, pp. 139-140).

As discourse is an extended stretch of text, CDA involves analysis of text to understand social practices that are revealed by the discourse because representation (in this case of Muslims though media) is based to a great extent on practice (in this case, what the people in general believe or talk about with reference to Muslims) (Leeuwen, 2015). After applying CDA to a specific discourse, the researcher can conclude as to how a specific phenomenon, event or person is represented in the social practice. In this case, we can use CDA to study the media reports on Muslims in Britain to understand how they are socially constructed. Left wing newspapers in particular are referred to for exploring the portrayal of Muslims. This dissertation is divided into chapters. The following chapters contain the literature review, the findings and discussion on findings, followed by the conclusion and recommendations for future research.

Literature Review

The term ‘Islamophobia’ has been increasingly used in literature to describe the generally negative feelings associated with Muslims in the UK and the negative portrayal of Muslims in the British media as well as the responses of people and media in general to the issue of migration of Muslims into the UK (Trust, R., 1997). One of the areas that has seen a portrayal of Muslims in media is with respect to the community and its implication in crime, particularly in terrorism related crimes. To a great extent, the negative portrayal of Muslims as terrorists and jihadis in the media, increased in the aftermath of the events of September 11, 2001, which saw a major terror attack on the American soil, and the subsequent terror attacks in prominent European capitals, including London. After the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. Muslims have been increasingly portrayed as what is called as a ‘suspect community’ in the UK media (Pantazis, & Pemberton, 2009). The term ‘suspect community’ was first conceptualised by Hillyard (1993) with relation to another much maligned community, the Irish community. The term ‘suspect community’ was used to describe how the Irish community was maligned and treated with suspicion under the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act 1974. The experiences of the Muslim communities have been similar in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. The ensuing ‘war on terror’ saw a media discourse on Muslims, which may justify the use of the term ‘suspect community’ to British Muslims (Pantazis, & Pemberton, 2009). The portrayal of an entire community as suspects in terror related crimes has led to the use of ‘suspicion’ against an individual due to membership of the Muslim community (Pantazis, & Pemberton, 2009). When Muslims are treated as suspects, this does not mean that they are only suspected of wrongdoing, but also that they are subjected to a generalised view on suspicion related to the community that they belong to (Pantazis, & Pemberton, 2009). The discourse in media and the wider community have led to the creation of the discourse of suspect community related to Muslims in the UK (Pantazis, & Pemberton, 2009). Greer (2010) has criticised the use of the term ‘suspect community’ and the thesis in general with respect to the Muslims as he did earlier with respect to the Irish (Pantazis, & Pemberton, 2009). Greer (2010) has argued that there is not sufficient evidence to establish that the Muslims can be termed as a suspect community in the media (Greer, 2010, p. 1171). He argues that there are no objective data that shows actual support for Islamophobia in Britain (Greer, 2010). However, a study does show that there have been significant number of Islamophobic attacks against Muslims and their establishments, which can be used as indicators of the negativity related to the portrayal of Muslims in the UK public opinion as well as media (Githens-Mazer & Lambert, 2010).

Greer (2010) further argues that the application of the term suspect community with respect to British Muslims is too broad as the community is not homogenous. However, literature indicates that media, political organisations and the civil society, tend to target the whole of the Muslim community, and do not necessarily see them as heterogenous (Pantazis & Pemberton, 2011). This is because the Muslim community is an imagined suspect community, considered as suspect from the perspective of those who are beholding them (Breen-Smyth, 2014). At the same time, British Muslim communities do increasingly define themselves in homogenous terms, with reference to their religion. In this respect, Muslim communities increasingly define themselves in a unified way as ‘Muslims’ and not with reference to their race or nationalities as was the norm earlier (Ahmad & Evergeti, 2010). This unified way of identifying themselves is also a response to the Islamophobia faced by Muslim communities in the UK, which may have led communities to identify themselves within the commonality of Muslim religion as opposed to identification on the basis of race and nationality (Ahmad & Evergeti, 2010). Another of the aspects of discourse on Muslims in media is related to immigration. In this, media discourse in the UK is not very dissimilar to the discourse in other countries, such as the US and European nations. Literature indicates that there is ample evidence of stigmatization of the Muslims in the public discourse in the Western nations, which has implications for the those who come to these nations as refugees and asylum seekers. One of the areas where mainstream media has contributed to the negative discourse on Muslim refugees is the inability of these refugees to integrate in the Western societies (Long, 2010). As media and public discourse increasingly focuses on the growing Islamic presence in the Western nations and links this presence to Islamic fundamentalism and lack of integration by the Muslim refugees, there are fears that Muslims will fail to integrate into the membership of the western societies (Long, 2010). As a response to these fears in the media as well as public discourse, there is an adoption of a purposive strategy in the western nations, which is meant to restrict immigrants from Islamic nations, by linking their ingress into their countries as leading to increased fundamentalism and terrorism (Long, 2010). These countries have then used detention, deportation and denaturalisation procedures as responses to Muslim refugees and immigrants, which does not find much public opposition because the media often does not portray such measures in a negative light, choosing to focus on the negative reporting of the refugees themselves (Long, 2010). Immigration control thus becomes entangled with discourse on securitization with relation to Muslim refugees and immigrants which is some ways a result of the negative reporting on Muslims (Gibney, 2008). This literature review has indicated that there is a consistent negative portrayal of Muslims in media; that this portrayal has increased in volume and scope after 9/11 and the bombings in European cities; and that to some extent this portrayal is a continuation of existing negative themes in media representation of Muslims even in the UK. The literature review has also indicated that the principal themes of negative portrayal of Muslims relate to two perceived threats that are reported on. First, Muslims are portrayed as threats to security of the nation due to terrorism; second, they are portrayed as threats to the culture of the place. While literature does show an engagement with discourse on Muslims, there is little research from the perspective of CDA, which reflects on how the Muslims are portrayed in the media and the use of language in media as a mirror of the social practice. This research seeks to consider how language on Muslims in the media can be used to construct Muslims and Islam in the social practice.

Findings

Introduction

The findings that are noted in this chapter are from two sources: literature and a selection of media reports. As this is the most substantive part of this dissertation, it is thematically organised into sections to discuss themes that were highlighted in the research. These themes are related to media portrayal of Muslims in post 9/11, discourse on Muslim immigrants, and discourse on perceived cultural threat from Muslims. Representation in the media regarding Muslims can be seen from two perspectives that are dominant in such representation. The first perspective, which has been discussed above is the security perspective. It is this perspective which has gained significant ground in the period since 9/11 attacks as the dominant discourse on Muslims in the media has revolved around the threat that Muslims pose to the security of the western states. The other perspective is a cultural threat perspective, where Muslims are portrayed as posing threat to the western culture. Therefore, there are elements of race as well as religion based threats that are attributed to the Muslim communities. The increasing negative representation of Muslims in the media are representation of Muslims as posing threat to the ingroup, that is, the British people, where the nature of the threat itself is hybridised because the threat is to the physical well-being of other groups of people and communities in the UK as well as cultural safety of other groups in the UK.

Portrayal of Muslims after 9/11 as the ‘suspect community’

Post the 9/11 terror attacks, there are studies that show the increasing negative portrayal of Muslims in the media (Alsultany, 2012; Saeed, 2007). Saeed (2007) writes that after the events of 9/11, the negative perception and reporting of the Muslims in the media has grown significantly, although the representation was negative in the period before 9/11 as well. He writes that:

“As late back as 1993, Ahmed noted that many Muslims voiced concern of the negative representation of Islam and Muslims by the Western media. However, following on from such incidents as the Rushdie affair, the first Gulf War and 9/11, interest in media representations of Islam have grown. An ever-increasing body of research has argued that on the balance the images, representations and discourses relating to Islam/ Muslims in mainstream Western media tend to be negative and hostile” (Saeed, 2007, p. 444).

The two words used by Saeed (2007) for the portrayal of Muslims by the Western media are negative and hostile. Despite the efforts by some prominent Muslim personalities to counter the negative reporting in the mainstream media, there is still continuance of such reporting. In the past few years, such negative reporting is generally associated with the Islamic State (ISIS) recruiting in Britain and the possibilities of British Muslims falling prey to ISIS recruitment for Syria. (Walt, 2015). In this context, media, especially the new media, has ironically led to the creation of conditions that do allow radicalisation, while it is the same media that reports on the radicalisation. It is by now established that terrorist groups based in the Middle East have been able to expand their influence and membership by utilising media to reach out to people across the world; this is especially the case with the ISIS which has managed to recruit a significant number of people from across the world including from the UK (Khan & Estrada, 2017). Internet and online chatrooms have provided opportunities to ISIS and similar organisations to reach out to a large number of people and recruit people in online environments (Khan & Estrada, 2017). Modern mass communication and Social Media technologies have allowed the spread of terrorism propaganda and facilitated the increase of the terror organisations’ memberships (Khan & Estrada, 2017). It does not matter anymore if terrorists are located in one place and they victimise people located in another, because the very essence of international terrorism is to harm “victims located in a different country or citizens of a different country than that in which terrorists originate” (Zimmermann, 2011, p. S153). Against this background, it is understandable that there is a section of the media that has reported on the issue of terrorism and Muslim populations in the UK because the major threat of international terrorism comes from Islamic terror groups based out of the Middle East. However, a question worth considering is how media reports on such terror related propaganda and how it links it to British Muslims. The case of Shamima Begum may be considered at this point, in how the case was reported in the media and how far the fact that Shamima Begum being a Muslim may have impacted reporting in the mainstream British media. Professor Lisa Downing writes that Shamima Begum’s criticism in the mainstream media and the negative public discourse surrounding her is due to her being a Muslim and a woman (Downing, 2019). Specifically, she notes:

“Other British citizens who have left the UK to join militant Islamic groups, including numerous male Jihadi fighters, have been allowed back into the country to face prosecution and deradicalization. A toxic nexus of misogyny and xenophobia is at play in discourses about Begum. As a figure perceived to be unemotional and unapologetic, she is illegible as a “proper” female subject. And as a woman of Asian and Muslim background and appearance, she may not inspire in the average Middle Englander on the omnibus (or in the SUV) the easy capacity for identification and forgiveness that a middle-class white teenager who had been radicalized at a young age might elicit. But, most damningly of all, we cannot ignore the fact that the irrational emotion of fear of the other is being not only encouraged by government ministers but also legitimated in acts that are potentially in breach of international law” (Downing, 2019).

Downing (2019) criticises the mainstream media, the public discourse as well as the government agencies for their treatment of Shamima Begum as hypocritical because she says that Shamima Begum would have received better treatment had she been a Muslim male ISIS fighter or a young White radical, in either of which cases her treatment would not have been so extreme. Our point here is restricted to the second criticism by Downing (2019), where she compares the case of Shamima Begum, a young radicalised Muslim girl, with that of radicalised White youth. According to Downing (2019), Shamima Begum has received more negative reporting from the media as well as harsher treatment from the government because she is a Muslim. Calling the treatment of Shamima Begum as that motivated by “cultivation of emotionalism and specifically of the emotion of fear”, Downing (2019) stresses that there is an increase in emotionalism and fear attached to Muslims in the UK. Left wing media has also been critical of Sajid Javid’s decisions with reference to Shamima. For instance, it has been said that Sajid Javid’s decisions were influenced by the right wing reporting in newspapers like The Sun and Telegraph (Roy, 2019). The Guardian takes a sympathetic approach to Shamima Begum as compared to right wing newspapers, that have taken a generally harsher stance on the issue. Siddique (2019) writes about the feelings of remorse that Shamima is having about publishing her desire to return to the UK. She also portrays a picture of a woman who is a young mother, afraid and wanting to return (Siddique, 2019). Another example of a sympathetic voice for Shamima is seen in the Liberal Democratic Voice, where Lindsay (2019) writes that the death of Shamima’s mother a year before Shamima made the decision to leave for Syria should be seen as a contributing factor for a bad decision and she be allowed to return to the UK. Shamima Begum’s case is also interesting because it led to the stripping of her citizenship, which may be seen as an extreme reaction to her radicalisation by the ISIS once she vocalised her desire to come back to the UK with her child. One of the areas based on which such decisions in the government and the negative reactions in the media can be seen is in the context of moral panic. Moral panic studies were first popularised by Stanley Cohen (Rohloff, Hughes, Petley, & Crichter, 2013). Moral panic has been explained as follows:

“The objects of normal moral panics are rather predictable; so too are the discursive formulae used to represent them. For example: They are new (lying dormant perhaps, but hard to recognize; deceptively ordinary and routine, but invisibly creeping up the moral horizon) – but also old (camouflaged versions of traditional and well-known evils). They are damaging in themselves – but also merely warning signs of the real, much deeper and more prevalent condition. They are transparent (anyone can see what’s happening) – but also opaque: accredited experts must explain the perils hidden behind the superficially harmless” (Cohen, 2011, p. viii).

Cohen (2011) provided four formulae that can be linked to moral panics and can also be linked to Muslims and their representations in the media in the context of reporting on terrorism as in the case of Shamima Begum. The first formula is that moral panic is a response to the ‘new’ in the society, in this case, something new being the radicalization of young British Muslims including teens like Shamima Begum. The media reports on this new event by constant reference Jihadi terror. The second formula is that although new, the event or phenomenon is also ‘old’ in some ways, which allows people to have a point of reference by which a moral panic can be created. This ‘old’ angle in the context of Muslims in the UK is their inherent ‘otherness’ in the English society wherein, not only are they different, but they are also represented as not being assimilated in the English culture and society (Long, 2010). Muslims have historically been considered to be the outsiders in the European society, with its history of the Crusades (Rohloff, Hughes, Petley, & Crichter, 2013). The third and fourth formulae of transparent and the opague can be seen in the interrelationship between terror and Muslims, and use of ‘expert’ testimonies as to Muslims being more prone to joining terror groups respectively. Media constantly uses these two points of reference, where the interlink between Islamic groups and terrorism is ‘transparent’ because it is obvious and the expert comments are seen to reinforce these obvious deductions of the media and public discourse. In the case of Shamima Begum, the fact that she is a young Muslim and a former ISIS bride lend to the moral panic that can be created through the mainstream media because all the elements of moral panic discussed above are present in the case. The fact that she is a part of the newly radicalized Muslim youth is the ‘new’, while her otherness as a Muslim is the ‘old’; the fact that she is a part of the Muslim community is the obvious link to her radicalization, while the opinion of experts, such as London Mayor Sajid Malik who stripped her of her citizenship is the opaque, which all lend to the creation of moral panic around her and increase public confidence in negative media reporting as well as decision of the government to strip her of her citizenship. Mass media has the potential to provide meaning and interpretations to events, which meanings can be picked up by a larger audience and then lead on to reactions in public discourse. Media reporting and narrative about events can lead to the “an ad infinitum chain of narratives” (Harris, 2014), which creates an impression that the event is really as big as the media is making it out to be. As the media can shape public perceptions and understandings of events and people, even though not always based in reality, the governments can use these perceptions to push through certain measures (Critcher, 2003). In the context of the Muslim community, the increased moral panic around the radicalisation of young Muslims has has translated into tougher laws and social control mechanisms that impact Muslims and also take steps like stripping Shamima Begum of her citizenship.

One may note that media also disproportionately reports certain events, as seen in the reporting on Al Zawahiri of al Qaeda, urging Muslims to undertake ‘lone wolf attacks’ against the Western society, which was reported vastly by the media (Reuters, 2015). Shamima Begum’s case has also been vastly reported in the mainstream media it the UK. In the aftermath of the 9/11 terror attacks as well, there was widespread media reporting on Islamic terror, which led to the decision of the government to deport a Muslim cleric because there were intelligence reports that he may be involved in terror. The case led to the decision of the House of Lords in Secretary of State v. Rehman, UKHL 47 (2001), where the House of Lords approved of the UK government decision to deport Rahman, which was critiqued by one academic writer as follows:

“Many expected that British courts would manifest the same deference to post 9/11 actions as they did to emergency measures taken during the two world wars. This pessimistic view was confirmed when a month after 9/11, the House of Lords unanimously upheld the decision of the Secretary of State to deport a Pakistan born Imam because the security service alleged that he was involved in terrorist activities (Roach, 2011, p. 239).

The reaction to Muslims involved in terror activities, like Shamima Begum, has been described as moral panics and media frenzies where the atypical case is compressed into general categories of crime control, where the explanatory theory is not based on a vast number of cases, but the measures are generalised (Cohen, 2011, p. x). The post 9/11 terror attacks reporting on Muslims in Europe and the west in general have seen a small number of cases being used to create a generally applicable crime control and social control measures, such as, immigration detention. Due to the generalised nature of the measures taken to counter the alleged problem, in this case, Islamic terror, there is a creation of measures such as detention which is used as social control mechanisms of the nature of sanctions, with Muslims more than any other community in the UK is affected by such measures (Siriyeh, 2014). Poole (2011) writes about the continuity of representation and changes in their representation in the British media post 9/11. He argues that although the negative portrayal of Muslims by the British media became more visible post 9/11, the representation of British Muslims in many key ways merely mark the continuity of the pre-9/11 representation of the British Muslims by the British media (Poole,, 2011). Poole’s (2011) argument is based on the premise that while 9/11 marks a watershed event, it did not change in particular how Muslims were represented in media, only it made the representation more visible and also in many ways more legitimised because “9/11 has been mobilised politically, on both sides, to legitimise specific agendas, accelerating their course, and with significantly negative effects” (p.50). Therefore, the agendas already existed, but 9/11 gave legitimacy to these agendas, be these political or socially oriented. Even prior to 9/11, negative reporting on the British Muslims was seen in the media as noted in the study on British media representations of British Muslims titled Reporting Islam: Media Representations of British Muslims (Poole,, 2011). The findings of the study were based on the quantitative analysis of two broadsheet newspapers, The Times and The Guardian in the period between 1994 to 1996 and the qualitative analysis of The Times and The Guardian and the two tabloids, The Daily Mail and The Sun from 1997 (Poole,, 2002). The findings indicate that the media in the period studied helped in those with political to play out these strategies in the public domain and there was negative portrayal of Muslims in the period before 9/11 as well (Poole,, 2011). This has led Poole (2011) to conclude that the post 9/11 coverage of Muslims is merely a continuum of the existing representations of Muslims in the media. The study by Poole (2002) shows that in the period studied, there were 6,507 articles about Islam in general and 837 articles about British Muslims, with the articles reporting on British Muslims with a homogenising effect along with Muslims around the world. The dominant themes in the media coverage at this time were related to “Muslims’ involvement in deviant activities threatens security in the UK, Muslims are a threat to British mainstream values and thus provoke integrative concerns, there are inherent cultural differences between Muslims and the host community which creates tensions in interpersonal relations and Muslims are increasingly making their presence felt in the public sphere” (Poole,, 2011, p. 52). The dominant topics of coverage with related to British Muslims in the media prior to 9/11 were politics, criminality, relationships, education and fundamentalism (Poole,, 2011). Even in the period before 9/11, the media coverage on Muslims in Britain and not just British Muslims were related to the topic of fundamentalism or Islamic extremism, with there being a focus on the activities of Muslims in Britain related to fund raising or other activities in support of Islamic extremists anywhere in the world (Poole,, 2011). With relation to this coverage, there were also juxtaposition of immigration policy in the UK and the activities of the Muslim immigrants that were related to fundamentalism (Poole,, 2011).

Irrespective of the continuities in British press with respect to negative reporting on the Muslims, in one respect 9/11 marked an important shift in the nature of negative reporting with the coverage on British Muslims generally focused on the link between Islam and terrorism (Poole,, 2011). As noted by Poole (2011), portrayal of Islam in a negative sense and its link to terrorism was always a part of media reporting in the UK even prior to 9/11, however in some ways 9/11 marked an important shift with respect to British Muslims:

“Whilst this was clearly the prevailing image of global Islam prior to 9/11, British Muslims were not directly attributed with this label ... Rather, it was Muslims in Britain; exiles, dissidents and asylum seekers, who were categorized as extremists. Suggestions of covert activity, such as raising funds for political groups abroad, were made as were links to the wider Muslim community but the physical threat remained at a distance. This shift occurred immediately following September 11th when coverage converged dramatically around three major topics: terrorism, counter terrorism measures and discrimination against Muslims” (p. 54).

Thus, 9/11 does seem to have played an important role in negativizing of British Muslims; before 9/11 happened, reporting of Islamic terrorism was done in the context of Muslims elsewhere as being involved in terrorism with no particular focus on British Muslims. However, after 9/11, British media turned focus on British Muslims. Research indicates that in 2008 alone, there were nineteen articles in the press on terrorism focused on the domestic context, with police raids on British Muslims forming the core of the reporting and coverage in this period (Poole,, 2011). In these reports, there were use of specific terms that linked terrorism to British Muslims, such as, “bombers”, “Islamic fundamentalists”, “violent Muslim fanatics”, and “Islamic extremists” (Poole,, 2011). The use of these terms can demonise a community and its members. The coverage of British Muslims who were found implicated in terror attacks also suffer from the use of such terminology which emphasises on their foreign roots, although these people are British by nationality. For instance, in covering the Glasgow airport attacks in which the defendants were doctors, The Sun referred to the defendants, Dr. Bilal Abdulla as “an Iraqi born in Britain” and his “Saudi- born pal” (Hughes, 2008). Such terminology seeks to emphasise on the characteristics of the defendants as being foreign born or foreign even though they are British. This is a pattern of otherisation in the media reports on the British Muslims post 9/11. The pattern of otherisation with respect to the British Muslims can be seen in the use of the term “preachers of hate” by the British tabloid press. This has been noted as follows:

“ “preachers of hate” to describe Muslim clerics who preach an anti-Western message. Rarely, the term is applied to someone outside Islam if they are deemed “extreme” enough. For example, it has been used to describe the leader of the extreme American Christian group, the Westboro Church, Fred Phelps. The term was not applied to Geert Wilders, the anti Islamic Dutch MP, who could be accused of “hate speech” (Poole,, 2011, p. 57).

Therefore, the use of more negative terminology may be more easily followed in the case of Muslims whereas the similar negative terms may be used with relation to non-Muslims only if the case is serious or extreme enough. Moreover, research indicates that with relation to non-Muslims, particularly white British in group, the press uses more positive representation in order to contrast them with the more negatively portrayed out group of Muslims (Poole,, 2011). Savage (2008) writes about the tolerance of the British people as compared to Muslims when she writes that “People in this country do all they can to understand the Muslim way of life” and contrasts this with Muslims who are not as tolerant (p. 47). Another study conducted by Bleich, Stonebraker, Nisar, and Abdelhamid (2015) confirm the findings of Poole (2002; 2011). This study considered how British Muslims were portrayed in the print media in the period from 2001 to 2012. The objective of the study was to test the scholarly propositions made out in several studies that Muslims are depicted by the media in a systematically negative way (Bleich, Stonebraker, Nisar, & Abdelhamid, 2015). The authors of the study compared the tone of newspaper headlines and also compared the portrayal of Muslims against that of Jews and Christians in the same media (Bleich, Stonebraker, Nisar, & Abdelhamid, 2015). While the authors of the study found that there is no evidence to support the contention that the negative portrayal of Muslims is consistently seen in the British media as a whole; they did find that there was a difference in tone of headlines in right-leaning newspapers and left-leaning newspapers, with the former being generally more negative than the latter (Bleich, Stonebraker, Nisar, & Abdelhamid, 2015). They also found that Muslims are consistently portrayed more negatively than Jews and frequently more negatively than Christians (Bleich, Stonebraker, Nisar, & Abdelhamid, 2015). While the authors themselves write that they do not think that Muslims are consistently portrayed negatively, it may be argued that the fact that they are consistently portrayed more negatively than Jews and Christians is also relevant to claiming that there is a consistent negative portrayal of Muslims in the British media. In yet another recent study in portrayal of Muslims in the media, the claims of consistent negative portrayal of Muslims in the media are confirmed (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). This study conducts a meta-analysis of 345 published studies to examine the media’s role in construction of a Muslim and Islamic identity (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). The study found that a significantly vast number of studies cover Western countries and ignore Muslim countries and Muslim media (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). The meta-study also found that that Muslims are generally framed negatively and Islam is dominantly portrayed as a violent religion (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). Interestingly, the study points out that the anti-Muslim discourse in the Western media started with the Iranian Revolution in 1979, and then became more vituperative during the crises in Libya and the Middle East in the 1980s, subsequent wars in Iraq in the 1990s, 9/11 in 2001, and further wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in the wake of 9/11 and the ensuing ‘war on terror’ (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). The study also points out that perceptions of Islam made out in the media are generally to the point that Islam is opposed to democracy and is a threat to the West (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). The findings of this study show that media portrayals of Muslims tend to show that Muslims and terrorism are associated, and that the reporting on such association becomes more prominent after a major terrorist event in the society (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). The study points out that the more negative construction of Muslims in the media as terrorists and the conflation of Islamic beliefs as terrorism became more apparent after the London terror attacks and the Glasgow International Airport attack in 2007, thus supporting the view that local terror events lead to the increase in negative portrayal of Muslims as terrorists or Islam as a supporter of terrorism (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017).

The portrayal of war in Muslim countries is also an important area where the Muslims may be portrayed negatively. This is especially relevant where the war may involve the army of the country itself as in the case of the United States, where researchers have found that as compared to a more humanistic foreign media, the “US media used pro-war and anti-Muslim/Arab frames, while the media outside of the USA were anti-war and more humanistic in their portrayals—examples include the results of a visual framing analysis for the Afghan war in the International Herald Tribune and Al-Hayat” (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017, p. 233).

Muslims as ‘unwanted’ immigrants, asylum seekers

UK faces a similar experience as other European countries and the US and Australia, in that there is an increase in immigration from Asia and Africa, which has led to demographic changes and the focusing of the issue of identities and the ‘us’ versus ‘them’ debate, where the Muslims are portrayed as the ‘other’ (Wodak & Boukala, 2014). The issue of immigration being linked inextricably to identity, where European identity is seen as different and distinct from the Asian or Arab Muslims (Wodak & Boukala, 2014). As discourse on immigration has become increasingly situated within the bipolarity of European and other identities, focus on Muslim immigrants with negative perceptions associated with Muslim immigration has increased, as noted by one author:

“Prior to September 11, 2001 there was but scant empirical research on newspaper representations of Muslims with the vast majority of work employing non-systematic anecdotal evidence in order to illustrate general trends in media coverage. It was of course after this date that newspapers began to dedicate an unprecedented amount of space, time and attention to British Muslims, their differences from the ingroup and the threats they allegedly pose to the ingroup. Muslims have never before occupied such a central position in the British media (Jaspal & Cinnirella, 2010, p. 289).

After the events of September 11, 2001, media in the UK as well as other Western countries have been more vocal on Muslims, the differences between Muslims and the rest of the people, and the threats that are allegedly posed to the rest by the ever present jihadi elements (Jaspal & Cinnirella, 2010). As noted by Jaspal and Cinnirella (2010), “Muslims have never before occupied such a central position in the British media… This perhaps explains the primarily negative ‘hypervisibility’ of Muslims across the media, which has encouraged social representations of negativity and threat” (p.289). The use of language in media, be these in the reporting by the media or the comments of the political leaders reported in the media, can be influential in mirroring the direction of the pubic discourse as well. Both politicians and media use language and specific words that express the contemporary political and social events, directed at creating an impact it the society or reinforcing the existing public discourse (Johnson & Ensslin, 2007). Politicians can also use language for personalising or polarising issues that already resonate with the public (Hjarvard, 2013, p. 8). With this in the background, one may note the discourse in the media on the issue of immigration as a representation of the public opinion as well. A now infamous speech by then British Prime Minister David Cameroon is relevant to the discourse on Muslim immigrants, in which speech he described the Syrians as ‘swarms of migrants’ who were trying to break into the UK (The Migration Observatory, 2013). In this context the word ‘swarms’ has been likened to ‘Flood’, ‘Influx’, or ‘Wave’, all words that have been used to describe Muslim refugees in the period prior to Cameroon’s speech (The Migration Observatory, 2013). Similarly, in Australia and the UK, the terms “unwanted invader”, has been used to describe Muslim immigrants and refugees (Parker, 2015). Another label often used in the media reports on refugees from Islamic countries is ‘boat people’, which also emphasises on the surreptitious nature of the entry of the Muslim refugees into the UK (Taylor, 2015).

The interchangeable use of negative terms to describe Muslim immigrants and refugees in the British media, is a reflection on the anti- immigration public discourse played out in political speeches as well as private discourse in the UK which sees refugees as illegal immigrants, and “interlopers” (Greenslade, 2005, p. 5). Similar terms have been used to describe refugees from Eastern Europe in an earlier period as ‘waves’ (Cap, 2016, p. 6). The language used in this context signifies the fear that is perceived in public discourse as to the incoming of the Muslim refugees and immigrants (Cap, 2016). Media has also reported on the negative perceptions of Muslims and this has also affected the discourse on immigrants and asylum seekers from troubled Muslim countries like Syria. National security has become a regular part of the discourse on Muslims and immigration even with relation to asylum seekers (Wodak & Boukala, 2014). Literature indicates that there is a tendency in the media to portray Muslims as the ‘dangerous others’, and using this discourse for restrictive immigration with relation to immigrants and refugees from Muslim countries (Wodak & Boukala, 2014). This is similar to the discourse on Muslims in the US where President Trump passed a travel ban order related only to specific Islamic countries (BBC News, 2017). In the US, the media portrayal of Muslims has generally led to impacts on policy from the early 20th century, as seen in the media support for the Zionist cause and opposition to Arab states in the 1950s, which prompted the US to stay overtly committed to Zionism even while having significant oil interests in the Arab states (Hahn, 2005, p. 22). The liberal media’s anti-Arab discourse has often led to policy making in the US, which is a response to negative portrayal of Muslims in the media (Hahn, 2005, p. 24; Dunsky, 2008). Media is not only used in a negative sense to create a more negativized perception of Muslim communities, but also for creating positive perceptions about Muslim communities, in which task, Muslim communities themselves have started using media for the purpose of increasing positive perceptions of Muslims in media (Sian, Law, & Sayyid, 2012). Muslim scholarship has played a role in fostering positive perceptions about British Muslim men and developing new orientalism (Dwyer, Shah, & Sanghera, 2008; el‐Aswad, 2013). In this respect, Muslim intellectuals have tried to deconstruct Islam so that there is more clarity in the general public about Islam as well as the concept of jihad, which is largely misunderstood in Western media (el‐Aswad, 2013). In order to counter the negative perceptions created in the media about Muslims in general, scholars and religious leaders are involved in consistent and regular public discourse against extremism (el‐Aswad, 2013).

Muslim communities in the UK are also involved in creating an alternate social life or social programmes, such as the Forum Against Islamophobia and Racism (FAIR), a charitable organisation, which works towards creating awareness of the Muslim community in the UK (FAIR, 2017). Internet and information technology is a positive development in this respect because the Muslim community has increasingly used these technologies for the purpose of dissemination of knowledge and information on Islam and British Muslims and dispelling media created perceptions about British Muslims (Sisler, 2011). At the same time, these new technologies have also made it easier to spread negative perceptions about Muslims because non-curated information can easily be spread through these new Media technologies.

Muslims posing threat to culture, religion

It is noted that in British media, British Muslims are often portrayed as ‘aliens’ irrespective of their association with the country (Saeed, 2007). He notes remarks made by journalist and reporters in their coverage on British Muslims to support the view that British media views Muslims with suspicion and concern (Saeed, 2007). For instance, he notes one comment made by former editor of The Times, Charles Moore, who wrote that “Britain is basically English speaking, Christian and white, and if one starts to think it might become basically Urdu speaking and Muslim and brown, one gets frightened” (Saeed, 2007, p. 445). The comment does not merely problematise Muslims on the basis of security, but also culture, which is the two-pronged threat perception related to British Muslims. By referring to the problem of Muslim immigration in terms of colour, race and language as Charles Moore has done, the media coverage turns the discourse on Muslims in the UK into a complex debate on national security, demographics, and culture. The terming of Britain as an “English speaking, Christian and White country”, others those who do not conform to this dominant characterisation of what it means to be British. As noted by Saeed (2007) “‘British’ is practically ‘quasi-ethnic’ in its close identification with whiteness. He goes on to claim that the right of individuals and communities to be culturally different in Britain is often neglected in favour of the expectation that they be absorbed or assimilated into the homogeneous host culture” (p.446). Therefore, Muslims who are un-British, are seen as a problematic community to begin with. Added to that, the reality of 9/11 and post 9/11 terror attacks, Muslims are also seen as a community that needs to be seen with suspicion and some fear or threat. Muslims are thus seen to be threatening in two respects, security related and cultural (Jaspal & Cinnirella, 2010). Media is also responsible to a degree for leading to this state of negative perceptions around Muslims. There are two ways in which media may contribute to the generation of negative perceptions about Muslims. First, interactions between journalists and the public leads to the development of public identities and actions (Johnson & Ensslin, 2007, p. 5). Second, media coverage around events often includes statements given by influential leaders and politicians, which may be directed at the public and does at times, find resonance with the public (Hjarvard, 2013, p. 8). Such journalistic interactions with the public as well as statements of influential leaders and politicians can lead to creation of perceptions, or reinforcement of existing perceptions that people may already have, but which may not be justified in reality (Johnson & Ensslin, 2007; Hjarvard, 2013). Despite the gap between the reality and the perception created through media reporting and coverage of events, at times the public opinion created through such perceptions may be so strong that the government may be able to use this to drive policies and structure laws to the disadvantage of the vilified community. Coming back to the hybridised threat perception of Muslims as being threats to both the security of the nation as well as culture of the ingroups, the relevant question is whether media plays a role in creating this two-pronged threat perception around the Muslim communities in the UK. There are two areas in the context of which this threat perception can be studied: the first is the media reporting after 9/11 and Westminster Bridge attacks; and the second is the media reporting related to the cultural threat posed by Muslims to the ingroups in the UK.

The focus on education also was one of the areas in which media has reported on Muslims in the pre-9/11 period in a negative light. The issue of Muslim religious Education in schools and public funding was one of the issues that were constantly taken up in the media, with there being an emphasis on the reporting by the conservative press that Britain being a Christian country Muslims must adapt their ways (Poole,, 2011). Muslims represented diversity but the need for assimilation of Muslims in the mainstream was stressed on which can be linked to the cultural threat that is perceived from Muslims by some sections of the media. Only The Guardian advocated secular pluralism and countered any religious instruction in schooling of any kind including the Islamic or Christian (Poole,, 2011). For this, The Guardian has been criticised for “exclusive liberalism” (Poole,, 2011). Therefore, it may be said that those newspapers or journalists who take to reporting more positively on Muslims, may be targeted for their views by other conservative journalists or in the general public discourse. This is significant because research indicates that there is quantitative evidence to show that the conservative press were more vociferous than the liberal press in their coverage on Muslims and Islam (Poole,, 2011). There was also more coverage on Muslims and Islam in the broadsheet press as compared to tabloids as is indicated by The Times having 162 references to Islam and Muslims and The Sun having only sixty two references in the period studied (Poole,, 2011). Another area of negative media portrayal of Muslims, which has significance to the perceived threat to culture from Muslims, is that of portrayal of mosques (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). It is noted that how Islam is constructed in news media content by political actors is also related to debates on mosque-building, where political actors and part of media may “present local facts to a national readership” and generate fears of threat to local culture through the building of mosques (Ahmed & Matthes, 2017). The discourse on mosques as well as Islamic education has increasingly become more focused on how these pose threats to local culture and religion. In this context, Islam is portrayed as a foreign religion and the building of mosques is seen as a way to infuse a foreign way of life and religion in British towns and villages. One may recall the earlier discussed two-pronged threat that is perceived from the Muslims in UK, the first being a security related threat, and the second being a threat to culture. The negative portrayal of mosques as well as Islamic education in the media relates to the threat that is perceived in cultural sense. However, there is also a security related angle here because media reports also at times lead to conclusions that mosques are being used to preach hate against the local cultures and religion.

Based on the study conducted through meta-analysis, the following conclusion was noted by Ahmed and Matthes (2017), which is relevant here:

“with the incidents of 9/11 acting as a catalyst, media discourse evoked Said’s Orientalist approach for constructing meanings and identities of Muslims as the ‘others’ in liberal societies. The events of 9/11 had an effect on the Western world’s perception about Muslims and Islam. Post 9/11, the international media focused intensively on Muslims and Islam and the Middle East in particular. Furthermore, the murder of Theo Van Gogh (2004) and the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy (2005) raised the question of Muslim integration in non-Muslim-majority societies, while the bombings in Madrid (2004), London (2005), Toronto (2006), Mumbai (2006), and Glasgow (2007) highlighted the threat of Muslim extremism globally. Correspondingly, we found numerous studies to follow 9/11, migration, terrorism, and war themes” (p. 235).

To conclude this chapter, it is noted that there are three areas where negative perceptions of Muslims in the media discourse reflects on the social practice or social discourse on Muslims in the UK. The first relates to the increasing portrayal of Muslims as a suspect community in the context of terrorism. The second relates to the negative portrayal of Muslim refugees as swarms or hordes into the UK. The third relates to the negative portrayal of Muslims as threatening to local culture and religion and their lack of assimilation into the British culture.

Discussion and Analysis

From the perspective of the critical analysis of discourse, it may be noted that interactions between media and the public can mirror the public discourse or also lead to the “development of identities and actions” (Johnson & Ensslin, 2007, p. 5). The findings of this research have shown that the language used in media is generally negative and reinforces generally held opinions and perceptions about Muslims in the UK. Language such as ‘preachers of hate’, ‘swarms of immigrants’ and other negative terminology reinforces negative stereotypes of Muslims. Literature indicated that “preachers of hate” that was devised by the British tabloid press and it conflates Islamic religious contexts with the threat from terrorism, which is perceived to be based on the security related threat that is posed by Jihadi terrorism. When Muslim clerics are posited as “preachers of hate”, it is easy to conflate Islam and mosques with terrorist activity (Poole,, 2011). As similar terminology is not used to describe religious leaders from Jewish or Christian backgrounds, although they too may be involved in hate speech, it is mosques and not other religious institutions that become portrayed as places where evil is preached. The media’s role in this context is important here because the media also portrays mosques in negative light. Opposition to the building of mosques, as against lack of similar opposition to other places of worship even amongst minorities, suggest that there is a negative perception of mosques which may be related to the threat perceived from establishment of mosques not just in the context of security but also in the context of cultural threats. Similarly, use of words such as ‘swarms’, ‘hordes’, etc, with reference to immigrants and refugees suggests that there is a terminology of fear that is applied to the Muslim immigrants coming in to the UK. This fear related terminology is reflective of the political discourse on immigration as well as the public discourse on immigration. The discourse on Muslims in the media in the post 9/11 period can be related to the ‘suspect community’ thesis proposed by Pantazis and Pemberton (2009) who wrote about Muslims being the new suspect community. Earlier, similar assertions were made for the Irish in the UK. However, in the period after 9/11, public discourse on Muslims has become much more vocalised around the fears of Muslims being perpetrators of terrorism in the UK. Literature considered in this dissertation has indicated that there is a more generalised perception around the Muslim communities in the UK being susceptible to terrorism (Jaspal & Cinnirella, 2010; Ahmad & Evergeti, 2010; Ahmed & Matthes, 2017).

From a critical discourse perspective, it can be argued that the use of negative language in the media is a reflection of the dominant perspectives of the public discourse, which are then mirrored in the media discourse (Leeuwen, 2015). Seen from this perspective, it can then be seen as to how the media discourse is used to reinforce already existing discourse on the Muslim communities in the UK. Some support for this argument can be found in the work of Poole (2011), who has shown that the post 9/11 reporting on Muslims in the UK merely continues existing stereotypes and discourse, which only became more agenda driven after 9/11. It may be inferred from this that it is not that 9/11 led to the increase in negative perceptions around the Muslims and their link to terrorism and fundamentalism; but that such perceptions were already there and these were only reinforced further and became more apparent in the post 9/11 discourse.

Conclusion and recommendations

There were two research questions that were posed in the beginning of this research:

How does the media portray Muslims in the UK in general? Do the Media portray Muslims in a negative or a positive manner?

How far does the media portrayal of Muslim impact popular perceptions and reflect perceptions of the community in the UK?

With respect to the first question, this dissertation concludes that the portrayal of Muslims in the British media is generally negative. The dissertation also found that those media sources that tend to be liberal towards the portrayal of Muslims, are attacked for their liberal views by the more conservative media and sections of public. With respect to the second question, this research found that the CDA method would indicate that the portrayal of Muslims in the media is a reflection on the social practice itself. Discourse in the media is reflective of the public and private discourse as well, because discourse is an extension of text (Leeuwen, 2015). One recommendation for future research in this same field is to conduct a quantitative research into the link between media reports and social practice from the perspective of Critical Discourse Analysis. In this dissertation, the analysis was qualitative in nature and was conducted by desk based research. While this method has allowed us to consider the literature, one limitation of this method is that it does not provide us with generalisable findings as to the link between the text and the social practice. From the perspective of CDA, it would be relevant to conduct a future research with the quantitative method, for instance, through a survey instrument which may be used to collate media reports and the language used in the media with the social practice or language.

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