Institutionalised Islamophobia in British universities

Abstract

This thesis is a conceptual study of institutionalised Islamophobia in British universities. Myanalysis is illustrated, although not driven, by exemplars drawn from fieldwork undertaken infour case study universities.The thesis is situated in the paradoxical context of increasing provisions for Muslim studentsthat occurred throughout the 1990s while simultaneously fears of Muslim student'fundamentalism' on campus were also on the increase and resulted in targeted action by theNational Union of Students, the Committee for Vice-Chancellors and Principals, and a numberof individual universities concerned about the possible threat to campus harmony posed byMuslim students.Employing a conceptual vocabulary influenced by anti-foundationalism and psychoanlysis, Iexplore the ways in which racialised governmentality is exercised over Muslim students. Thisanalysis includes consideration of the functions of formal multiculturalist practices asstrategies for the governance of bodies, and through which racialised exercise of disciplinarypower over Muslim students can be exercised. The thesis begins with a generalconsideration of the reasons why perceived distinct changes to the ways in which Muslimsarticulate their identities should so often be seen as potentially transgressive or disruptive, Itthen proceeds to an analysis of the ways in which Muslim students are constructed throughinstitutional practices, paying particular attention to strategies for stabilising representations ofMuslims, whiteness and the west which range from lslamophobic hoaxing to lslamophobicviolence