Responding to Islamophobia: British Muslims “Talk Back” to the UK

Abstract

This study explores how second and third generation Muslims in Britain resist calls to become “normal” good Muslims and are less willing to respond to accusations of “clashing civilizations,” and instead seek to unapologetically assert their particularized racial and religious difference through cultural expressions of dissatisfaction. I analyze forms of British Muslim cultural production, including visual art, fashion, music, and poetry including a focus on forms particularly expressed on digital platforms. Social media, for example, offers a new discursive landscape where British Muslims are actively using aesthetic driven communities to produce self-expressed visual content. I look at how these forms of sub-cultural expression function as sites of contestation, where Muslim minorities reframe their experiences, challenge dominant messages about their group identity, problematize the essentialism of Muslims, and construct a counter-public—a distinct British Muslim public discourse and cultural narrative specific to Muslims in Britain.