Muriel’s wedding: News media representations of Europe’s first female suicide terrorist

Abstract

Muriel Degauque is reported as Europe’s first female suicide bomber, as such her life and death were covered in a wide variety of media. Given this combination, of coverage and non-standard profile, this article seeks to explore to what extent she and her death are defined by her ‘Muslimness’ and by her ‘sex’ in the news media. The construction of Muriel Degauque and her death in the news media can tell us something about our relationship to sex, security and religion as well as to the stability and hegemony of dominant social discourses. This article will demonstrate that the coverage of Muriel Degauque and her death is organised through three interlocking themes of gender, security and religion that combine in a particular trajectory to present her as ‘Other’. Indeed, it concludes that Degauque was fitted into the media mould because of her Islamic identity, and despite of her sex and white European heritage.