Islamophobia

Course Description

A very topical issue, Islamophobia, the fear or hatred of Muslims, takes all sort of forms. This session is divided into three parts. The first part provides the theoretical input about Islamophobia, the second part will give participants the opportunity to think about and reflect on instances of Islamphobia in everyday life, and school practices. The session closes with Ted Talks by Muslims who share their direct experiences of Islamophobia.

Estimated Lesson Duration: 40 minutes

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Learning Outcomes

By the end of the session participants will be able to:

Define Islamophobia;
Describe experiences they deem Islamophobic and identify what makes them so;
Make a list of actions that can be taken (including organising activities) to combat Islamophobia in schools and in their community.

The Session

Introduction

Go over the PPT presentation. The first few slides highlight how Islamophobia is disseminated.. Theoretical aspects of Islamophobia are then discussed. What is Islamophobia exactly? When is a comment fair and when is it Islamophobic? What instigated anti-Muslim prejudice? How is this sustained?

Activity 1: Islamophobic or Fair Comment

Work out the Islamophobic or fair comment worksheet using Modood’s guidelines that are on the last slide of the PPT Presentation

Activity 2: Identifying instances of Islamophobia

Now that you have a better idea of what constitutes Islamophobia, browse through some newspaper articles and Facebook pages and identify instances of Islamophobia.

Do you think you have ever encountered it at school? Islamophobia could be present is these instances, to mention a few:

Curricular material (e.g. Poetry, stories, history and others)

Policies (e.g. Muslim students cannot go and pray in another room)

Teacher/SMT/Parent/Student talk

Activity 3: Addressing Islamophobia in the School Setting

Read “Addressing Islamophobia in Schools”

Read “Addressing Islamophobia creatively in the classrooms”

Activity 4: Combating Islamophobia Case Studies

Choose a case study. Identify Islamophobia, and also provide an alternative solution/action etc to combat Islamophobia.

Case study 1: It is break time. Children are running and playing in the yard. A boy is running and pushes a girl out of the way. The girl falls and grazes her knee. She goes to the teacher, tells her what happened, and is sent to put some water on the graze. The teacher calls the boy. “Abdul, why did you push Cara? Did you know you hurt her? You must treat girls with respect.” Abdul says simply that he was running and did not want the others to catch him. The teacher gives him a punishment. She then turns to the other teacher and says, “These Arabs are all the same. They have no respect for women. They beat up their wives. Who knows what this kid has been exposed to?” The other teachers agree with her.

Case study 2: Karen has been married to Faisal for a few years. She gradually learnt about Islam and decided to convert. It took her a long time to put on her hijab. Her parents, none too pleased about her decision to convert, were horrified at the idea that Karen wears the hijab. Karen, aware of people’s reactions waited until she changed schools to wear the scarf so that it would be the only way she is known. On her first day at school, another teacher told her, “Why don’t you go and teach at Mariam Albatool?” She later heard other teachers discussing her, saying that she must have been forced to put on the hijab, as otherwise it would be crazy to force it on yourself.

Case study 3: A Muslim Year 7 student was called a terrorist by his teacher at a Middle School. The student laughed at a scene from a movie that was being screened for the class, and the teacher said “I wouldn’t be laughing if I was you.” Asked why, the teacher responded, “because we all think you’re a terrorist.” Other students then began adding their own jokes implying the twelve-year-old was a terrorist such as, “You have bombs” and “I can see the bombs.”