International Conference on Islam, Media and Communication (ICIMaC2017)

The 2016 Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s candidacy and win fundamentally transformed the relationships between Muslim identity, media, and culture. Following Trump’s win, many wondered how polls, news, entertainment, mainstream and social media shape the Muslim cultural identity and their everyday life. Media discourses on Muslim identity and social integration often fuelled by an anti-Muslim political culture or the politics of anti-extremism. Because the media commonly set their agenda around these sociopolitical discourses, a large part of Islamic culture and everyday life of Muslims remain obscured. Moreover, there is a sense in which Muslims have, in some studies and reports, reduced to a function of their religion while other dimensions of their identity and experience have been ignored. Therefore, this conference seeks to answer such questions as:

• How do media shape our understanding of Muslim identity and culture?

• What role did/can media play in constructing/destructing Muslim identity and culture?

• How do news, media, and entertainment outlets set their agenda and portray Muslims and Islamic culture?

• What kinds of methodological approaches adopted by scholars to examine Muslim identity politics from various socioeconomic, religiopolitical, and cultural backdrops?

• What kinds of media texts and pedagogical approaches can we use in the classroom to contextualise the development of Muslim identity surrounding such events as an election campaign, intellectual discourse on Islamophobia, global terrorism, and intercultural communication, while providing important spaces of discussion, conversation, and exchange?