This article explores my teaching experiences that informed my distinction between religious literacy and critical religious literacy, ultimately leading to the creation of the Challenge Islamophobia Project. I highlight the impacts of post-9/11 criminalization and dehumanization of Muslims, which have significantly shaped public perceptions of…

In this paper, I insert the importance of teaching race through Middle Eastern America and Muslim America. By bringing in critical analysis of Middle Eastern America and Muslim America, I offer theoretical insights and pedagogical strategies in the education curriculum to teach race that will deconstruct, destabilize, and interrogate the dominant…

The UK Government's PREVENT strategy to counter radicalisation and extremism has been the subject of criticism. Concerns arise over clarity of purpose, clarity of terminology used and potential human rights impacts. Where the policy engages with schools, one human right potentially engaged is the right of parents to transfer their religious…

From the assumed physical threat of a ceremonial Kirpan in an elementary school carried by a Sikh child, to the fictional possibility of rich, Arab, Muslim University students utilising their implicitly understood patriarchal power to subjugate all women from access to common swimming pools, Canada has become increasingly replete with examples of…

If Islam continues to evoke skepticism, as it has done most intensely since 9/11, then it stands to reason that its tenets and education are viewed with equal mistrust, and as will be highlighted in this special issue, equal misunderstanding. The intention of this special edition is neither to counter the accusations Islam stands accused of, nor…

Terrorism is not new. It has existed since the beginning of recorded history and more particularly after the Second World War Terrorist activities have been witnessed around the world. These attacks have multiplied since the terrorist attack on the United States of America on September 11 2001. In recent times in Nigeria, the unity of the country…

The intent of this series is to generate a space for critical reflection and inquiry on a burgeoning form of sociopolitical labor of schooling, that of educating against "extremism." In the United States' ongoing "War on Terror" being waged across the Middle East, North and East Africa, and South Asia, formal and informal…

The oil-rich northern districts of Iraq were long considered a reflection of the country with a diversity of ethnic and religious groups: Arabs, Turkmen, Kurds, Assyrians, and Yezidi, living together and portraying Iraq's demographic make-up. Yet the territory has suffered from heightening ethno-political influence and sectarianism throughout its…

The purpose of this paper is to study Naqvi's novel, "Home Boy" (2010) as a Neo Orientalist discourse of US officials about Pakistani Muslims. This paper will discuss how US officials including that of G. W. Bush perceive the Oriental world -- by using the same strategy -- as one distinguished by strangeness, creepiness, and unusual…

Research data show that religion plays a role in the activization of extremist behavior among young people in Dagestan, but that it is a relatively small one. The usual kinds of expression of social protest over difficult material conditions and social injustice, along with manifestations of criminality, are finding religious justification in the…

In the final eleven months of its five-year term, the Coalition Government placed much emphasis in the education system on what it called fundamental British values (FBV). The phrase had its origins in counter-terrorism strategies that were of dubious validity both conceptually and operationally, and the trigger for its introduction into the…

Since the terrorist atrocities of September 11, 2001, Westerners have been challenged to understand the ideological and theological concepts, derived from Islam, that motivated the actions of Al-Qaida on that day and in other attacks before and since. Differences in taxonomy have proven to be a major issue. In the author's view, it is insufficient…

"Trojan Horse" has become journalistic shorthand for an apparent attempt by a small group in East Birmingham to secure control of local non-faith schools and impose policies and practices in keeping with the very conservative (Salafist and Wahhabi) version of Islam which they hold. In this article, Pat Yarker gives an account of two…

This article presents a critical media literacy technique for teaching about the social construction of terrorism. In a post-9/11 context where the human rights of Arabs and Muslims in the United States and overseas are threatened by drone attacks, profiling, detentions, and hate crimes, educators must not shy away from this issue. I use visual…

While much research has considered the way Muslims are represented in the mass media in recent years, there has been little exploration of the way Muslims and Islam are discussed in U.S. public schools. This article considers how Muslims and Islam are represented in educational standards, textbooks, and supplementary resources, with an eye to the…