Media and Islamic Representation

Cultural representation is a theoretical credence to the socially constructed identity of any object, while language and media is in many occasions the tool of that construction. Some analyst have noted that the terrorist attack of the September 11, 2001 spark the viral conception of “Islamphobia”, “Islamic Terrorism”, and “Muslim Fanatics” (Akbarzadeh and Smith, 2005) while others believe that it has been a western historical orientation, where Muslims are constructed and represented by the essentialist as other, immature, and backward ethics. The later and the former are unanimous. Deductively, the media has successfully represented Islam and the Muslims to the world as fanatics, fundamentalist, terrorist, and orthodox (Dunn, 2001). Cultural theorists believe that there is a strong nexus between the development of society, culture and the media, hence media is an influential tool that enliven social construction of identity; cultural representation. Interpretatively, what people do, affect what media say, and vice versa. Precisely, Hall (1997) regards media as a representational system with a potential capability of constructing and transmitting cultural identity.  Essentially with these theoretical postulations it is rightful to deduct that Medias are societal mirror that project a particular societal/cultural representation of a particular object.  According to Hall (1997), media applicably present and represent societal cultures, and the interpretation of media (TV programmes, Photograph, Entertainment and Music) is a cultural function that is bound to be unitary and unanimous.  Corroboratively with the Hall (1997) anthropological promulgation of language as a media and that media function through and for representation of human culture. Consistently, Mokhlis (2006) positively maintain that religion is an inseparable part of human culture that inherently affect their lifestyle and use of information. Apparently, religion is affectively capable of monitoring human emotional, cognitive and psychological transactions, depending on their level of affection and commitments.

Individual perception and believe are characterized by several demographic factors, such as educational background, social and cultural environments (Akbarzadeh and Smith, 2005).  Meanwhile, Poole, (2002) behold that media is an influential and powerful institution that opine the construction and implementation of cultural knowledge. Additionally, media itself contribute meaningfully to the societal source of information and knowledge, and its reportage (media content) relay on the vulnerable editorial decisions, which can indulge the framing of media content and sometimes availing the media content for an unconventional usage. A very good example of such manipulation is the account of the presently prevailing world media stereotyping of Islam and Muslims (Akbarzadeh and Smith, 2005).

To some extent, theorists believe that the conventional function of media surpass religious affiliations but still, the daily output of the entire media today, can be conspicuously associated to religiosity, thus it is arguable that religion and media are functionally connected. In fact, it is historically believed that Media was initially spawned purposefully for religious usage (Soukup, 2002). The “media output” as according to Soukup, is what the essays of (Hoijer, 2011; and Sanson, et al. 2000) referred as the intrinsic nature of media responsibility to actively compose, construct, shape, present and educate the societal perception of the world. Although, this societal or cultural perception construction by media can psychologically educate the society to allow or reject, like or dislike and can as well negatively or positively tag an object. As the world media has successfully stigmatized or rather represent Islam and Muslim with terrorism and extremism (Dunn, 2001), Akbarzadeh and Smith (2005) sense that media is capable of placing a prohibiting pressures and societal or cultural rejection on minority groups. The masterpiece of communication theory by Griffin (2012), reviewed the cultural studies of Stuart Hall, where he was accord the most influential figure in cultural and representation studies till date. The review highlighted most of the theoretical stands of Hall, such as the; corporate control of mass communication; making meaning through discourse; post 9/11 media coverage: the chill of constraint, most of which illuminate that “media has an influence and responsibility on societal culture and perception” and that influence could be true or false, and holds positive or negative effect. Griffin can be quoted as follow;

“…Hall and Scholars who follow his lead wish to place the academic spotlight directly on the ways media representations of culture reproduce social inequalities and keep the average person more or less powerless to do anything but operate within a corporatized, commodified world…” (Griffin 2012, p. 347)

Evidently, researchers from different disciplines (communication, philosophy, psychology and sociologist) have always been interested to theoretically and academically resolve the chaotic relationship between media and religion (Soukup, 2002). So far, a multidisciplinary and documentary literatures have recorded several findings on the issue of media and religion, including and most especially representation theorems. Sanson et al. (2000) advocate the relevancy of media researches, since the alarming and worrisome role of media in the societal public sphere continue to escalate. 

More particularly to the academic realm of which this project research propose to sail through, there have been quite a number of formative efforts by researchers (Susskind,2002; Akbarzadeh and Smith, 2005; Yenigun, 2004) that have examined the media representation of Islam and Muslims both before and after the 9/11 attack, and most of these studies have been done objectively to examine the Australian, European, and the United States media, hence; states where Muslims and Islam are minorities, immigrates or alien to their societal culture.

Yenigun (2004) in his study essentially examined the response of the American Muslim to the provenance terrorism stigmatization in the American Media amid his quest to compare the colonial and the postcolonial representation of Islam in the western media. The study of Yenigun found that American Muslims are reactive and responsive to the popular media discourse of Islam, but their response being a minority could not override the dominant discourse. The findings of Yenigun coincide with the critics of Griffin (2012) while reviewing the “corporate control of mass communication” by Stuart Hall, that the ownership and corporate control influence media reportage of events and resultantly “media representations”.