The purpose of this project is to examine how contemporary contexts of Islamophobia contribute to shaping notions and performances of Muslim womanhood. I center Muslim female social media influencers in my analysis and examine how they perform and (re)define Muslim womanhood through fashion, aesthetic labor, the hijab, and modest embodiment practices online. The specific research question that undergirds this project is, "How do contexts and discourses of Islamophobia contribute to shaping notions and performances of Muslim womanhood?" My data is derived from interviews with Muslimah social media influencers in the US, UK, and Canada; a survey with their social media followers, and a content analysis of their photo and video posts on Instagram and YouTube. Findings suggest that racialized and gendered expectations of Muslim womanhood emerge on the one hand, from the western non-Muslim community's racialized perceptions and understandings of Muslim women and Islam, and on the other, from the western Muslim community's reaction to its racialization in the global war on terror. The result of these expectations is the imposition of representational and moral responsibilities on Muslim women, who are regarded as visible and public representations of the Muslim community and of Islam as a faith. Findings also suggest that in response to the burden of these expectations, Muslim women exercise their agency to mobilize Islamic feminisms to their advantage in order to negotiate with, resist, and critique western Muslim and non-Muslim expectations of modesty, piety, empowerment, and the hijab. Consequently, Muslimah influencers are forcing western Muslim and non-Muslim communities to reevaluate their expectations of who fits within the category the 'Muslim Woman' while also opening up a discursive space for the possibility of new formulations and conceptualizations of Muslim womanhood that are more aligned with egalitarian Islamic feminist interpretations of Muslimah ways of living and being. / Doctor of Philosophy / In this research study, I examine how Islamophobia has contributed to shaping western Muslim and non-Muslim community perceptions and expectations of Muslim women. I focus specifically on Muslim female social media influencers to understand how they perform Muslim femininity, modesty, piety and the hijab on Instagram and YouTube. I collected data from interviews with Muslim female social media influencers in the U.S., UK, and Canada, a survey with their social media followers, and photos and videos posted by Muslim female influencers on social media. My findings show that Muslim women must contend with expectations from western non-Muslim communities, whose perceptions of Muslim emerge from Islamophobic understandings of Muslims and Islam. Simultaneously, Muslim women must contend with certain moral and representational responsibilities imposed on them by Muslim communities in the west, who are currently working to address and counteract Islamophobia, by posing a positive image of Muslims and Islam in the eyes of the western public. My findings also show that in response to the burden of these expectation, Muslim women critique these gendered burdens by exercising their agency to interpret Quranic scripture on modesty, the hijab, and gendered behaviors with an Islamic feminist lens. In doing so, they are forcing Muslim and non-Muslim communities to reevaluate the moral and representational burdens placed on Muslim women's shoulders, while also offering a space where others can conceptualize and perform Muslim womanhood in ways that align more with egalitarian Islamic feminist interpretations of Muslim women's ways of living and being.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VTETD/oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/112749 |
| Date | 08 June 2021 |
| Creators | Islam, Inaash |
| Contributors | Sociology, Brunsma, David L., Zare, Bonnie, Harrison, Anthony Kwame, Samanta, Suchitra |
| Publisher | Virginia Tech |
| Source Sets | Virginia Tech Theses and Dissertation |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Dissertation |
| Format | ETD, application/pdf, application/pdf, application/pdf |
| Rights | In Copyright, http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ |
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