Kevin Dunn

Contemporary racism and Islamaphobia in Australia Racializing religion

Contemporary anti-Muslim sentiment in Australia is reproduced through a racialization that includes well rehearsed stereotypes of Islam, perceptions of threat and inferiority, as well as fantasies that the Other (in this case Australian Muslims) do not belong, or are absent. These are not old or colour-based racisms, but they do manifest certain characteristics that allow us to conceive a racialization process in relation to Muslims. Three sets of findings show how constructions of Islam are important means through which racism is reproduced. First, public opinion surveys reveal the extent of Islamaphobia in Australia and the links between threat perception and constructions of alien-ness and Otherness. The second data set is from a content analysis of the racialized pathologies of Muslims and their spaces. The third is from an examination of the undercurrents of Islamaphobia and national cultural selectivity in the politics of responding to asylum seekers. Negative media treatment is strongly linked to antipathetic government dispositions. This negativity has material impacts upon Australian Muslims. It sponsors a more widespread Islamaphobia, (mis)informs opposition to mosque development and ever more restrictive asylum seeker policies, and lies behind arson attacks and racist violence. Ultimately, the racialization of Islam corrupts belonging and citizenship for Muslim Australians.

Contemporary racism and Islamaphobia in Australia : de-racialising a religion

Contemporary anti-Muslim sentiment in Australia is reproduced through a racialization that includes well rehearsed stereotypes of Islam, perceptions of threat and inferiority, as well as fantasies that the Other (in this case Australian Muslims) do not belong, or are absent. These are not old or colour-based racisms, but they do manifest certain characteristics that allow us to conceive a racialization process in relation to Muslims. Three sets of findings show how constructions of Islam are important means through which racism is reproduced. First, public opinion surveys reveal the extent of Islamaphobia in Australia and the links between threat perception and constructions of alien-ness and Otherness. The second data set is from a content analysis of the racialized pathologies of Muslims and their spaces. The third is from an examination of the undercurrents of Islamaphobia and national cultural selectivity in the politics of responding to asylum seekers. Negative media treatment is strongly linked to antipathetic government dispositions. This negativity has material impacts upon Australian Muslims. It sponsors a more widespread Islamaphobia, (mis)informs opposition to mosque development and ever more restrictive asylum seeker policies, and lies behind arson attacks and racist violence. Ultimately, the racialization of Islam corrupts belonging and citizenship for Muslim Australians.

Who's Driving the Asylum Debate?: Newspaper and Government Representations of Asylum Seekers

The welfare and future of asylum seekers in Australia have been very contentious contemporary issues. Findings based on content analysis of media releases in 2001 and 2002 reveal the unrelentingly negative way in which the federal government portrayed asylum seekers. While the governments negative tenor was constant during the study period, the specific terms of reference altered, from ‘threat’ through ‘other’, to ‘illegality’ and to ‘burden’. The negative construction of asylum seekers was clearly mutable. Analysis of newspaper reporting during the same period indicates that the media largely adopted the negativity and specific references of the government. The media dependence upon government statements and spokespersons in part explains this relation. The findings generally support the ‘propaganda model’ that holds a pessimistic view of the news medias critical abilities. However, the media departed somewhat slightly from the governments unchanging stance following some key events and revelations. Clearly, there is scope for disrupting the flow of negative constructions from government to media, and ultimately to audiences.

Constructing Racism in Sydney, Australia's Largest EthniCity

Contemporary Australia is in a contradictory situation as a nation where multiculturalism co-exists with various forms of what are collectively called racisms. Based on a survey of Sydney residents, this study uses a social constructivist approach to investigate the nature and sociospatial context of racist attitudes in Sydney, Australias largest EthniCity. Results show a mix of compositional (aspatial) and contextual (spatial) associations with racisms. The former indicate a general but inconsistent relationship between socioeconomic status and tolerance, and also between cultural diversity and tolerance. The latter, however, reveal place-based cultures of tolerance and intolerance cutting across compositional relationships. A geography of racism in Sydney therefore adds a level of understanding which cannot be obtained from aspatial analysis alone. This helps to understand the complexity of local political cultures and can assist with the formulation of anti-racism interventions.

Islam in Sydney : contesting the discourse of absence

Non‐recognition is one of the key modes of re‐inscribing the Other. In Sydneys anti‐mosque politics this form of oppression was manifest as a discourse of absence. Sydney Muslims have been portrayed as non‐existent within, or external to, localities where mosques have been proposed. In these circumstances claims to belonging and citizenship by Sydney Muslims have been fundamentally injured. Census data are used to challenge the historical and contemporary constructions of Islamic absence in Australia. Sydney Muslims are a culturally diverse and somewhat disparate faith group. They are increasingly present in areas outside of the initial zones of residential focus. This diversity and dynamism is a substantial challenge for Islamic community building (Ummah) in Sydney and presents rich foci for further research.

Roadside Memorials: Interpreting New Deathscapes in Newcastle, New South Wales

Over recent years, roadside memorials to commemorate people killed in motor vehicle accidents have become increasingly noticeable in parts of the Australian landscape. In Newcastle, New South Wales, roadside memorials are placed for young people. The age/gender group most at risk of road death, and those most memorialised, are young men. This is linked to spatially specific constructions of masculinity which circulate within youth milieux of Newcastle. Like other memorials and monuments these ‘deathscapes’ have multiple meanings, differing between those who build, maintain and interpret them. They function as conservative memorials of youth machismo; of heroic aggression, disregard for safety and egocentrism. Roadside memorials need to be re-read as symbolic of societal flaws; of a wasteful road toll, and a testament to dominant and problematic strains of masculinity.

Racism and intolerance in eastern Australia : a geographic perspective

Abstract Racism has become a fact of life in Australia over the past decade or so, yet there are relatively few studies of its nature or extent, and still fewer on its geography. Using a social constructivist approach, this study draws on a survey of 5056 respondents to investigate attitudes to racism and cultural diversity in New South Wales and Queensland, and of perceptions of out-groups as instances of ‘strangers in our midst’. On racism, results show the presence of a continuum of attitudes ranging from generally tolerant to generally intolerant, a presence which cuts across compositional (social or aspatial) characteristics to emphasise the existence of a distinctive geography, an everywhere different nature to racist and non-racist attitudes which transcends urban–rural and traditional social layers. On the other hand, perceptions of out-groups are not uniformly correlated with presence or absence of cultural diversity. In many cases, the ability to make judgements about significant ‘others’ or out-groups has been shown to relate more to abstract notions of self and national identity, reproduced in public by mainstream news media and political leaders. In particular, it may reflect an Anglo (or Anglo-Celtic) view on nationalism, which is a hallmark of the ‘new racism’: an assimilationist or ethnocultural view of Australian society which is different from the ‘civic nation’ ideal envisaged by multiculturalism. That the geography of attitudes and perceptions people have towards and about different cultural groups is so ‘everywhere different’ has important implications for attempts to address and redress issues of intolerance in Australia.

Repetitive and troubling discourses of nationalism in the local politics of mosque development in Sydney, Australia

The contested nature of multiculturalism in Australia is stark in local debates over mosque developments in Sydney. Queer-theory concepts (citation, repetition, sedimentation, and troubling) are used to reveal the differing utilities of discourses on nationalism at this everyday level. Neoconservatives oppose the declining normativity of Anglo-Celtic culture, and nostalgically invoke “White (or Anglo-Celtic) Australia”. Mosque opponents are both limited and empowered by this discourse of nationalism. The official recognition of Australias multicultural composition and the shift in rhetoric on national identity have provided a counterideology to the still hegemonic constructions of an Anglo-Celtic Australia. Muslim associations and their supporters have drawn on these symbolic tools in their arguments with planning-consent authorities, and in other local political forums. Through the repetition of their claims to local and national citizenship, and by evoking the rhetoric of multiculturalism, they challenged the hegemony of Anglo-Celtic culture. A deeper and broader multiculturalism may be sedimented through the reiterative deployment of the national discourse of multiculturalism.

‘Core’Culture Hegemony and Multiculturalism Perceptions of the Privileged Position of Australians with British Backgrounds

Tensions between acceptance of policies aimed at creating a multicultural society and British (Anglo or Anglo-Celtic) Australians concerned about loss of their privileged position as members of the dominant society have been an important feature of political debate in Australia in recent years. There is, however, a paucity of empirical evidence available to assess the extent of recognition of Anglo privilege in this debate. This study draws on questions about attitudes to multicultural values and Anglo privilege from a recent survey of New South Wales and Queensland respondents to address this issue. Principal components analysis of the attitudinal data shows that multiculturalism and privilege are separate, independent dimensions in respondents’ thinking. Cross-tabulations show both polarization of views and ambivalence in attitudes to Anglo privilege, which are in substantial part resolved by consideration of the geography of privilege and linked multicultural values.

Challenging the Public Denial of Racism for a Deeper Multiculturalism

The further development of Australian multiculturalism must squarely address racism, and a primary step must be the acknowledgement of racism. The Challenging Racism Project (2001–2008) data provide a clear picture of the acknowledgement of racism and of Anglo cultural privilege among Australians. Encouragingly, most Australians recognise that racism is a problem in Australian society. A little under half, however, deny that there is Anglo cultural privilege. Perhaps surprisingly, respondents from non-Anglo-Australian backgrounds, including those born in the Middle East and South Asia, were significantly more likely than those from Anglo backgrounds and Australian-born respondents to deny that racial prejudice exists in Australia. Cultural hierarchies of citizenship regulate the acknowledgement of racism, encouraging denial and deflection, and punishing ‘complaint’ from those more exposed to racism. The broader social pathology identified by this paper is an unevenness in the sense of citizenship across ethnic groups, and addressing this social weakness must be a macro-level ambition for the further development of Australian multiculturalism.