Appadurai and Halliday

In this post I will be writing about Fred Halliday's chapter West encountering Islam: Islamophobia reconsidered in light of chapter 3 of Arjun Appadurai's Modernity at Large.

In my previous post (entitled "Qutb and Appadurai"), I talked about how Seyyid Qutb's Milestones seems to focus mostly on ideoscapes. Halliday's, on the other hand, talks more holistically about various other kinds of scapes, in addition to ideoscapes. One of the things he discusses is the international dimension of the Islam/West divide. He writes that the divide is "fuelled by the misuse of history and culture on both sides" (p. 20). History and culture fall within the arena of ethnoscape. Halliday also says that the international dimension involves wealth (p. 20), which is parallel to Appadurai's finanscape.

In more explicit contrast with Qutb, Halliday actually elevates the importance of ethnoscapes over the importance of ideoscapes. He argues that a faith-based "Muslim" identity is not sufficient to understand the Muslim world; divergent ethnic identity is often more significant than having a shared Muslim faith (p. 21). So while Qutb emphasizes ideoscapes, Halliday emphasizes ethnoscapes, as well acknowledging the importance of all of the other scapes.

When I read Halliday's discussion about the international dimensions of the Islam/West divide, I couldn't help but think of the current Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. Halliday brought up the issue about the Palestine/Afghanistan conflict. He writes that Palestine's hostility toward Muslims stemmed from a "one-sided sympathy" for Israel, and that the reverse was true for Afghanistan (p. 19). I wonder if this is true for the U.S. as well. Obviously, Islamophobia in the U.S. is largely connected to the events of 9/11 and the ensuing "war on terror." However, is it possible that some of the Islamophobia also stems from the U.S.'s support of and alliance with Israel?

-GGM