Yusuf Shah, a year-six student from Leeds, achieved the maximum IQ for under-18s.

He took the Mensa test after constantly being told how smart he was by his friends.

“I have always wanted to know if I was in the top two percent of people who take the test, it feels special to have a certificate for me and about me.” he said.

Shah is not the only genius Muslim student to make such remarkable success.

In 2019, Tara Sharifi, an Iranian girl and a student in UK’s Aylesbury High School, scored an impressive 162 points. The result put Sharifi well above the “genius benchmark” of 140.

Source: Metro.co.uk

Author: Hlaimi, S., University of Exeter

Date of Award: 2022

Qualification Level: Doctoral

Supervisor: Jonathan Githens-Mazer and Lise Storm

Abstract:

The first decades of the twenty-first century have seen a resurgence of debates on immigration, with a particular focus on Islam and its place within Western liberal societies. Are British and French Muslims citizens first? Muslims first? Or citizens and Muslims equally? This question is the starting point for this research on belonging and the connection between Britishness and Frenchness, and Muslimness. Unlike previous research, this thesis addresses the Muslim question according to the perspective of belonging. Through the exploration of the determinants of identification for French and British Muslims, this thesis assesses the articulation between French and British citizenships and Muslim identity. This thesis presents three strategies which Muslims may follow: assimilation, integration or conflict. While British Muslims are more likely to follow a cohabitations strategy, many French Muslims actualize a conflictual strategy. The question of Islamophobia is put forward by both groups as the major obstacle for a successful articulation of their identity. Islam in France appears to be the driver of a transnational construction of non-ethnic Muslim communities and an important element of belonging. This has enhanced the role of religion as a symbolic boundary that allows the inclusion of Muslims in France. For British Muslims, citizenship is held as a symbolic attachment to Britain, which Islam is described as an important source of inspiration for British values. This is particularly true for converts who cultivate and develop their experiences of socialization to better assimilate within their new community. Finally, the comparison of both French and British cases shed the light upon the crisis multiculturalism and secularism are facing. The former has been criticized by Muslims for its role in the exacerbation of securitization, and the latter is perceived by French Muslims as a new form of Islamophobia. In France and Britain, neo-secularism and a neo-multiculturalism have emerged with new tensions regarding being a citizen and being Muslim. Neo-secularism is an identitarian approach that no longer implies a neutrality of the state regarding religion, but rather a neutrality, and even an obligation of neutrality, of Muslim citizens. Neo-multiculturalism is mutating into a monoculturalism when it comes to Muslim identity, where the recognition of differences is retreating and being replaced by a more assimilationist paradigm. Accordingly, this thesis concludes that a new paradigm of articulation between Muslim identity and Western citizenship should address the Muslim question using a more inclusive rhetoric, in order to avoid the othering approach largely spread in public discourses and media 3 coverage. In particular, French secularism requires a legal and concise definition clarifying the principle of separation between religion and state. For British multiculturalism, securitization should be reassessed through the promotion of a more positive prevention of radicalization and through the closer involvement of Muslims themselves.

Source: EThOS

Islam in British Media Discourses

By Laurens de Rooij

Publisher: Manchester University Press

Publication Date: May 2020

Ever wondered what non-muslims actually do with media stories about Islam and how it relates to Islamophobia? How is society affected by repeated discussions of Islam and Muslims in print and television news?

Media reporting on Islam and Muslims commonly relate stories about terrorism, violence, or the lack of integration with western values and society.

Building on extensive fieldwork interviews and focus groups, Laurens de Rooij argues that individuals negotiate media reports to fit their existing outlook on Islam and Muslims. Non-Muslim responses to these reports, de Rooij argues, are not only (re)productions of local and personal contextuality, but are co-dependent and co-productive to the reports themselves.

Table of Contents

Introduction
1: Modes of production: British media as a discursive system
2: Symbolic representations of Islam and Muslims
3: A dialectic of media theory and audience praxis
4: Examining the influence of current media portrayals of Islam and Muslims
Conclusion

About the Author

Laurens de Rooij is a Lecturer of Islamic Studies at the University of Chester.

Source: Manchester University Press

Crest Advisory, an independent crime consultancy, commissioned representative surveys of 1,000 Muslims and 1,000 other adults.

It found that 63 per cent of British Muslims were worried about Islamist extremism and 64 per cent trusted the police – slightly less than the general population.

When asked about the government’s Prevent counter extremism program, which is being reviewed following years of discrimination allegations, 55 per cent of Muslim respondents had not heard of it. When asked if they supported the principle of a scheme that is “mostly aimed at Muslim communities at risk of being drawn into Islamist extremism, because police and security services assess that that is currently the biggest single terror threat”, the majority said they did.

Source: The Independent

Mr Johnson also received a considerable degree of criticism for comparing Muslim women to ‘letterboxes and bank robbers’ in a column for the Telegraph last year. The prime minister has insisted his comments were taken out of context and he was defending the right of Muslim women to wear what they like. During the election campaign he also apologized for Islamophobia in the Conservative party, after a number of candidates shared posts by Tommy Robinson, referring to Muslims as scum.

However, after Mr Johnson’s Conservatives won a landslide in the election on December 12, Manzoor Ali, who runs the Barakah Food Aid charity in Greater Manchester, said that his family have given him their blessing to move to a place that would be safe and secure for them.

Source: Metro.co.uk