Arabs and Muslims in the Media: Race and Representation after 9/11

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Arabs and Muslims in the Media CRITICAL CULTURAL COMMUNICATION General Editors: Sarah Banet-Weiser and Kent A. Ono Dangerous Curves: Latina Bodies in the Media Isabel Molina-Guzmán The Net Effect: Technology, Romanticism, Capitalism Thomas Streeter Our Biometric Future: The Pursuit of Automated Facial Perception Kelly A. Gates Critical Rhetorics of Race Edited by Michael G. Lacy and Kent A. Ono Circuits of Visibility: Gender and Transnational Media Cultures Edited by Radha S. Hegde Commodity Activism: Cultural Resistance in Neoliberal Times Edited by Roopali Mukherjee and Sarah Banet-Weiser Arabs and Muslims in the Media: Race and Representation after 9/11 Evelyn Alsultany Visualizing Atrocity: Arendt, Evil, and the Optics of Thoughtlessness Valerie Hartouni Arabs and Muslims in the Media Race and Representation after 9/11 Evelyn Alsultany a NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS New York and London NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS New York and London www.nyupress.org© 2012 by New York University All rights reserved References to Internet Websites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing. Neither the author nor New York University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the manuscript was prepared. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Alsultany, Evelyn. Arabs and Muslims in the media : race and representation after 9/11 / Evelyn Alsultany. p. cm. — (Critical cultural communication) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8147-0731-9 (cl : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-8147-0732-6 (pb : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-8147-2917-5 (ebook) ISBN 978-0-8147-3814-6 (ebook) 1. Arabs on television. 2. Muslims on television. 3. Stereotypes (Social psychology) on television. 4. Television programs—United States—History— 21st century. I. Title. pn1992.8.a7a58 2012 305.6'970973—dc23 2011051502 New York University Press books are printed on acid-free paper, and their binding materials are chosen for strength and durability. We strive to use environmentally responsible suppliers and materials to the greatest extent possible in publishing our books. Manufactured in the United States of America c 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 p 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 For my father, Kamal Ali Alsultany 1941–2011 In the idealized desire for national unity served up nightly on evening cable and network newscasts, new actors—this time Arabs, Palestinians, Islamic fundamentalists—have quickly become the bodies and cultures that the logic of race marks as different and therefore potentially threatening to the national order. Television’s role in this process is absolutely central, for it is television that makes these images and representations of difference meaningful, legible, and familiar. —Herman Gray, Watching Race ...