Muslim Women in War and Crisis: Representation and Reality

13. Spain. Muslim Women in the Spanish Press: The Persistence of Subaltern Images

13 MusliM WoMen in the spanish press The Persistence of Subaltern Images án g e l e s r aMí r e z This chapterexplores howand in what ways the terrorist attacks in Madrid influenced the Spanish media’s representation of Muslim women. As I began researching this topic, the assumption was that their image had been reframed as part of a larger threatening aggressor group: Muslims. If this were the case, it might coincide with the new forms of Islamophobia already identified in Europe. The metamorphosis from an old Islamophobia anchored in colonial relations to a new breed, tied to the attacks and to identifying Islam with terrorism, would be of primary interest.1 Had March 11 eradicated the subordinate image of Muslim women, supplanting it with a new and more threatening image—that of a veiled aggressor? islaMophobia: a neW brand of raCisM To begin with, it seemed evident that the train bombings had to some degree transformed Maurophobia (a phenomenon closely tied to Spain’s colonial and postcolonial relationships with Morocco)2 into Islamophobia. Unlike Maurophobia, in which Islam was never a relevant factor, Islamophobia (as a new type of racism) used Islam alone as a primary basis for discrimination. According to Pnina Werbner: What we have, then, uniquely in the case of contemporary Islam, is an oppositional hegemonic bloc which includes intellectual elites and the consumerist masses, as well as “real” violent racists, like members of the British National Party, who exploit anti-Muslim discourses to target Muslims in particular (as statistics show) for racial attacks.3 What is the media’s role in all of this? Discourse is the form of racism through which the elites explain themselves.4 The press writes and gathers, spai n 228 ángeles raMírez in different genres, the constructions and images of Islam. In fact, they naturalize them and make them appear to be consensual questions, which ensures their legitimate reproduction. Moreover, a coterie of “specialists” has begun to proliferate, representing themselves as expert voices on Islam in various news publications. This is as common in other European nations as it is in Spain. For example, Geisser points to the French intellectual who has created discourse that “naturalizes” exclusion, contributing significantly to Islamophobia .5 This type of specialization has also arisen in Germany.6 In Spain, journalists pontificate on Islam when, in fact, they may have no real personal experience or expertise in this area. As of this writing, each of Spain’s major newspapers includes a staff of writers generally acknowledged as academically qualified and intellectually capable. With the exception of one author at ABC, however, these are persons whose academic and/or professional backgrounds stray far from Islamic studies; that is, they are not specialists in the field. To make matters worse, the general tendency of the press is to lean right, especially in regard to immigration issues—an unfortunate phenomenon pointed out by Van Dijk in his assessment of the Dutch case.7 As immigration concerns become politicized in Spain and as the presence of terrorist groups wreak havoc in the name of Islam, Spanish newspapers have promoted an ultraconservative level of discourse. A newspaper’s tendency to voice concerns on behalf of the political right reinforces and legitimizes the sensation of a threat, one of the main thematic categories of racism.8 Furthermore, everything that refers to Moroccans—to moros—the secular object of phobia in Spain, leaves its stain on Islam and is perceived as Muslim. An increasingly collective sense of fear, coupled with vague implied threats, lends legitimacy to Islamophobia, a legitimacy that its ancestor Maurophobia never enjoyed. MusliM WoMen and journalistiC disCourse From the beginning of Europe’s relationship with the Middle East, it has used the theme of discrimination to further its own political agendas. European travelers, politicians, and writers have labeled Muslim women as oppressed. Their observations on this Arab-Muslim social construct have facilitated arguments regarding the overall inferiority of Arabs and Muslims and allowed colonial masters to condemn the conquered peoples.9 Another overriding Western theme, which buttressed the belief in Arab inferiority, concerned the incompatibility of democratic values and Islam.10 229 MusliM WoMen in the spanish press Post-3/11, for the first time in Spain’s history, the Spanish press equated a Muslim woman (the only one accused in the bombings) with aggression. Up to that point, the press had represented Muslim women...