REPRESENTATION AND RESISTANCE THROUGH DIGITAL MEDIA IN MUSLIM GIRL: A COMING OF AGE
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.29121/shodhkosh.v5.i6.2024.3677Keywords:
Hybridity, Identity, Diaspora, Misrepresentation, Digital MediaAbstract [English]
Amani Al-Khatahtbeh is a young American author and activist. She was born in a Middle Eastern immigrant family in 1992 in the U.S. Her father is of Jordanian descent, while her mother is Palestinian. Al-Khatahtbeh rose to prominence as the founder of MuslimGirl.com, a ground breaking digital platform dedicated to amplifying the voices of Muslim women and challenging their misrepresentation in mainstream media. This initiative earned her a place on the prestigious Forbes 30 Under 30 in Media list in 2016. Muslim Girl: A Coming of Age is her first book which was published in 2016. It was written in the form of a memoir, where Al-Khatahtbeh writes about her experience of living in America after the infamous attacks of September 11, 2001. In this paper, an attempt has been made to trace how the Islamophobic attitude, in the Western world, affects the identity of the author of this memoir. It also presents an overview of the issues faced by the first-generation Muslim immigrants. The paper deals with various other aspects which lead to the hybrid identity of the author and how she creates an online / digital space to deal with the identity crisis.
References
Abrams, M. H., and Geoffrey Galt Harpham. A Glossary of Literary Terms. Cengage Learning, 2012.
Al-Khatahtbeh, Amani. Muslim Girl: A Coming of Age. Simon & Schuster. 2016.
Badran, Margot. Feminism in Islam: Secular and Religious Convergences. Oneworld. 2011.
Bergen, Peter L. “September 11 Attacks.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., www.britannica.com/event/September-11-attacks. Accessed 23 March 2020.
Conway, Gordon. “Islamophobia: A Challenges for Us All.” Edited by Robin Richardson, Runnymede Trust, The Runnymede Trust, Mar. 1997, www.runnymedetrust.org/projects-and-publications/past-projects/commissionOnBritishMuslims.html. Accessed 23 Mar. 2018.
Consalvo, Mia. “Cyberfeminism.” Encyclopedia of New Media, Edited by Steve Jones, 2002, SAGE Reference Online, https://study.sagepub.com/sites/default/files/Ch17_Cyberfeminism.pdf. Accessed 21 Feb. 2019.
Daniels, Jessie. “Rethinking Cyberfeminism(s): Race, Gender, and Embodiment.” WSQ: Women's Studies Quarterly, vol. 37, no. 1-2, 2009, pp. 101–124., doi:10.1353/wsq.0.0158. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/wsq.0.0158
Gleeson, Jessemy. What's Next For Digital Feminism? HuffPost UK. 2017, www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/jessamy-gleeson/digitalfeminism_b_15651696.html. Accessed 19 March 2020.
Haddad, Yvonne, and Nazir Harb. “Post-9/11: Making Islam an American Religion.” Religions, vol. 5, no. 2, 2014, pp. 477–501., doi:10.3390/rel5020477. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/rel5020477
Keller, Jessalynn, et al. “Speaking ‘Unspeakable Things’: Documenting Digital Feminist Responses to Rape Culture.” Journal of Gender Studies, vol. 27, no. 1, 2016, pp. 22–36., doi:10.1080/09589236.2016.1211511. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09589236.2016.1211511
Jouet, Jousiane. “Digital Feminism: Questioning The Renewal Of Activism.” Journal of Research in Gender Studies, vol. 8, no. 1, 2018, pp. 133–157., doi:10.22381/jrgs8120187. DOI: https://doi.org/10.22381/JRGS8120187
Lopez, Kimberly J., et al. “One Day of #Feminism: Twitter as a Complex Digital Arena for Wielding, Shielding, and Trolling Talk on Feminism.” Leisure Sciences, vol. 41, no. 3, 2018, pp. 203–220., doi:10.1080/01490400.2018.1448022. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/01490400.2018.1448022
Magearu, Alexandra. “A Phenomenological Reading of Gendered Racialization in Arab Muslim American Women's Cultural Productions.” The Comparatist, vol. 42, no. 1, 2018, pp. 135–157., doi:10.1353/com.2018.0007. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/com.2018.0007
Mansoor, Shaista. Hybridity and Contemporary Muslim Identity in Select Muslim Womens Writings in English. 2020. Aligarh Muslim University. PhD Thesis.
Mendes, Kaitlynn, et al. “#MeToo and the Promise and Pitfalls of Challenging Rape Culture through Digital Feminist Activism.” European Journal of Women's Studies, vol. 25, no. 2, 2018, pp. 236–246., doi:10.1177/1350506818765318. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/1350506818765318
Reiners, Bailey. “What Is the Glass Ceiling & How Do We Break It?” Built In, Sept. 2019, builtin.com/diversity-inclusion/glass-ceiling. Accessed 28 April 2020.
Richardson, Robin. “Us and Them in This Age of Anxiety: Past, Present and ...” A LECTURE IN LEEDS AND LONDON, Nov. 2017, www.islamophobia2017.org.uk/lectures2017/lectures_at_leeds_and_london.pdf. Accessed 29 April 2020.
Stryker, Sheldon, and Peter J. Burke. “The Past, Present, and Future of an Identity Theory.” Social Psychology Quarterly, vol. 63, no. 4, 2000, p. 284., doi:10.2307/2695840. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/2695840
Tindongan, Cynthia White. “Negotiating Muslim Youth Identity in a Post-9/11 World.” The High School Journal, vol. 95, no. 1, 2011, pp. 72–87., doi:10.1353/hsj.2011.0012. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/hsj.2011.0012
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2024 Dr. Shaista Mansoor

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
With the licence CC-BY, authors retain the copyright, allowing anyone to download, reuse, re-print, modify, distribute, and/or copy their contribution. The work must be properly attributed to its author.
It is not necessary to ask for further permission from the author or journal board.
This journal provides immediate open access to its content on the principle that making research freely available to the public supports a greater global exchange of knowledge.