The theoretical framework concerning the representation of Muslim women in Europe, and how the media (particularly news media such as TV news) has influenced the point of view of European society towards Muslim women in a negative way. Introduction There has been extensive coverage of Muslims in the British media in recent years, with Ahmad noting that “...Muslim women, their role in Islam, and the issue of dress, receives special scrutiny in the British media” in the post 9/11 period. 1 Indeed, 11th September, 2001 provided a watershed for an increase in the discourse regarding Muslim women around the world but the European context in which they have been represented demands scrutiny. It is necessary to address how far societal attitudes have been influenced by the media and whether the negativity perpetuated has impacted upon wider conversations relating to the political, economic, social and cultural elements of modern life. During the course of the establishment of this framework, it is necessary to examine a multitude of media types and the representation that occurs within them, including the national newspapers, magazines, television, Internet sites (including blogs, news sites and political sites) and social media. All forms of media are inextricably linked together in a communicative network today as a result of its importance in modern life as a whole and the discourse it produces and conveys playing “...a vital role in constituting people’s realities.”2 If this is true then a logical conclusion to reach is that the representation of Muslim women in Europe has ultimately led to the imposition of negative values and ideas 1 Fauzia Ahmad, ‘The 7/7 London Bombings and British Muslim Women: Media Representations, Mediated Realities,’ in Faegheh Shirazi (ed.), Muslim Women in War and Crisis: Representation and Reality (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2010), p. 245. 2 Mary Talbot, Media Discourse: Representation and Interaction (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007), p. 3. upon them, with the media significantly influencing the view of European society as a whole. This will provide the thesis for this research. It is extremely difficult to measure specific media influence on demographic groups and wider audiences as a whole3 so the established theoretical framework will not be geared towards a quantitative analysis. However, a qualitative study incorporating discourse analysis will provide the scope to analyse the wording of media reports, the connotations within them and audience response without limiting the results to a degree that could be misleading. Discourse analysis of cultural products provides the ability to analyse the ideology of their producers and also facilitates the examination of power relations and the dynamics associated with the majority view within a hegemonic culture, 4 which is ideal for this particular study. The Representation of Muslim Women Theories concerning the representation of Muslim women vary widely in nature. For example, Ahmad suggests that the images projected of Muslim women reflect a “victim- based pathology” that is “selectively maintained by the mainstream media”, using the burqa as an example as to how Muslim women and their bodies have become a renewed site for controversy whilst societal demands jeopardise their civil liberties. 5 Zarkov points out that such representations of victimhood are historical with theorists presenting Muslim 3 David Croteau & William Hoynes, Media/Society: Industries, Images and Audiences (London: SAGE Publications, 2013), p. 239 4 Jane Stokes, How to do Media and Cultural Studies (London: SAGE Publications, 2012), p. 88. 5 Ahmad, ‘The 7/7 London Bombings’, p. 245. communities as cruel to women and imposing a “political muteness” upon them. 6 However, she notes that there had been a site for the emergence of feminist representations out of the development of autonomy for Muslim women historically, with no causal relationship between media hate speech and violence. 7 That is not the case in the present political and social climate. Jiwani adopts a different perspective, asserting that the Muslim woman, although a victimised figure, may also be represented as a highly sexualised individual with the veil she wears providing a platform on which to build stereotypical images that do not have power over their own narratives. 8 She gives the example of the veil as an iconic symbol that is indicative of difference within Western discourse that removes the idea that the Western patriarchy is to blame for her objectification as it renders the patriarchal a purely Islamic phenomenon. 9 Indeed, the veil is an othering force that is divisive and is subject to controversy within society so this element of theory is of vital importance in the context of this research question. Jones reinforces this point of view, quoting former British Home Secretary Jack Straw’s concerns that the veil is indicative of a lack of community unity in Britain and that “...these women are selfishly choosing their personal religious beliefs over the good of the community at large.”10 This projects an inherently Western discourse onto Muslim women as well as noting the raising of gendered concerns by the white, dominant patriarchy that structures society. The veil is undoubtedly a divisive feature of the lives of 6 Dubravka Zarkov, The Body of War: Media, Ethnicity and Gender (Durham: Duke University Press, 2007), p. 148. 7 Zarkov, The Body of War, p. 148. 8 Yasmin Jiwani, ‘Doubling Discourses and the Veiled Other: Mediations of Race and Gender’, in Sherene Razack, Malinda Smith & Sunera Thobani (eds.), States of Race: Critical Race Feminism for the 21st Century (Toronto: Between the Lines, 2010), pp. 62-64 9 Jiwani, ‘Doubling Discourses’, pp. 64-65. 10 Rachel Jones, Postcolonial Representations of Woman: Critical Issues for Education (Dordrecht: Springer, 2011), p. 155 some Muslim women but it is not divisive as a result of the choice to wear it but rather the choice to project non-Muslim values onto it. There are other theories that supplement this particular framework and advance the notion that white patriarchal values are projected through the mass media that is not only dominated by them but also formed on them. For example, bell hooks’s theories concerning black representation highlights that the media is white controlled and actively constructs the figures that appear within its products, 11 thus suggesting that white fears and ideological values are likely to be embedded within the discourse advanced by it. She also asserts that the “...mass media was a system of knowledge and power reproducing”12, thus suggesting that the media reflects societal attitudes as well as reinforcing the hierarchies of power that exist within society at specific times. This theory is relevant because it explains the structures that the media works within and the extent to which it is an integral element in creating representations. Although it is not specifically relevant to Muslim women, it is of seminal importance in establishing the theoretical context and particularly the nature of representations that are produced. However, there are ideas within the existing body of knowledge that challenge the stereotype of the Muslim woman as a victim and a veiled other, such as Kahf’s assertion that Western representations have been attacked by those that have “...tended to ignore the ‘representation’ part and instead contest the realities of ‘the Muslim woman’.”13 Indeed, the condition of women has been discussed in the media, with emphasis on their roles in the domestic sphere, but this is undermined by the idea that the media actually 11 bell hooks, Black Looks: Race and Representation (Abingdon: Routledge, 2014), p. 76. 12 hooks, Black Looks, p. 109. 13 Mohja Kahf, Western Representations of the Muslim Woman (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2010), p. 2. constructs realities and so it is possible to confuse the true reality with the constructed one. Representations may be constructed as “subjective experiences of place” and help to constitute reality within the context of cultural politics. 14 This is an important premise within the context of this study as it raises the question as to how Muslim women’s realities are in their control and how far the media subverts them in order to project its own values. However, in order to understand how an audience would read this, and particularly a European audience that incorporates diverse cultures and social values, it is necessary to examine the theories concerning the audience. Audience Research Methods The audience research method examines the relationship between media products and the audience that receives them. This has been discussed extensively by theorists like Stuart Hall that advocate the role of the media as a source of power that propagates social values that in turn frame public debates and create dominant ideologies. 15 In effect, Hall’s theory asserts that the role of the media is to convey messages to the audience that are designed to communicate ideas that are ultimately fully accepted. Although he does provide alternative models in the negotiated reading and the oppositional reading, 16 these concepts demand audience interaction with the intended meanings in order to challenge them. Rose draws upon Hall’s theory to note that this methodological approach is essentially a critical visual one that is concerned with the production and reproduction of social power relations, 14 Ghazi-Walid Falah & Caroline Nagel, Geographies of Muslim Women: Gender, Religion Space (London: Guildford Press, 2005), p. 278. 15 Stuart Hall, ‘Encoding, Decoding’, in Simon During (ed.), The Cultural Studies Reader (London: Routledge, 1994), p. 93. 16 Hall, ‘Encoding, Decoding’, pp. 101-102. although convergence culture does pose conceptual challenges to the immediacy of the response to communicated ideas. 17 Despite insisting that such changes to the media framework should not be exaggerated, she notes that disparate ways of consuming media products may mean that a considered reaction is forthcoming more often than an immediate response. 18 Hall’s theory undoubtedly provides the basis for the analysis of audience reactions to media products but his ideas were proposed based upon a traditional framework and there is a need to update it, which is what Rose tries to do. However, according to other theorists, she does not go far enough. Carpentier argues that there is a specificity and newness associated with digital media types as a result of the fluidity and multiplicity that is inherent within them and this essentially challenges theories of spectatorship. 19 He essentially challenges the existing theories outlined here that have not evolved in order to incorporate new paradigms of spectatorship that do not necessarily lend as much authority to the dynamic interactions and reciprocal relationships that are created on digital platforms. 20 This argument is convincing and innovative as it recognises the value of digital platforms even when manifest within traditional types, such as television and print media. As such, it would be important to bear the authority that new patterns of audience behaviours in mind when performing analysis on the way in which individuals interact with representations in the media. Davis and Michelle concur, pointing out that there is significant fragmentation of the modern audience and yet the media proliferates stories “...without an accompanying accumulation of 17 Gillian Rose, Visual Methodologies (London: SAGE Publications, 2012), p. 263 18 Rose, Visual Methodologies, p. 264 19 Nico Carpentier, ‘New Configurations of the Audience? The Challenges of User-Generated Content for Audience Theory and Media Participation’, in Virginia Nightingale (ed.), The Handbook of Media Audiences (Malden: Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), p. 204 20 Carpentier, ‘New Configurations’, pp. 204-206 knowledge and theory about the processes governing audience engagement and response per se.”21 Indeed, although social media and the Internet has impacted upon the representations of Muslim women in multiple contexts, the digital era has also impacted upon the demands and responses of the audience at the point of consumption and that is an important consideration in terms of the assess of media influence on gendered and racial representations. The Influence of the Media on European Society There are multiple theoretical perspectives that engage directly with European society when assessing the influence of the media on its audience and this provides another area of importance for the purpose of this study. For example, Harrison and Wessels argue that European member states “...retain the power to determine their own regulatory regimes in the media sector... [which] stems from the basis of a belief that the media can generate changes and produce benefits.”22 There is an acknowledgement that there is a need to consider the local despite the access that many have to the global discourse that is so often perpetuated and propagated by media sources that have a wider forum from which to project ideas and concepts. However, the local offers the possibility to reread and represent performances and constructions in similar ways to the global. 23 21 Stuart Hall, ‘Encoding, Decoding’, in Simon During (ed.), The Cultural Studies Reader (London: Routledge, 1994), p. 93. 22 Jackie Harrison & Bridgette Wessels, Mediating Europe: New Media, Mass Communications and the European Public Sphere (New York: Berghahn Books, 2013), p. 5. 23 Norman Denzin & Yvonne Lincoln, The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Research (London: SAGE Publications, 2011), p. 441 The influence of the media on European society is also considered by Carpentier et al, who note that the media is “...not particularly successful in addressing or including ethnic minorities beyond a limited range of genre programmes designed to recognise and celebrate lived multiculture.”24 This suggests that European society is not routinely exposed to difference or multiculturalism in any format other than that with an essentially public service remit. Although this is rather broad and would not apply to all European nations, it places some of the blame for a lack of integration on the media, thus suggesting that it has indeed heavily influenced the attitudes inherent within European society. This particular element of the theory is somewhat speculative but it does introduce a new idea that may be of use in the analysis for the research question, primarily because it lends the media a level of influence that transcends any other form of power in modern society as a result of pervasive technology. Conclusion The theoretical framework established here provides an insight into the agreements and disagreements concerning the representations of Muslims, the relationship between the audience and the influence that the media has on modern society. The theories available about representation tend to agree, citing the white, patriarchal control as problematic in terms of the proliferation of constructs that are almost wholly negative. Gender and race inform the idea of what a Muslim woman is in an era gripped by fear of ostensibly ideologically driven terrorism, and the fear is of course whipped up by the media. The 24 Nico Carpentier, Kim Schroeder & Lawrie Hallett, Audience Transformations: Shifting Audience Positions in Late Modernity (Abingdon: Routledge, 2013), p. 85 theories discussed undoubtedly provide a means of analysing how far European societies have been influenced by the media in terms of the representation of Muslim women, although it should be noted that other factors, such as terrorist events, may also influence the opinions and ideas that are embedded in the societal consciousness in various countries. Somehow the fact that the media only plays a part in projecting representations onto society must be fully considered in order for any conclusions drawn to be credible. 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