A Virtual Canvass’ – designing a blog site to research young Muslims’ friendships & identities (original) (raw)
Related papers
A Virtual Canvas"—Designing a Blog Site to Research Young Muslims' Friendships & Identities
Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung Forum Qualitative Social Research, 2012
This article is based on research among a group of Muslim youth living in the west of Ireland as part of a study on "social belonging" and identity. One part of the research involved designing a youth centered, participatory research method, in the form of a blog site, to investigate what young people say and do when they are asked to talk about themselves and their relationships, with minimal researcher involvement. Participants were presented with a "blank virtual canvas" where they determined what became discussed. Twenty-two teenaged Muslimscomprising close friends as well as fellow students of the same school and living in the same West of Ireland town-contributed to a time limited, closed blog site over a four month period. The blog site offers interesting snippets of Muslim identification, and how they choose to present themselves to others. In the process of contributing to this exercise, we can also observe subtle means through which inclusion and exclusion co-exist online, refracting young people's offline worlds. The blog affords an opportunity to consciously "do" friendship by presenting to each other images, symbols and statements of friendship that invoke both cohesion and closure. The research unravels certain gendered patterns in online performances. In demonstrating this evidence, we argue that the study of online interactions of youth can provide an alternative window in exploring relationships, identification and social positioning. Table of Contents 1. Introduction 2. Research Study-Background, Aims and Methods 2.1 Method 3. Identity and Identifications 4. Young Muslims' Online Performances and Interactions 4.1 Overarching identifiers 4.2 Notable silences and "loud" statements 4.3 Expressing friendships online 5. Conclusion References Authors Citation
Young people with muslim backgrounds exploring their multiple sense of belonging
2017
In this article, I discuss the performative, art-based, and participatory methods used in two major research projects conducted with immigrant youth in Finland: Since 2009, I have been engaged in the participatory performative research project “A Finn, a Foreigner, or a Transnational Hip-hopper? Participatory Art-Based Research on the Identification Negotiations and Belongings of Second-Generation Finnish Immigrant Youth”, and in 2016, I began to work as a researcher for a project called “Young Muslims and Resilience—A Participatory Study.” I also discuss the roles that participatory performative research approaches play in these projects. I begin by briefly discussing my own positionings as a researcher and by introducing the main data, materials, productions, and themes that emerged from the data. I then reflect on the methodological foundation of these projects. Finally, I discuss how young people have negotiated their belonging through multiple identifications and relations to r...
Presenting Muslim gender on the internet; the study of presenting Iranian Muslim youth on Facebook
The relationship between a user's real identity and what is presented on the internet is an interesting and important field for researchers. Growing social networking websites, especially Facebook, are becoming increasingly popular thereby making this topic more important. Gender and religion are two crucial factors shaping identity in the real world and it is important to know how they affect the creation of new online identities, especially on Facebook. In this research, the profiles of 50 Facebook users were assessed regarding the profile picture, information that users had shared, and statuses (referring to a section in Facebook called, "What is on your mind?"). Of this sample, 30 Facebook users were interviewed in-depth to attempt to uncover both the thought process behind the development and representation of their identity, and (with regard to gender) what role religion plays in that representation. It seems Facebook users (male and female) are not overly concerned about religious or other social norms in their real life while representing themselves online.
Muslim Young People Online: “Acts of Citizenship” in Socially Networked Spaces
This paper reviews the current literature regarding Muslim young people’s online social networking and participatory practices with the aim of examining whether these practices open up new spaces of civic engagement and political participation. The paper focuses on the experiences of young Muslims living in western societies, where, since September 11, the ability to assert claims as citizens in the public arena has diminished. The paper draws upon Isin & Nielsen’s (2008) “acts of citizenship” to define the online practices of many Muslim youth, for whom the internet provides a space where new performances of citizenship are enacted outside of formal citizenship rights and spaces of participation. These “acts" are evaluated in light of theories which articulate the changing nature of publics and the public sphere in a digital era. The paper will use this conceptual framework in conjunction with the literature review to explore whether virtual, online spaces offer young Muslims an opportunity to create a more inclusive discursive space to interact with co-citizens, engage with social and political issues and assert their citizen rights than is otherwise afforded by formal political structures; a need highlighted by policies which target minority Muslim young people for greater civic participation but which do not reflect the interests and values of Muslim young people.
International Communication Gazette , 2010
This study utilizes a textual analysis of selected threads from the Arabic discussion forums of two of the most popular Islamic websites-Islamonline.net and Islamway.com-to explore the potential impact of the new Islamic virtual public sphere, and the reconfiguration of the 'virtual umma' (Islamic community) online, on the creation of collective identities. The study also assesses whether the discourses and deliberations taking place in these two sites' discussion forums exemplify an ideal Habermasian public sphere, through shura (consultation), ijtihad (interpretation) and ijma (consensus), as defined within the Islamic context. Findings indicate that there is an uncritical, unquestioning type of emotional consensus among posters who did not exemplify a truly rational-critical debate, particularly when it came to issues of political salience. Discussions among the posters show that they consider being a 'Muslim' as the most important 'identity signifier' in their lives. However, in some cases, especially while discussing political issues of a 'pan-Arab' nature, a parallel 'Arab' identity also emerged, confirming the parallelism and interrelatedness of 'Arab' and 'Muslim' identities, and the overlap between mediated 'Arab' and 'Islamic' public spheres.
#NousSommesUnis: Muslim Youth, Hypermediated Internet Spaces, and European Islam
https://www.amazon.com/Prayer-Pop-Politics-Transformation-Contemporary/dp/3847109790, 2019
In the aftermath of the November 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris, the French youth interfaith association Coexister created the hashtag #NousSommesUnis (We Are United) to show solidarity and promote social cohesion. The hashtag assumes a particular meaning for young Muslims, such as the members of the association Ptudiants Musulmans de France (EMF, French Muslim Students), who use it not only to mourn victims, but also to distance themselves from religious-inspired violence and counteract Islamophobia. This chapter explores the diffusion of #NousSommesUnis to show that digital media are a relevant tool to understand the religious engagement of young people, who tend to rely on Internet communications more heavily than previous generations. By means of a qualitative analysis, the chapter explores discourses created in three digital venues: 1) Twitter messages containing the hashtag #NousSommesUnis sent by members and sympathizers of Coexister and EMF; 2) videos about #NousSommesUnis created and uploaded on YouTube by EMF members and other young users; and 3) the website of the collective of associations #NousSommesUnis, founded by Coexister to promote campaigns in digital as well as physical venues. The analysis suggests that #NousSommesUnis helps to create a hypermediated religious space. The theory of hypermediation is useful to understand how young Muslims connect everyday actions and experiences on various digital media, articulate discourses that are re-mediated by other users, and aim at attracting the attention of national and international media. They create hypermediated spaces because they are able to connect online and offline activities through different media strategies, and establish venues to negotiate their religious identities in a society that tends to frame Islam as incompatible with Western values. In conclusion, the chapter argues that a focus on hypermediated spaces created by young Muslims can open up new perspectives on relationships between religion, race, age, communities, and social actions.
ReOrient, 2018
The identity formation of Muslim youth in the global south without colonial binaries, and with an emphasis on giving voice to the researched, is a topic deserving of scholarly work and attention. Such is the attempt Máiréad Dunne, Naureen Durrani, Kathleen Fincham and Barbara Crossouard undertake in 'Troubling Muslim Youth identities': a collection of four different case studies seeking to explore 'how young Muslims integrate or differentiate the three themes of nation, religion and gender in their identity constructions' (p. 52). Demonstrating the richness, the plurality and the complexity of Muslim youth identities, the comparative corpus is bursting with insights.
Intertextuality and Constructing Islamic Identities Online
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Virtual identities of Muslim women: A case study of Iranian Facebook users
The virtual identity of women in the cyberspace surrounding Muslim countries is undergoing a process of differentiation from real-life identity. Although in some Arab countries women present themselves in online social networks as faceless users, in other Muslim countries, such as in Iran, they act differently. Despite the risk of possible real-life consequences, in some Muslim countries women are starting to feel free to decide how to present themselves on the Net, especially regarding the Islamic hijab. In addition, Muslim men and women are engaging in more open dialogue through their digital identities. Furthermore, social networks have given Muslim citizens a political voice, giving them the freedom to express what they object to in social or political terms. Within the context of Iranian society, this research project analyzes how the virtual and real behavior of female Muslim Facebook users varies and how the social networks are pushing them towards a kind of ‘Westernization’. The data has been collected through a content analysis of 550 public Facebook profiles of Iranian female users who live inside and outside this country.
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Economic and Political Weekly, 2021
This article is an exploration into the self-representation of online Muslim youth and their engagement with contemporary politics. It is based on an analysis of responses to tweets on the recent Bihar assembly election.