Islamophobia: Deal With It in the Name of Peace

Ideally, I would have co-authored this review with someone of the Muslim faith. I haven’t been able to find a co-author, and so I am reviewing Islamophobia: Deal With It in the Name of Peace and admitting my limitations in that I have never experienced Islamophobia. Having said that, I feel that this book has limitations from my perspective.

Islamophobia: Deal With It in the Name of Peace is aimed at both Muslim and non-Muslim readers. Its opening chapter, titled “Islamophobia 101”, is a short primer on Islamophobia. The three subsequent chapters, “The Believer”, “The Intolerant”, and “The Bystander”, each deal with the same three types of individuals involved in any incident of bullying or intolerance. The bully is “the intolerant”, the person being bullied, in this case due to their faith, is “the believer”, and onlookers who do nothing are “the bystanders”.

Islamophobia: Deal With It in the Name of Peace is part of the Lorimer “Deal With It” series. With the rise in hate crimes and intolerance and fear of others in our culture and the media, it is understandable that adults working with young people need resources to help negotiate the difficult conversations around topics including Islamophobia. The topic is important and very relevant. My concerns are about the presentation of the information in Islamophobia: Deal With It in the Name of Peace.

First, the good points about this book. Islamophobia: Deal With It in the Name of Peace includes many organizational aspects that readers will find helpful to understanding the information. These include charts such as the one in “Islamophobia 101” titled “Islamophobia can be based on …” which illustrates examples into the categories “Ignorance”, “Stereotypes”, “Assumptions” and “Fear”. The examples in the chart are presented in the form of cartoon strips.

Another good feature is the use of quizzes at the end of each chapter to emphasis and review the information in the chapter.

Also, in the chapter “The Intolerant”, there is a clear explanation of how to judge information on social media.

To truly understand if what you are reading can be trusted and is accurate, you have to ask yourself some questions.”
Who is the author?...

Where does it come from?...

Who stands to gain?... (p 25)

My favourite bit of information in the book is in the quiz at the end of “The Bystander”.

This quiz has no right or wrong answers, because each situation is unique. Your answers may be different from the ones given below, but they could be right under the circumstances. (p 28)

Despite these good features, I feel that there are several important weaknesses in Islamophobia: Deal With It in the Name of Peace.

Although the charts and quizzes used to organize some of the information in the book are useful, some of the examples used feel like they have been forced to fit into the charts and other organizational features. The quiz at the end of “The Believer” consists of 10 scenarios. It gives readers three choices for each scenario. Depending on the reader’s choice, they are identified as being “Assertive”, “Aggressive” or “Passive”. The wording of the choices is very uneven.

#10 Tackling Dummy

Your Social Studies class is having a discussion about war, refugees, and immigration. Someone turns to you and asks, “So do Muslims believer in holy war?” Do you

a) Yell at your classmate and call them a racist?

b) Quietly say that you don’t know?

c) Tell them you can’t speak for almost two billion people with their own opinion? (p 17)

Answers given are a) aggressive, b) passive, c) assertive.

I do understand the mistake in asking any member of any group to act as the spokesperson or authority for that group. I don’t feel that this scenario is well-chosen or that the answers given are really accurate representations of assertive, aggressive and passive behaviour, especially for readers this age who are probably trying to sort out what assertive, aggressive and passive behaviour is.

Even the title of this scenario – “Tackling Dummy” is problematic.

In the chapter “The Intolerant”, the author identifies ways that the reader can be part of the solution: “Get to Know a Muslim”, “Visit a Mosque”, “When in Doubt, Ask!”, and “Remember that Diversity is Strength”. In the last section, “Remember that Diversity is Strength”, the author states,

Throughout history, many great inventions and new innovations came from Muslim people who contributed to knowledge in math, science, astronomy, medicine, art, language, literacy, and philosophy./i> (p 25)

Unfortunately, this is a missed opportunity to identify some of those significant contributions either in an illustration or a list. This is not nearly as engaging as it could be. Examples including names and achievements would be much more meaningful.

Finally, the language is sometimes awkward. "It can lead to intolerance, and even hateful, speech and actions."

Overall, I can only recommend Islamophobia: Deal With It in the Name of Peace with reservations. Islamophobia is an important topic, and how to deal with it deserves a better presentation than this.