- Uzair Ahmed, C-REX, University of Oslo: Race, space and Muslims
- Sveinung Sandberg, University of Oslo: Opposing violent extremism: Forms of narrative resistance among young Muslims in Norway
- Aslaug Kristiansen, University of Agder & Roger Säljö, University of Gothenburg: '… you get a lot of attention': Young people’s reactions to a Nazi provocation against a human rights centre
Race, space and Muslims
Uzair Ahmed, C-REX, University of Oslo
In the post-9/11 world, sociologists have often studied the racialisation of Muslims. Still, less attention has been paid to how racialisation constrains spatial experiences. In this article, I investigate how 30 young Muslims in Norway make meaning of their racialised spatial experiences. Identify three patterns in which racialisation affects spatial experiences: day-to-day interactions in places of work and education, avoidance of areas due to a sense of safety and choice of residence, school and leisure activities. My findings suggest being Muslim is a segregating layer in Norway.
Opposing violent extremism: Forms of narrative resistance among young Muslims in Norway
Sveinung Sandberg, University of Oslo
Following terrorist attacks in the US and Europe, Western Muslims have been criticised for not taking a firm stand against radical Islam and extremist organisations. This presentation challenges such assertions and reveal young Muslims' narrative mobilisation against violent jihadism. Based on 90 qualitative interviews with young Muslims in Norway, we show how religious extremism is rejected in a multitude of ways. This includes using derogatory terms to describe jihadist organisations and criticising extremists for false interpretations of Islam. For example, powerful narratives that invoke religious concepts—jihad, Sharia, shahid, Caliphate, kuffar, and al-Qiyāmah—have accompanied jihadi violence but also inspired robust counter-narratives from Muslims. The opposition to violent extremism also includes less acknowledged forms of narrative resistance, such as humour and attempts to silence jihadist organisations by ignoring them. We argue that stories that counter jihadism are crucial to understand the narrative struggles of Muslim communities, whose outcomes can help determine why some individuals end up becoming religious extremists – while others do not. We furthermore suggest that young Muslims’ religious narratives reject a mainstream characterization of Islam as essentially a religion of aggression and simultaneously join forces with that mainstream in seeking the narrative exclusion of the jihadi extremists.
'… you get a lot of attention': Young people’s reactions to a Nazi provocation against a human rights centre
Aslaug Kristiansen, University of Agder & Roger Säljö, University of Gothenburg:
This paper reports analyses of how young people conceive of a public Nazi provocation against the Norwegian Human Rights Centre, Arkivet in Kristiansand. The provocation in question included raising a Nazi flag at the entrance of the Centre on April 9, 2018, while video-documenting the activity. The data on student interpretations were generated through focus group interviews with students (aged 14-15), who visited the Centre. The ensuing discussion also concerned the students’ views of what attracts young people of today to such extreme ideologies. The results show that the participants realize the provocative nature of the undertaking of raising the flag. Their accounts (Scott & Lyman, 1968) of the motives behind such an initiative range from seeing it as a way of gaining public attention for Nazi ideology to, alternatively, seeing it as a way of provoking by people who do not know what happened during Nazi oppression. With respect to the issue of what attracts young people to such ideologies today, the accounts point to a) lack of knowledge about history (in spite of the rich evidence), b) beliefs in racist ideologies, c) needs of young people to provoke (without necessarily being committed to the ideology).
This paper is co-authored by Inger Marie Dalehefte, University of Agder, and Ingunn Tønnevold Hansen,Competence Centre for Prevention of Radicalization and Violent Extremism, ARKIVET in addition to the two presenters.