Racialized Agents and Villains of the Security State: How African Americans are Interpellated against Muslims and Muslim Americans

Abstract

This article examines modern American warfare and policing to draw parallels in the ways that national citizens and foreign nationals are subjected to similar regimes of violence and subjugation and highlight the interrelated oppressions of marginalized groups at home with marginalized groups abroad. It analyzes media representations of people from the Middle Eastern, North African, and South Asian (menasa) regions to further demonstrate the workings of empire. In particular, the us military-industrial complex, in conjunction with the us media industry, has played a pivotal role in creating dangerous post-9/11 stereotypes of menasa people as ruthless terrorists. Simultaneously, the us media fabricate an organic alliance between African Americans and its security state apparatus, thereby creating discord and disunity between African Americans and Arabs and other Muslim Americans. Against the hegemony of these institutions, how can activists create spectatorial solidarity and unified movements?