Circulating Conspiracy: The Invocation of Antisemitic Canards in Anti-Muslim Prejudice

Abstract

This research examines how antisemitic tropes play a critical role in producing prejudice against Shi’as and, ultimately, Muslims more broadly. It focuses on the rhetoric of conspiracy in anti-Shi’i discourse rooted in the Sunni revivalist Ṣaḥwa movement of the Arabian Peninsula and how this discourse has been transformed by social media. Ṣaḥwa (“awakening”) refers to the politicization of Sunni Islam following the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan and the decline of Pan-Arabism after the Six Day War. The rise of the Islamic Republic in Iran offered both inspiration and rivalry, deepening sectarian divides. In this context, centuries-old heresiographies have been rearticulated globally and entangled with national politics. I analyze how Ṣaḥwa polemicists disparage Shi’i beliefs by constructing parallels between Shi’ism and qualities ascribed to Jews in global registers of antisemitism. This commensuration provides a language for broader anti-Muslim discrimination in English-language media. My analysis highlights how hate discourse often spills over, extending prejudice beyond its original targets. This tendency underscores the need for intersectional approaches to institutional interventions.

Field

Anthropology

Team

Jarred Brewster, Erin Debenport, PhD

Jarred Brewster

I am a Ph.D. candidate in the Anthropology Department at the University of California, Los Angeles. I am linguistic anthropologist concerned with language and economy, knowledge production and circulation, dissimulation, and language documentation with an areal focus on the Arabian Peninsula. I come to the Bedari Kindness Institute with a keen interest in applying the toolkit of my profession to explore the discursive linkages between antisemitic, anti-Shi’a, and generally anti-Muslim canards around conspiracy. This project is related to my work on the practice of precautionary dissimulation (taqiyya) among minority Muslims in Saudi Arabia, done in collaboration with Aidah Aljuran (Ohio State University).

My dissertation research deals with language maintenance efforts in a globalizing Oman. I conduct ethnography in two sites where a minority language called Shehret is being used: in newly introduced language classes in state-run school, and in the pasture where Omani livestock owners interact with the South Asian migrant workers employed to tend their herds. My work illuminates the complex and often fraught relationship between Oman’s economic and social transformation and the goals of local language revitalization efforts.

I am a lifelong trail runner, an amateur musician, a benefactor to stray cats, an inadvertent film buff (thanks to COVID-19), and a proud member of UAW 4811.

VIEW MORE PROJECTS