Branding Islam: Mobilising a Victimised Memory of Al-Andalus
Introduction
With the rise of social media channels and the critical democratisation of mediation in the last decade, new terms have invaded the media discourse on terror and extremism. In an absurd yet influential manner, extremist groups are now in direct connection with their audiences, expanding their ideologies all over the internet. When analysing this discourse, traditional media is involved in content and messaging, leaving aside an entire branding strategy that communicates nostalgia, terror and violence, and that seeks mobilisation. This virtual Islamist ‘brand’ can no longer be ignored.
In my intended research project, I will demonstrate how digital propaganda around the return to al-Andalus contributed to the development of the Islamist ‘brand’ that is formed, maintained and developed by religious groups online. Specifically, I will examine the components that initiated the Islamist perception of al-Andalus and the virtual contexts within which this vision is establishing deep roots, while comparing it to other sub-brands of Islamic nostalgia and identity in modern Spain and Europe.
Methodology
My research project will study material in the public domain an d in encrypted religious forums that communicate in Arabic over the internet. I will use an interdisciplinary, collaborative, and ethnographic approach in order to understand the technical and creative attributes of such productions from within, by reaching out to the main communication agents and tracing hierarchies and connections.
I plan to curate workshops, analyse data sets and conduct interviews in order to take into consideration the agents of transmission and dissemination (programmers, hackers, animators, designers and online ‘armies’, to name but a few). I also aim to use my design experience to create processes that structure my research, to test and iterate my findings, and to design monitoring tools to further understand the communication
strategy of al-Andalus mobilization groups.
The Golden Age and Spanish Denial
A biased and selectively chosen historical narrative that is replicated in colonial education is the primary means of constructing a collective memory that feeds into the identity narrative excluding al-Andalus in Spanish curricula (2). A thriving period of art, literature, architecture, science and culture is reduced to a small part in taught Spanish history. The latter attributes Spain’s modern rebirth primarily to the Reconquista and its heroic actors: the Catholic Monarchs. The Spanish denial and suppression of Islam’s influence on national and cultural identity creates a strong foundation for counter-propaganda. Instead of limiting its dissemination, however, it feeds ISIS’ mandate to reconstruct an Islamic State as well as its nostalgic marketing ‘pathos’.
The Exotic Branding of Al-Andalus
Today, al-Andalus is stripped from its history and reduced to an exotic set of symbols and images in the Orientalist imagination, a folkloric circus made for the consumption of tourists. Years of altering the perception of ‘self’ have left their mark on the inhabitants of the region who have adopted the victimized attitude imposed on them. This submissive attitude and its nostalgic trope have expanded the exotic brand.
The Reconquista 2.0 vs. ISIS
Serra del Pino suggests that Spain is now engaged in a Reconq uista 2.0 that is aimed at subduing Catalan and other autonomous regions of Spain. It i s not surprising that, with the resurrection of Reconquista imagery (3) in the mainstream media, an Islamist discourse is starting online that reclaims al-Andalus and mobilises religious crowds around recovering a land lost by Islam on the European territories. This discourse represents al-Andalus as a paradise that leads to the ultimate paradise: the post-Jihad afterlife. The visual language is abundant: golden floral ornaments, green fields, mosques, weaponry, calligraphy and kufiyas and an aggressive vocabulary focused on returning to a Muslim land at any cost and occasionally building on the Palestinian land/resistance narrative.
Brands are no longer a set of visuals aimed at selling a physic al product. The strongest brands today carry distinct ideologies and mobilise communities around social codes. ISIS, similar to most successful brands, creates a story, creed, icons, rituals, lexicon, a duality of believers and non-believers and has a leader. In that light, ISIS propaganda should not be dismissed at times when dismissal can strengthen its roots.
Conclusion
Today, scholarship on Islam has leapt into a new phase through reform ing religious communities, institutions and media outlooks, and redesigning Muslim encounters with their traditions and future aspirations. It is our role to advance our knowledge on Islam to avoid creating another ‘virtual’ Andalus, one that dismisses history and reduces communities to exotic objects. Deconstructing Andalusian imagery on the internet alongside more than two decades of Islamist digital mobilisation facilitates an understanding of the engineering of attraction for groups like ISIS and generates the means to potentially face their threat. How can we re-position al-Andalus out of the Orientalist visual repertoire? How can scholars, researchers and especially media designers extract meaning from ‘religion-as-brand’ to inform a multidisciplinary research on Islam, identity and mediation in the digital age?
2019
Published on:
November 27, 2019
#Al-Andalus, #Branding, #Criticality, #Digital, #Dissemination, #Identity, #Islam, #Mediation, #Memory, #Politics, #Propaganda, #Representation
This abstract was written as a submission to the ITN MIDA - Mediating Islam in the Digital Age program. It answers the topic on “Loss, memory and mobilisation: al-Andalus on the Internet”.
(1) – According to Jordi Serra del Pino al-Andalus is ‘hardly mentioned’ in the secondary school curriculum in Spain. [Sardar, Ziauddin, and Robin Yassin-Kassab. Critical Muslim 06: Reclaiming Al-Andalus. Hurst, 2013.]
(2) – The fierce El Cid is now being projected onto billboards as a hero of Spain and Queen Isabella is depicted in a new television series as a modern woman, a feminist, and spiritual mother of Spain. There is a drive to force Castile and its language onto everyone, to homogenise the state, and purge Spain of its linguistic and ethnic diversity. Reconquista 2.0, Serra del Pino argues, is aimed at subduing Catalan and other autonomous regions of Spain. [Sardar, Ziauddin, and Robin Yassin-Kassab. Critical Muslim 06: Reclaiming Al-Andalus. Hurst, 2013.]
Branding Islam: Mobilising a Victimised Memory of Al-Andalus
2019
Published on:
#Al-Andalus, #Branding, #Criticality, #Digital, #Dissemination, #Identity, #Islam, #Mediation, #Memory, #Politics, #Propaganda, #Representation
This abstract was written as a submission to the ITN MIDA - Mediating Islam in the Digital Age program. It answers the topic on “Loss, memory and mobilisation: al-Andalus on the Internet”.
Introduction
With the rise of social media channels and the critical democratisation of mediation in the last decade, new terms have invaded the media discourse on terror and extremism. In an absurd yet influential manner, extremist groups are now in direct connection with their audiences, expanding their ideologies all over the internet. When analysing this discourse, traditional media is involved in content and messaging, leaving aside an entire branding strategy that communicates nostalgia, terror and violence, and that seeks mobilisation. This virtual Islamist ‘brand’ can no longer be ignored.
In my intended research project, I will demonstrate how digital propaganda around the return to al-Andalus contributed to the development of the Islamist ‘brand’ that is formed, maintained and developed by religious groups online. Specifically, I will examine the components that initiated the Islamist perception of al-Andalus and the virtual contexts within which this vision is establishing deep roots, while comparing it to other sub-brands of Islamic nostalgia and identity in modern Spain and Europe.
Methodology
My research project will study material in the public domain an d in encrypted religious forums that communicate in Arabic over the internet. I will use an interdisciplinary, collaborative, and ethnographic approach in order to understand the technical and creative attributes of such productions from within, by reaching out to the main communication agents and tracing hierarchies and connections.
I plan to curate workshops, analyse data sets and conduct interviews in order to take into consideration the agents of transmission and dissemination (programmers, hackers, animators, designers and online ‘armies’, to name but a few). I also aim to use my design experience to create processes that structure my research, to test and iterate my findings, and to design monitoring tools to further understand the communication
strategy of al-Andalus mobilization groups.
The Golden Age and Spanish Denial
A biased and selectively chosen historical narrative that is replicated in colonial education is the primary means of constructing a collective memory that feeds into the identity narrative excluding al-Andalus in Spanish curricula (2). A thriving period of art, literature, architecture, science and culture is reduced to a small part in taught Spanish history. The latter attributes Spain’s modern rebirth primarily to the Reconquista and its heroic actors: the Catholic Monarchs. The Spanish denial and suppression of Islam’s influence on national and cultural identity creates a strong foundation for counter-propaganda. Instead of limiting its dissemination, however, it feeds ISIS’ mandate to reconstruct an Islamic State as well as its nostalgic marketing ‘pathos’.
The Exotic Branding of Al-Andalus
Today, al-Andalus is stripped from its history and reduced to an exotic set of symbols and images in the Orientalist imagination, a folkloric circus made for the consumption of tourists. Years of altering the perception of ‘self’ have left their mark on the inhabitants of the region who have adopted the victimized attitude imposed on them. This submissive attitude and its nostalgic trope have expanded the exotic brand.
The Reconquista 2.0 vs. ISIS
Serra del Pino suggests that Spain is now engaged in a Reconq uista 2.0 that is aimed at subduing Catalan and other autonomous regions of Spain. It i s not surprising that, with the resurrection of Reconquista imagery (3) in the mainstream media, an Islamist discourse is starting online that reclaims al-Andalus and mobilises religious crowds around recovering a land lost by Islam on the European territories. This discourse represents al-Andalus as a paradise that leads to the ultimate paradise: the post-Jihad afterlife. The visual language is abundant: golden floral ornaments, green fields, mosques, weaponry, calligraphy and kufiyas and an aggressive vocabulary focused on returning to a Muslim land at any cost and occasionally building on the Palestinian land/resistance narrative.
Brands are no longer a set of visuals aimed at selling a physic al product. The strongest brands today carry distinct ideologies and mobilise communities around social codes. ISIS, similar to most successful brands, creates a story, creed, icons, rituals, lexicon, a duality of believers and non-believers and has a leader. In that light, ISIS propaganda should not be dismissed at times when dismissal can strengthen its roots.
Conclusion
Today, scholarship on Islam has leapt into a new phase through reform ing religious communities, institutions and media outlooks, and redesigning Muslim encounters with their traditions and future aspirations. It is our role to advance our knowledge on Islam to avoid creating another ‘virtual’ Andalus, one that dismisses history and reduces communities to exotic objects. Deconstructing Andalusian imagery on the internet alongside more than two decades of Islamist digital mobilisation facilitates an understanding of the engineering of attraction for groups like ISIS and generates the means to potentially face their threat. How can we re-position al-Andalus out of the Orientalist visual repertoire? How can scholars, researchers and especially media designers extract meaning from ‘religion-as-brand’ to inform a multidisciplinary research on Islam, identity and mediation in the digital age?