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Culturalising the Abject: Islam, Law and Moral Panic in the West

Culturalising the Abject: Islam, Law and Moral Panic in the West This paper explores the construction of Islam as abject and the symbolic positioning of Muslims as being outside secular modernity in Australia through an analysis of the way the criminal legal process and perceptions of criminality are culturalised. The empirical focus is gang rape and the trials of Muslim youth on gang rape charges in Sydney between 2000–2003 which quickly became culturally inflected as ‘Muslim’ and ‘Lebanese’ by media reporting of the criminal trials and moral panic about them as source of social menace. Three dimensions of culturalisation of crime and the criminalisation of culture are identified in the criminal legal process and media reporting of it; firstly the cultural inflection of new laws against gang rape by their association with particular events and trials; secondly the introduction of ‘cultural defence’ by the accused as a mitigating factor in the criminal legal process; thirdly, media reporting and commentary on criminal cases which emphasize cultural explanations for individual criminal behaviour. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Australian Journal of Social Issues Wiley

Culturalising the Abject: Islam, Law and Moral Panic in the West

Australian Journal of Social Issues , Volume 42 (1) – Sep 1, 2007

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References (45)

Publisher
Wiley
Copyright
© Australian Social Policy Association
eISSN
1839-4655
DOI
10.1002/j.1839-4655.2007.tb00036.x
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

This paper explores the construction of Islam as abject and the symbolic positioning of Muslims as being outside secular modernity in Australia through an analysis of the way the criminal legal process and perceptions of criminality are culturalised. The empirical focus is gang rape and the trials of Muslim youth on gang rape charges in Sydney between 2000–2003 which quickly became culturally inflected as ‘Muslim’ and ‘Lebanese’ by media reporting of the criminal trials and moral panic about them as source of social menace. Three dimensions of culturalisation of crime and the criminalisation of culture are identified in the criminal legal process and media reporting of it; firstly the cultural inflection of new laws against gang rape by their association with particular events and trials; secondly the introduction of ‘cultural defence’ by the accused as a mitigating factor in the criminal legal process; thirdly, media reporting and commentary on criminal cases which emphasize cultural explanations for individual criminal behaviour.

Journal

Australian Journal of Social IssuesWiley

Published: Sep 1, 2007

Keywords: ; ;

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