Jasmin Zine’s work, Under Siege: Islamophobia and the 9/11 Generation is a comprehensive study, examining Canadian Muslim youths’ experiences in the post-9/11 era and in the aftermath of the global War on Terror. There are a few other books which have examined Canadian Muslim youth experiences with Islamophobia, race and racism in the post-9/11 context (Bakali 2016; Nagra 2017). However, this work differs in two crucial ways from previous work in the field. In this study, Zine engages in a comprehensive study speaking with 135 participants over a span of six years in numerous Canadian cities across Canada. Most previous studies have examined this phenomenon on a smaller scale and have limited participants to two to three major Canadian cities. In this way, Zine’s study provides more depth and nuance to build upon and inform the existing literature in the field. As such, it is not a stretch to say that this book is the most comprehensive study to date of Canadian Muslim youth experiences with Islamophobia since the onset of the War on Terror.
Zine’s opening chapter lays out the premise of her book, namely that young Muslims (in this study the focus were Muslims between 18 and 26) at the time of 9/11 have had experiences that were uniquely impacted by this event. As such, this demographic represents a unique “generation”. The essence of their experiences can be encapsulated by feelings of being “under siege”. This entails being hyper-vigilant of their “Muslimness” in public spaces, having to be in a constant spotlight, where they need to be representative voices of their faith, experiences of bias, prejudice, racism, and being associated with oppression, backwardness, and terrorism. The opening chapter does a good job of outlining key events in Canadian history, which demonstrate systemic forms of Islamophobia prevalent in Canadian society. Though these events could have been connected to deeper historical roots to race and racism in Canadian history, through conversations about displacement and genocide of Indigenous communities, residential schools, the Chinese Head Tax, and other instances; Zine limits her discussion to concrete and specific forms of systemic bias perpetrated against Muslims within the last twenty years. This conversation, though extremely insightful and important for providing a foundation for the discussions of experiences of Islamophobia in the post-9/11 era in later chapters, could have been enhanced by making these connections to Canada’s longer history of racism as a colonial settler society. The following two chapters explore Islamophobia through issues related to identity, gender, radicalization, and harassment. This is where we begin to hear the voices of the 9/11 generation. Zine does an excellent job of highlighting, through excerpts from her participants, just how diverse and heterogeneous Muslims living in Canada are. They possess multiple identities, come from various socio-economic classes, have variant views towards religion and religiosity, and situate themselves along a fluid spectrum of commitment to the faith and religious affiliation. What’s even more important in this discussion is that their experiences with Islamophobia are also unique and nuanced, based upon their positionalities and identities.
A unique contribution of this work is Zine’s exploration of Muslim experiences in Canadian universities in chapter 4. This chapter is a bit of a divergence from the previous chapters in some ways, as parts of the chapter get into the nitty gritty of Muslim Student Association (MSA) politics on Canadian campuses. Though some of these discussions are not tightly connected to Islamophobia and 9/11 per se, these explorations are a refreshing discussion, as scholarship on Muslim youth experiences in Canada rarely engages with issues associated with being a Muslim university student and the complex dynamics that unfold through the intersections of self-discovery, religious awakenings, global political conversations/confrontations, as well as the many other aspects of university student life.
Under Siege also addresses the issue of securitization of the Muslim subject, which has become endemic on a global scale in the War on Terror. Zine alludes to the global nature of Muslim securitization projects by making reference to programs in the US and UK, in addition to the ones in Canada. However, it would have been interesting to also bring in some discussion of case studies from China, Myanmar, and other spaces within the global South to demonstrate how the specter of the dangerous Muslim terrorist is not isolated to the global North (see Bakali and Hafez 2022 for a more detailed discussion). The most impactful idea relating to securitization of Canadian Muslims discussed in this work (covering chapters 5 and 6) was the discussion of the “panoptic society” that Muslims have come to inhabit in Canada. Here, Zine describes how many Muslim youth don’t perceive that the events of 9/11 directly impacted them, yet; they constantly engage in regulatory behavior, as normalized practice. In other words, as Zine (2022) succinctly states, “These youth were not aware of a world where securitization didn’t impact their lives, and they were socialized into accommodating these conditions” (p. 147). There are also interesting conversations covered in these sections that elucidate participants thoughts around possible triggers or drivers which may have caused some Canadian Muslim youth to adopt and take up violent extremist actions. These conversations in many ways reinforce findings in the literature which tease out the symbiotic relationships between Islamophobia and radicalization (see the work of Abbas (2019) for a more detailed discussion).
Under Siege does not just explore Islamophobia in Canada and its negative impact on Canadian youth. Rather, it also discusses spaces where young Muslim voices expressed their agency and resistance to the bigotry and bias that they have experienced. Zine describes these spaces as “Muslim Counterpublics”. Where much of the literature on Muslim youth experiences falls short, this work dedicates an entire section (chapter 7) that recounts how Muslim youth of the 9/11 generation engage in resistance to Islamophobia in Canadian society through artistic expression. The voices of young Muslim poets, filmmakers, comedians, and other artists are showcased to demonstrate how Muslims of this generation are not simply passive victims of racism. Rather, they are reclaiming spaces within Canadian society by producing counter-narratives through artistic expression to define themselves and their experiences as Canadian Muslims.
As someone who grew up in Canada in the post-9/11 years and is a member of the 9/11 generation – according to the parameters laid out by Zine, this work masterfully illustrates a range of experiences, emotions, and reactions that have been experienced by Canadian Muslim youth in the aftermath of 9/11 and the War on Terror. From feelings of alienation, conflicts in identity, self-censorship and hyper-vigilance, to resistance and expressing agency, this comprehensive work, like few others covering Islamophobia in Canada, amplifies the voices of a generation that has been largely overlooked and silenced.