She Just Wanted to Be Like Any Other Canadian.Pdf

SHE JUST WANTED TO “BE LIKE ANY OTHER CANADIAN TEENAGER”: REPRESEN- TATIONS OF MUSLIM WOMEN IN LOCAL NEWSPAPERS, LEGISLATION AND POLITI- CAL DEBATES IN POST 9/11 CANADA JACLYN ALLEN A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Arts in History Nipissing University School of Graduate Studies North Bay, Ontario © Jaclyn Allen ! ! ! ! ! ! ! Abstract This MRP, “She just wanted to “be like any other Canadian teenager”: Representa- tions of Muslim Women in Canadian newspapers, legislation, and political debates in the context of post 9/11 Canada,” analyzes local newspaper coverage of the murders of Muslim women. It focuses, in particular, on the 2007 murder of Aqsa Parvez in Mississauga, On- tario, but also considers reports on the 2009 murder of Rona Mohammad, Zainab Shafia, Sahar Shafia, and Geeti Shafia in Kingston, Ontario. Alongside this analysis this MRP considers the Zero Tolerance for Barbaric Practices Act, Quebec’s Bill 94, and political debates at the federal and provincial level about these pieces of legislation. Post 9/11 discourses in newspapers, legislation, and political debates mobilize gendered and racialized stereotypes about Muslim women and men, which have particular consequences for Muslim women and men living in Canada. They raise important historical questions: What is the history of women like Aqsa Parvez, Rona Mohammad, Zainab Shafia, Sahar Shafia, and Geeti Shafia in Canada? What stories are shared about them, and the men in their families and commu- nities, in these public discourses? How does this impact ideas about the past and present of Muslim people in Canada? To answer these questions, I examine local newspaper coverage from the Mississauga News and the Kingston Whig-Standard, as well as, Canadian legislation and political debates. I argue that these discourses do little to complete the story of Muslim women in Canada, such as Parvez, and even less to challenge incomplete un- derstandings of Muslim people and Muslim culture, which continue to be deployed in media and inform those ignorant about the Muslim community in Canada. I argue that when media, politicians and lawmakers generalize, prescribe, or make assumptions about people they perpetuate, often with dangerous consequences, stereotypes and Islamophobia and do not challenge structural inequalities that lead to violence. This MRP highlights the per- sistence and growth of such misunderstandings for Muslim people in Canada in the post-9/11 era and contributes to historical discussions about the Canadian nation, which have highlighted the gendered and racialized dimensions of multiculturalism, immigration, and citizenship by extending these discussions to ideas about Muslim men and women. ! ! !iv Acknowledgements These individuals have had a great influence on my passion for history and on mak- ing this project into something of which I am very proud. First, I would like to thank my advi- sor, Dr. Katrina Srigley, whose door was always open whenever I had a question or needed to talk through my thoughts. Thank you for your patience, knowledge, editing, encouragement, and support throughout this process. I also want to thank Dr. Hilary Earl for taking the time to work and meet with me this past year. Thank you for your guidance, encouragement, and insightful comments, which have shaped and strengthened this MRP. I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Murton, Dr. Kozuskanich, Dr. Neal, Dr. Gendron, Dr. Connor, Dr. Thorn and Dr. Wenghofer for taking the time to attend our Methods II meetings. Thank you for those hard questions that encouraged me to widen my research from various per- spectives. I would like to extend my gratitude to Nipissing University, the Graduate Studies Department, and the entire History Department for providing the tools necessary to complete this project. I want to thank Stephen, Emily, and Nick, for their support and for their continuous encouragement throughout this year. Thank you for the gym sessions, editing, and late- night laughter. I am profoundly grateful for my family, especially my mom, dad, and broth- ers, for supporting and listening to me throughout writing and researching for this thesis. I am also grateful for my dear friend, Meghan Dovey, for her constant support this year and for always being so enthusiastic and excited about my project. This accomplishment would not have been possible without them. Thank you. ! ! ! !v Table of Contents ! Abstract iv Acknowledgements v Introduction 1 Methodology 6 Historiography 12 Context 23 1. National Identities 27 1.1 Exploring ‘Canadian’ As A Category Of Analysis 27 1.2 Exploring Muslim Femininity 31 2. Unsettling Multiculturalism: Muslim as ‘Other’ 39 2.1 “Honour Killings”: Imported or Domestic Violence? 45 3. Listening to Muslim Women 50 Conclusion 55 Bibliography 58 ! ! ! ! ! ! !vi !! !1 INTRODUCTION The following is an experience of one immigrant girl in Canada, as told by the Mis- sissauga News. In 2001, eleven-year-old Aqsa Parvez moved with her family from Pakistan to Canada.1 The family settled in Mississauga, Ontario where Parvez attended Applewood Heights Secondary School. The Mississauga News reported that the women of the Parvez family observed gendered customs of the Muslim faith: Parvez wore a hijab and her father and mother had arranged her marriage.2 As is often the case for young immigrants adjust- ing to a new culture and country, when Parvez was in the eleventh grade she began to ex- periment with her identity, incorporating the Muslim traditions of her family and the secular, ‘Western’ influences of her friends and school. According to her friends, Parvez started taking off her hijab in gym class, increased the amount of time she spent out with friends, and skipped some school classes.3 The story in the Mississauga News suggests these behav- iours created tension at home between Parvez and her parents.4 It was later reported that Mohammad Parvez, in particular, felt that his daughter was ignoring her Muslim identity.5 In the fall and winter of 2007, when Parvez was sixteen-years-old, she was prompted by a school counselor to move into a women’s shelter.6 At 7:20 am on December 10, 2007, Parvez was picked up at a bus stop by her brother, Waqas Parvez.7 At 8:03am Peel Re- 1! Louie Rosella, “Aqsa ‘just wanted to be herself,’” Mississauga News, June 16, 2010. !2 Louie Rosella, “No parole for 18 years,” Mississauga News, June 16, 2010. !3 Rosella, “Aqsa ‘just wanted to be herself.’” !4 Ibid. !5 Louie Rosella, “50th Anniversary: Aqsa Parvez murder: Did father or brother fatally strangle teen?” Mississauga News, July 26, 2015. !6 Louie Rosella, “Culture clash led to fatal attack, friends say,” Mississauga News, December 11, 2007. !7 Adrian Humphreys, Megan O’Toole, and Kenyan Wallace, “Aqsa Parvez’s father, brother plead guilty in death,” Global News, June 15, 2010. #2 gional Police responded to a 911 call by Mohammad Parvez who confessed to killing his daughter “with [his] hands.”8 As a young woman who grew up with primarily male family members close to Mississauga in Burlington, Ontario, I was interested in this story and how it was reported. This MRP investigates representations of the 2007 murder of Aqsa Parvez in the Mississauga News and the 2009 murder of Rona Mohammad, Zainab Shafia, Sahar Shafia, Geeti Shafia in the Kingston Whig-Standard. These local online newspapers pro- vide a particular type of reporting relevant to my analysis of them as discourses. While the reports from these papers are picked up and reproduced by nationally-circulated newspapers including the Toronto Star they reflect a pattern of news reporting found in local online newspapers. First, these are free online newspapers designed to share quick digestible sound bites that will easily resonate with readers, encourage repeat visits and, as a result, grow advertising revenue. The news reports are rarely longer than a page, generally string- ing together quotes from various people with generalizations rather than nuanced analysis. Local news reporters, in this case Louie Rosella for the Mississauga News and Paul Schliesmann for the Kingston Whig-Standard, construct narratives to achieve these goals and, as this MRP will show, in the process deploy gendered and racialized discourses about Muslim men and women that do little to connect with the contexts of and information about the murders. Rather, these local newspapers deploy gendered and racialized discourses that have long animated Western imaginations of the backwardness of Muslim people and that have shape ideas about the Canadian nation, particularly as they relate to immigration, citizenship, and multiculturalism. This MRP also analyzes similar representations of Muslim masculinity and femininity, as they exist more broadly in other discourses. !8 Bob Mitchell, “‘I killed my daughter…with my hands,’” Star, June 16, 2010. #3 In the Zero Tolerance for Barbaric Cultural Practices Act, assented to on June 18, 2015, and in legislative amendments to the Citizenship Act, which emerged particularly under the Conservative Stephen Harper Government, I find remarkable consistency in the ways Mus- lim women are described. I argue that this approach does little to complete the story of Muslim women in Canada, such as Parvez, perpetuates stereotypes and Islaophobia, and fails to challenge structural inequalities that lead to violence in Canada. Where relevant this MRP points to discourses found in popular culture, social media, and art exhibitions (particularly the Aga Khan exhibit – Rebel Jester Mystic Poet), which challenge the discourses that ignore or do not include Muslim women or rely on simplified representations of them, highlighting differences between representations of Muslim women and how Muslim women describe and define themselves in Canada after 9/11, but this is not the focus of this MRP. Defining Muslim women as a group is in itself an impossible task.

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