Master Thesis MSc in Sociology: track migration and ethnic studies Online Islamophobia after the Brussels attacks on March 22nd 2016. A critical discourse analysis of Facebook comments on news articles regarding the Brussels attacks by Het Laatste Nieuws and De Standaard Ezra Dupré (ID: 12759317) Supervisor: dr. L.M. Hernandez Aguilar Second reader: dr. M.A. van den Berg July 6th 2020 Abstract Online Islamophobia in the Flemish context is facing a research gap. Offline Flemish Islamophobia has been investigated previously. However a significant amount of reports on Belgian Islamophobic behaviour took place online. Social network platforms have become full- fledged social spheres where public discourse debates are encouraged. This thesis investigates the dominant narratives of Islamophobic comments on Flemish news articles posted on Facebook within a month after the Brussels bombing on March 22nd 2016. Because of the cultural and linguistic differences between the French speaking community and Flemish speaking community in Belgium, Islamophobia is bound to be affected by these differences. The comments are posted as a response to articles by the Flemish popular newspaper Het Laatste Nieuws and the Flemish quality newspaper De Standaard. In total 28 416 comments were analysed through Fairclough's critical discourse analysis with an additional focus on semiotic decisions made in the comments. The results indicate that dominant narratives of offline Islamophobic statements conform to online dominant narratives found in the Facebook comments. Dominant narratives supplementary to previously examined offline dominant narratives were detected such as “Muslims do not provide adequate upbringings for their children.” The main Islamophobic themes discussed in the comments cohere and overlap. In conclusion, the different dominant narratives of online Islamophobic comments combine into the online Islamophobia which arose from different forms of prejudice towards Muslims. Acknowledgements Without the following people’s support, writing this thesis would not have been possible. I would therefore like to thank these people ahead of the actual thesis. During the Migration and ethnic studies track, my interest in Islamophobia gradually grew. First of all, I would like to thank the professors in the migration track for sparking my interest. Secondly, I would like to thank my supervisor through this thesis, dr. L.M. Hernandez Aguilar, for the supportive guidance and feedback. His comments, motivation and critical eye always helped me forward during the process. Additionally, I would like to thank my second reader dr. M.A. van den Berg for the helpful advice regarding my thesis proposal. Next I would like to thank my fellow students in my thesis seminar group for giving me the critical feedback I needed. Lastly, I would like to thank my mother and my friends for the support and advice they provided. Table of contents Abstract ....................................................................................................................... 3 Acknowledgements ....................................................................................................... 4 1. Introduction ........................................................................................................... 7 1.1. Islam and Islamophobia in Belgium ................................................................... 8 1.2. Academic and societal relevance ..................................................................... 10 2. Research questions ............................................................................................... 10 3. Theoretical framework .......................................................................................... 12 3.1. Islamophobia ................................................................................................. 12 3.2. Islamophobia and racism ................................................................................ 13 3.3. Social media ................................................................................................. 15 3.4. Facebook ...................................................................................................... 16 3.5. Cyberhate ..................................................................................................... 17 3.6. Online Islamophobia ...................................................................................... 18 4. Research design and methods ................................................................................ 20 4.1. Data ............................................................................................................. 20 4.2. Data collection .............................................................................................. 22 4.3. Data analysis ................................................................................................. 23 4.3.1. Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis ...................................................... 23 4.3.2. Hall’s encoding and decoding ................................................................... 25 4.4. Conceptual model .......................................................................................... 26 5. Results ................................................................................................................ 27 5.1. Dominant narratives in descriptions Muslims.................................................... 27 5.1.1. Islamic practices need to be secularized to be accepted in Western societies .. 27 5.1.2. Veiling is incompatible with Western values and local rules ........................ 28 5.1.3. Islamic belonging is a prior identity marker ............................................... 28 5.1.4. Islam threatens Belgian traditions ............................................................. 29 5.1.5. Brussels is turning into a Muslim city ........................................................ 30 5.1.6. A process of radicalization of Muslims is underway in Belgium ................... 31 5.1.7. Islam is (and Muslims are) a problem for Western societies ......................... 32 5.1.8. Islam is an easy object of derision ............................................................. 33 5.1.9. Islamic religion legitimates extreme forms of women oppression ................. 34 5.1.10. Mosques do not have their place in the local context ................................... 35 5.2. Alternative dominant narratives ....................................................................... 36 5.2.1. Muslims provide their children with inadequate upbringing ......................... 36 5.2.2. Muslims support terrorism ....................................................................... 37 5.2.3. Comments opposed to Muslim migration to Belgium .................................. 38 5.2.4. Islam and racism ..................................................................................... 39 5.2.5. Unsubstantiated claims ............................................................................ 41 5.3. Semiotics ...................................................................................................... 42 5.3.1. Metaphors .............................................................................................. 42 5.3.2. Us-them division ..................................................................................... 43 5.3.3. Aggregation ............................................................................................ 45 5.3.4. Nomination-functionalization ................................................................... 46 5.3.5. Specification- generalization .................................................................... 47 5.3.6. Other semiotic choices ............................................................................. 47 5.4. Differences between HLN and DS ................................................................... 49 5.5. Encoding and decoding .................................................................................. 52 6. Discussion and conclusion .................................................................................... 54 6.1. Discussion .................................................................................................... 54 6.2. Limitations.................................................................................................... 69 6.3. Recommendations for future research .............................................................. 70 6.4. Conclusion .................................................................................................... 70 Bibliography .............................................................................................................. 72 Appendix 1: Diagram proportions dominant narratives ................................................... 82 Appendix 2: Overview articles Het Laatste Nieuws ........................................................ 83 Appendix 3: Overview articles De Standaard ................................................................. 91 1. Introduction On 22 March 2016, the Zaventem airport and Maelbeek Metro Station in Brussels were bombed by Belgian members of ISIS causing 31 people to lose their lives and 300 to be injured (Rathore, 2016). Additionally, the Muslim terrorists of the Bataclan in Paris (2015) were Belgian as well. Many far-right politicians blamed the European Union for the attacks because of the Schengen area’s open