The Immigrant Muslim American at the Boundary of Insider and Outsider

Abstract

Studies of Orientalized portrayals of Muslims have generally been distinct from studies on the Othering of immigrant Americans. This study employs concepts of insider/outsider status, applying theories of Orientalism and representations of the Other to newspaper coverage of the Muslim and Pakistani American perpetrator of the 2010 attempted Times Square bombing. Newspapers constructed a seemingly contradictory representation of Faisal Shahzad, as the apparent insider/American who becomes the alienated outsider/Other. This portrayal of the Orientalized insider establishes an emerging discourse on the “homegrown” terrorist who exists at the boundary of self and Other.