Muhammad Tariq Awan, a research scholar at the Department of Media and Communication Studies (DMCS) of International Islamic University (IIU) successfully defended his PhD dissertation. He was declared eligible for the award of doctorate degree in Media and Communication Studies.
He did his thesis on “Construction of Islamophobia in The US & The UK Press: A Discourse Analysis”. He did his research under the supervision of Professor Dr. Zafar Iqbal, Dean Faculty of Social Sciences, IIUI, while his co-supervisor was Prof. Dr. Fazal Rahim Khan, Dean, Foundation University.
Dr. Syed Inam ur Rehman, Chairman DMCS was internal examiner. External examiners were Prof. Dr. Saqib Riaz, Chairman Department of Mass Communication, AIOU and Prof. Dr. Zahid Yousaf , Chairman Department of Mass Communication, University of Gujrat.
Dr. Tariq’s research focused to explore Islamophobic discourses in Western media, which portray Islam and Muslims so as to produce specific perceptions of them. The study concludes that Islamophobia stems primarily from the perception of Islam as a threat, which fuels Muslim-centered psychological, political, and structural phenomena such as prejudice, racism, and securitization. It identified the discursive process of construction of Islamophobia, proposing that it functions in a cyclical fashion; its cycle starts by problematizing Islam, which activates the process of otherizing Muslims, racializing them, and later securitizing them.