Diğer Dini Gruplara Yönelik Tutumların Algılanan İslamofobi, Gruplar Arası İletişim ve Sosyal Kimlik ile İlişkisi: Batı Ülkelerinde Yaşayan Müslümanlar Üzerine Bir Araştırma

Year 2024, Issue: 27, 69 - 81, 20.10.2024

Kenan Sevinç , Metin Güven

https://doi.org/10.32950/rid.1496733

Abstract

Batı ülkelerindeki Müslüman nüfus giderek artmakta ve buna bağlı olarak Müslümanların hayatını ilgilendiren bireysel, toplumsal, kültürel, ekonomik, siyasi vb. farklı meseleler her geçen gün araştırmacıların ilgi sahasına dahil olmaktadır. Azınlık bir grup olarak genel nüfus içerisinde kendine yer bulmaya çalışan Müslümanlar dışlanma, ayrımcılık, önyargı, damgalama, nefret öfke ve şiddet gibi olumsuz tutum ve davranışlarla hayatın farklı alanlarında karşılaşabilmektedirler. Sözlü sataşma, dini pratiklere müdahale, iş yerinde ayrımcılığa maruz kalma, seyahat esnasında dışlayıcı güvenlik taramalarına katlanma, silahlı saldırı, tehditler, zorbalık ve vandallık yaşanan problemler örnekleri olarak tespit edilmiştir. Özellikle 11 Eylül saldırıları, bu tür olumsuz tutum ve davranışlar açısından Müslümanların hayatında yeni bir dönemin başlangıcı olmuş; hayatı zorlaştırıcı bu tür olaylar çok daha fazla yaşanır hale gelmiştir. Dolayısıyla Batı toplumu içerisindeki farklı dini grupların birbiri ile olan ilişkileri araştırmacılar açısından yeni bir boyut kazanmıştır. Mevcut literatür, dini grupların birbirine yönelik düşünce, tutum ve davranışları üzerine incelemeler yapmış ve Müslümanlara karşı sergilenen böylesi yıpratıcı tutumların diğer herhangi bir dini gruba yönelik tutumlardan daha yıkıcı olduğunu tespit etmiştir. Bu bağlamda, şu önemli soru akla gelmektedir: Batı ülkelerinde yaşayan Müslümanlar, diğer dini grupların olumsuz ve hayatı zorlaştırıcı düşünce, tutum ve uygulamalarına maruz kalıyorken, onlar diğer dini gruplara karşı hangi düşünce, hissiyat ve tutumlara sahiptirler? Buradan hareketle bu çalışma, Batı ülkelerinde yaşayan Müslümanların diğer dini gruplara yönelik tutumlarını, bu tutumların tecrübe edilen gruplar arası temas ile ilişkisini, diğer gruplar ile olan iletişimlerinin kalitesini, algıladıkları İslamofobi düzeyini ve kendi grup içi dinamiklerini belirleyen sosyal kimlik seviyelerini incelemiştir. Araştırmada ilişkisel tarama yöntemi ve anket tekniğinin kullanılmıştır. Araştırma verileri ise kesitsel desenle Amerika Birleşik Devletleri, İngiltere, Almanya başta olmak üzere Batı ülkelerinde yaşayan, 18 ile 55 ve üzeri yaşlardaki 158 Müslüman katılımcıdan elde edilmiştir. Katılımcıların 93’ü erkek (%58,9) ve 65’i kadındır (%41,1). Katılımcılara sunulan anket formunda “Grup İçi Kendini Tanımlama Ölçeği” ve “Algılanan İslamofobi Ölçeği,” kullanılmıştır. Bunun yanında gruplar arası ilişkilerin sıklığı ve niteliğine dair sorular ile diğer dini gruplara yönelik tutumları belirlemeyi amaçlayan sorular katılımcılara yönlendirilmiştir. Araştırma bulguları (a) Müslümanların en olumlu şekilde yaklaştığı dini grubun Katolikler olduğunu ve en sık şekilde Katolikler ile iletişime geçtiğini, (b) diğer dini gruplara yönelik tutumların onlarla iletişime geçme sıklığı ve olumlu temaslarda bulunma ile ilişkili olduğunu, (c) sosyal özdeşleşme, temas ve algılanan İslamofobi düzeyleri ile diğer dini gruplara yönelik tutumlar arasında istatistiksel olarak anlamlı bir ilişki bulunmadığını ve (d) algılanan İslamofobi’nin sadece Yahudilere yönelik tutumlar ve bu grupla olan nitelikli iletişim ile ilişkili olduğunu göstermiştir. Araştırmanın sonuçları, sınırlılıkları ve konuya dair ileride yapılabilecek çalışmalar çalışma içerisinde değerlendirilmektedir.

Keywords

İslamofobi, Batı, Müslümanlar, Dini Gruplar, Tutumlar, Sosyal Kimlik

The Relationship of Attitudes toward Other Religious Groups with Perceived Islamophobia, Intergroup Contact, and Social Identity: A Study among Muslims Living in Western Countries

Abstract

The Muslim population in Western countries gradually increases, and thereby, individual, social, cultural, economic, political, etc. matters related to the lives of Muslims draw researchers’ attention day by day. Muslims, who make efforts to survive within the given population as a minority group, may encounter negative attitudes and behaviors in different life venues such as exclusion, discrimination, prejudice, labeling or stigmatization, hatred, anger, and violence. In this regard, the literature addressed verbal taunting, obstructing religious practices, workplace discrimination, travel discrimination, armed attacks, threats, bullying, and vandalism as significant problem instances. Particularly, the 9/11 attacks had caused a breakthrough change in the lives of the Muslim population in terms of the addressed negative attitudes and behaviors, causing such complicated and deleterious incidents to happen increasingly. Therefore, the relationships of different religious groups with each other living in Western society prompted a significant scholarly interest. The existing literature explored the thoughts, attitudes, and behaviors of religious groups toward each other and found that Muslims have to struggle with detrimental attitudes more compared to any other religious group. In this regard, an important question that comes to mind is what thoughts, feelings, and attitudes Muslims living in Western countries may have toward other religious groups while facing negative and complicated thoughts, attitudes, and actions of other religious groups. Accordingly, this research explored the attitudes of Muslims living in Western countries toward other religious groups and the relationship of these attitudes with intergroup contact, quality of contact, perceived Islamophobia level, and social identification level. As a quantitative study, we collected the data with the survey technique and ran the correlational analysis. The cross-sectional data came from 158 participants (93 Males (58.9%) - 65 Females (41.1%)), who mostly live in the U.S., the U.K., Germany, and other Western countries, aged 18 and 55+. The survey deployed “Social Identification Scale” and “Perceived Islamophobia Scale.” In addition, we ask questions to the participants regarding (a) the frequency and quality of intergroup relations and (b) the attitudes towards other religious groups. Results indicated that (a) Catholics are the most positively regarded religious group for Muslims and they are the group with whom Muslims have the highest frequency of contact; (b) attitudes toward other religious groups were associated with frequency of contact and positive evaluation of contact; (c) there was no statistical relationship between levels of social identification, contact and perceived Islamophobia and attitudes towards other religious groups, and (d) among religious groups, perceived Islamophobia was only associated with attitudes toward Jews and evaluations of contact with this group. We discuss the study implications, limitations as well as future research avenues.

Keywords

Islamophobia, West, Muslims, Religious Groups, Attitudes, Social Identity

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