The media has a powerful ability to shape the way we view our world. In the midst of elections, international conflicts and refugee crises, Islamophobia has permeated the news cycle.

Last week, April 5, 2016, rabble put together a panel discussion called Combatting Islamophobia in Media.

On today's program, we're bringing you highlights from the event, held at the Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House on unceded Musqueam territory, also known as Vancouver.

The evening provided a critical ear on media representation. Together, the panelists engaged in an important dialogue about the value of diversity, storytelling and truth sharing from the hands of marginalized communities within the media.

Panelists:

Urooba Jamal: In the past year, Urooba has run for political office as the youngest candidate in Vancouver's municipal elections, has given a TEDx talk on student activism and has helped to co-found a leftist, alternative student press, The Talon, at the University of British Columbia. A recent graduate, she is currently interning at Leftward Books, a Marxist publishing press in India.

Itrath Syed: PhD candidate at School of Communication at Simon Fraser University. Research focus: analysis of discursive regimes that given Muslim subjectivities in the post 9/11 world. Strath also teaches Women's Studies at Langara College and Asian Studies at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.

Sunera Thobani: Associate Professor at the Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice, University of British Columbia. Research focuses on critical race, postcolonial and feminist theory, globalization and violence, citizenship, migration, Muslim women, the War on Terror, and media.

Emcee Ayesha Kahn: fourth year student at Kwantlen University, she has also studied at Harvard University where her studies in Archaeology and History focused on Slave Trades, the African Diaspora and Slave Roots Tourism throughout Ghana, West Africa. She is the Secretary of the Ottawa-based Board of Directors for Human Concern International and director of Anti-Oppression at Kwanten Public Interest Research Group.

Thanks to collaborators on this event: Media Democracy Days, Langara College Women Studies Program and BC Civil Liberties Association.

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Combating Islamophobia in Media