Schumann APSA draft 2005
direct this at a specific target audience. This paper showed that language helps to differentiate
between certain discourses. The debates (mostly in Arabic) on the relationship between Islam
and Arabism differ in content and textual style from the debates (in English and Arabic) on
American citizenship and its connection to the cultural, ethnical and religious particularities of
Arab and Muslim immigrants. At the same time, however, there are certain key words such as
muwâtana (citizenship), asâla (authenticity), ijtihâd (independent reasoning), and shûrâ
(consultation) that connect these discourses with each other without merging them into one
ideological construct.
(3) ‘Dialogue’ (hewâr) in the understanding of Al-Hewâr magazine also fits to the concept of
‘articulation’. Al-Hewâr sees ‘dialogue’ as a way to bring separate ideas and ideologies
together without, however, dissolving the differences between them by finding a consensus.
The goal is rather restricted to ‘enhancing a better understanding’ or ‘creating more harmony’
between the different positions. The magazine sees its own function in this context merely as
providing a forum (minbar) for the expression of different ideas and opinions.
Simultaneously, and somehow at odds with this claim is the fact that Al-Hewâr wants also to
be a pulpit (minbar) to propagate a certain conviction, i.e. the compatibility of Islam and
Arabism, and to serve Arabs and Muslims in the United States as a mouthpiece with view to
their foes.
29
Convention