Stereotypes: The Roles Of Muslim Women

A major issue Muslim women face from non-Muslim 's is being seen as one homogenous group. Ahmad and Evergeti 's (2010), study found that Muslim is seen as predominant identity. They argued that even though the religion is formed of multiple different denominations and linguistic group, in the media they are portrayed as a homogenous group against western values. Afshar et al. (2005) research compliments this study by explaining that "there has been a tendency of late to conflate all Muslim 's as belonging to a single nation and aspiring to a single political aim". This could lead to Muslim women being marginalised as the individual voices of Muslim women are not being heard. David Cameron stated that a lack of integration left Muslim women vulnerable to harmful practices such as female genital mutilation.

The Prime Minister 's argument does not take into account that Muslim women are formed of different ethnicities. Rizvi et al. (1999) stated that Female genital mutilation is most commonly practiced by people of African descent, countries such as Turkey and Iraq are far less likely to conduct it. This is supported by Unicef (2013) reports which state that 89% of women in Mali ages between 15-49 had been mutilated. Whilst only 8% of Iraq women in the same age group had been. This shows that different groups of women face different issues, by putting all women into one category the women who need assistance could be neglected. The themes relate back to the views mentioned in chapter one by Petley (2011) Muslim women are often about in the media, however, cultural sensibilities are often ignored which result in a misunderstanding of minority