This Fall 2010 (VIII, 2) issue of Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-Knowledge, entitled "Islam: From Phobia to Understanding," includes the proceedings of an international conference on "Debating Islamophobia," co-organized by the issue co-editors in Madrid, Spain, in May 2009. Beginning with the lead article by the late Nasr Abu-Zayd (1943-2010) from which the title of the issue is adopted, and to whose author this collection is dedicated in celebration of his life and work, the papers explore the nature and meaning of Islamophobia and its diverse unfolding in specific national and historical contexts. The covered themes are: "Religions: From Phobia to Understanding," "Unconscious Islamophobia," "Epistemic Islamophobia and Colonial Social Sciences," "Islamophobia: a French Specificity in Europe?," "Terror and the Politics of Containment: Analysing the Discourse of the 'War on Terror' and its Workings of Power" "Fundamentally Danish? The Muhammad Cartoon Crisis as Transitional Drama," "Historiographic Narratives: The Discourse Strategies for Constructing Expellable "Moorish" Subjects," "Islamophobia and Sexism: Muslim Women in the Western Mass Media," "Discrepancies Around the Use of the Term 'Islamophobia, '" and "The Homelessness of Muslimness: The Muslim Umma as a Diaspora." The publication is an academic contribution to the study of Islamophobia, a tool for social researchers and useful to overcome the prejudices and institutional barriers that produce second-class citizens at the heart of Western Europe. Contributors include: Ramon Grosfoguel (also as journal issue guest editor), Gema Martin-Munoz (also as journal issue guest editor), Nasr Abu-Zayd, Vincent Geisser, Farish A. Noor, Heiko Henkel, Jose Maria Perceval, Laura Navarro, Javier Roson Lorente, S. Sayyid, and Mohammad H. Tamdgidi (also as journal editor-in-chief). Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-Knowledge is a publication of OKCIR: The Omar Khayyam Center for Integrative Research in Utopia, Mysticism, and Science (Utopystics). For more information about OKCIR and other issues in its journal's Edited Collection as well as Monograph and Translation series visit OKCIR's homepage.
