From western Africa to southern Asia, the Muslim world includes many countries with significant Muslim populations, not to mention Muslim Diasporas scattered throughout the globe. On 11th September 2001 with the fall of the Twin Towers in the US, the world experienced a huge change in the relationship of multicultural US with the Muslims of Asian-Arab countries, thereby developing a notion of the ‘other’. The result of this Islamophobia has led to subsequent wars on terror and with the overthrow of Saddam Hussein’s regime in Iraq, the United States has become deeply involved in the affairs of the Muslim world, where religion, politics and culture intertwine in complex and conflicting ways. The present study examines the impact and challenges of September 11, 2001 on liberal imagination and shows how our ability to engage in democratic criticism of the liberal public sphere in the 21st century is overshadowed by mistrust. Using references from a few Post 9/11 fictions, the paper examines how 9/11 introduces a new history of racial segregation of the Muslims as the ‘other’.
Research Scholar, Dept. of English, School of Languages and Literature, Sikkim University
