Exceptional and Banal Constructions of British Muslims in Grenfell: Social Boundaries, Twitter, Superdiversity and Online Vernacular memory

Abstract

The Grenfell fire catapulted North Kensington into the spotlight, an area both synonymous with immigration and social policy innovation for over a century. However, it remains under examined how this extraordinary event re-defined the discursive landscape around British Muslims and how they have been situated in the national landscape. To do this it analyses the twitter activity in the 96 hours after the fire and also the victim profiles published in the Guardian Newspaper. It finds that the narratives that emerge blur British Muslim social boundaries through narratives both around the exceptional and banal narratives which emerged during and after the fire. This constructs British Muslims as both saviours during Grenfell, and also as a super-diverse population that resists topologizing as pre-dominantly South Asain. This article also raises broader questions about the not only the role that social media has in the creation of vernacular memory, and also that in this case twitter was importantly not a conduit for the fake news and hate speech created against British Muslims during Grenfell.