Islamic Narratives in Ukraine: Analyzing Communicative Dynamics

Abstract

The significance of Islamic marketing for Ukrainians is determined by its influence on consumers of informational and industrial products in a non-Muslim country. The objects of our research are semantic components of the Islamic narrative in Ukraine. The subject of the study is Islamic marketing of communications. The research objective is to analyze the communicative dynamics of Islamic narrative found in the popular Ukrainian media. The research methodology is based on the current scholarly approaches to religion narratives. The results show that the Islamic narrative has consisted of two different narratives, the first related to Ukrainian Muslims, and the second related to Muslims of other countries. The analysis of the narratives revealed that since the beginning of the military confrontation with Russia, a battle of ideologies has emerged in which the successful business narrative was first rooted in soft power strategy, then turned into a strategic narrative, and has eventually become a weaponized narrative.