Islamophobia, Victimisation and the Veil

I. Zempi, N. Chakraborti

• Publisher: Palgrave Pivot
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9781349470419, 9781137356147
• eBook ISBN: 9781137356154
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Social Sciences

This book examines the experiences of veiled Muslim women as victims of Islamophobia, and the impact of this victimisation upon women, their families and wider Muslim communities. It proposes a more effective approach to engaging with these victims; one which recognises their multiple vulnerabilities and their distinct cultural and religious needs.

1

Constructions of Islam, Gender and the Veil

Abstract: The chapter examines historical and contemporary discourses of the veil and considers the wider implications of this framework for veiled Muslim women in the West. In colonial times the veil was seen as a symbol of gender oppression in Islam as well as a sign of exoticism. Within this paradigm, the ‘liberation’ of veiled Muslim women became fused with the motivations of imperial expansion. In a post-9/11 climate, popular perceptions of the veil suggest that it is a symbol of Islamist extremism and segregation as well as a sign of gender inequality. As such, the chapter demonstrates that the veil has been – and continues to be – perceived as a symbol of Muslim ‘otherness’ and its visibility is key to constructing stereotypes which identify it as a marker of Muslim ‘difference’. The chapter then offers a discussion of legal restrictions upon the wearing of the veil in public places in Europe, and argues that perceptions of veiled Muslim women as either oppressed or acting on behalf of a ‘terrorist religion’ potentially legitimise public acts of violence towards veil wearers. Even if not explicitly inciting hate-motivated violence, popular stereotypes contribute to a climate of intolerance towards veiled Muslim women and to mounting tensions between Islam and the West.

Zempi, Irene and Neil Chakraborti. Islamophobia, Victimisation and the Veil. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. DOI: 10.1057/978113735614.0004.

Orientalism and the veil

Historically and traditionally, Western contact with veiled Muslim women was rare before colonial exploration. Prior to the 17th century, colonial perceptions of veiled Muslim women were the product of male travellers’ tales and poor translations of Arabic texts. From the late 17th century, colonial interaction with veiled Muslim women remained limited until the next century when colonial expansion began to produce a ‘Western narrative of women in Islam’ (Ahmed, 1992: 149). In 1978, Said coined the term ‘Orientalism’ to portray the way that Western scholarship reflected a distorted image of the East. In particular, the ‘Orientalist framework’ stemmed from ‘an imaginative and yet drastically polarized space dividing the world into two unequal parts, the larger, ‘different’ one called the Orient, the other, also known as ‘our’ world, called the Occident or the West’ (Said, 1981: 4). This imaginative space was characterised by the strict binary of ‘us’ and ‘them’ whereby the West was privileged over the Orient. The ideology associated with Orientalism served to construct a Western identity based on opposition to the Orient. From this perspective, the production of knowledge about the colonial ‘Other’ was a simultaneous constitution of the ‘Self’. This framework was also employed in relation to the dress code of women in Islam.

Within the Orientalist framework, the veiled female body became the symbol for Islam. Essentially, the wearing of the veil was seen as evidence of the debasement of women in Islam based on the premise that women were forced to wear the veil by Muslim men. As such, the veil became the symbol of the backwardness of Islam itself. Al-Saji (2010) argues that colonisation functions not only through economic and political hegemony but also by means of a representational apparatus which determines perceptions of the colonised. This apparatus of representation is the lens through which the colonial observer views the colonised society. At the same time though, this lens is also a mirror. The representational apparatus of colonialism not only constitutes the image of the ‘native’ but posits this image in opposition to a certain self-perception of colonial society. Correspondingly, the veiled female body was projected as the counter image for the ideal Western woman, particularly in the context of gender equality. Against this background, the ‘liberation’ of veiled Muslim women became the justification for colonialism. During the late 19th and early 20th century colonial officials adopted a ‘civilising mission’ in relation to colonised countries. The veil took on an acute visibility in this attempt, with the image of the subjugated Muslim woman in need of rescue by Western men being used to legitimate the build-up of French and British colonial empires.

At a time when Victorian morals predominated, Muslim women were the objects of male erotic fantasies related to the idea of harem.¹ An eroticised desire to remove the veil was evident in the growing European print culture of the 18th century. Mabro’s (1991) study of Western travellers’ perceptions of Middle Eastern women found that they were seen as ‘exotic’ and the veil was placed at the centre of this exoticism. For Mabro (1991), a desire to ‘uncover what was covered’ and to ‘see the unseen’ was a constant feature within colonial discourses, thus pointing to a libidinal desire to unveil the veiled female body. The same image was evident in Orientalist paintings in which Middle Eastern women were frequently portrayed naked or scantily clad lounging in harems (Haddad, 2007). However, it was also argued that these women were unhappy in their harem and thus in need of rescue by the West. Vulnerable, naked women who needed to be rescued by Western men were presented as the victims of cruel Eastern men. It is this image of captive beauty that appealed to the patriarchal urges of domination and imperialism of Western men. Clearly, such paintings presented a sharp contrast between the barbarity of the East and the civility of the West, between ‘us’ and ‘them’.

Western men were prohibited from entering the private world, including harems, where unveiled women could be viewed, and as a result the removal of the veil signified the ultimate form of colonisation. In this regard, the objectification of the veil as a form of visibility of sexual desire to unveil the veiled female body became fused with the motivations of imperial expansion. The visible transformation from veiled bodies to ‘Westernised’ bodies was a key factor in subduing resistance towards colonial powers through imposing ‘Western values’ upon them. Billaud and Castro (2013) observe that the removal of all distinctive signs, and especially the veil, from the public domain was key to the assimilation of the colonised. Ultimately, removing women’s veils became a central motive of the so-called civilising mission on the basis that the veil was seen as a visible barrier to the establishment of Western superiority.

In colonial times, therefore, the veil was invested with a twofold visibility of desire: a sexual desire to see beneath the veil in parallel with a desire to ‘civilise’ and ‘modernise’ Middle Eastern women by removing their veils. From this perspective, the veil was seen as a symbol of gender oppression in Islam as well as a sign of exoticism, whilst the ‘liberation’ of veiled women became fused with the motivations of imperial expansion, at least from the gaze of the coloniser. This approach of viewing veiled women as subjects who can and should be unveiled functions as a contemporary precedent for the state’s desire to remove the veil in public places and to ‘see the unseen’. This indicates that colonial ways of seeing the veil still function as a lens through which to view veiled Muslim women, particularly in certain European countries such as France, Belgium and Italy where the wearing of the veil has been banned in public.

Contemporary understandings of the veil

In colonial times the image of the subjugated veiled Muslim woman in need of rescue by Western men dominated the gaze of the colonisers. In a post-9/11 climate, popular perceptions of the veil suggest that it is a symbol of Islamist extremism and self-segregation as well as a sign of gender oppression. Such negative connotations of the veil interact with each other whilst promoting the veil as a ‘threat’ in the West. Although there is an overlap amongst these misconceptions of the veil it is necessary to assess them separately, particularly since they promote Islamophobia in different ways. As the following discussion demonstrates, the wearing of the veil in the West attracts negative attention premised on three main arguments: gender equality, public safety and integration.

Gender oppression

The wearing of the veil in public places in the West is routinely perceived as a marker of patriarchy and a symbol of gender subjugation. From this perspective, the female code of dress in Islam functions as a metonym for the perceived backwardness of Islam. The assumption of patriarchal domination and matriarchal submissiveness in Islam consolidates and reproduces oriental views of Islam as culturally inferior to the West. Based on the rigid dichotomy of ‘us’ and ‘them’, the act of veiling is constructed as evidence of the misogyny and violence associated with Islam whilst the act of unveiling is identified as an example of the equation of the West with gender equality and freedom. Accordingly, the veil is stereotypically seen as a symbol for the oppression of women against which the West prides itself as being emancipator.

Within this paradigm, popular stereotypes about women in Islam provide the negative mirror in which Western constructions of gender can be positively reflected. By erasing the multiplicity and variety of veiled Muslim women’s lived experiences, they are constructed as ‘Other’ compared to the emancipated Western women. In striking contrast to the image of the oppressed veiled Muslim woman stands the image of the emancipated Western (and non-Muslim) woman who has ‘control over her income, her body and her sexuality’ (Kapur, 2002: 16). From this perspective, the reduction of images of Muslim women to monolithic categories maintains the construction of the Muslim as ‘Other’ whereby Muslim women are underprivileged and oppressed, ‘with the West being the primary referent in theory and praxis’ (Raju, 2002: 173).

Critique of veiling practices located on the ‘us’ and ‘them’ dichotomy infers that the increasing visibility of veiled female bodies in the public sphere is indicative of ‘Muslimness’ rather than femininity. This approach is based on a simplistic equation between sexual expressiveness and bodily display. As Macdonald (2006) points out, Western imagination is itself obsessed with bodies and the possibility of revealing the female body. Popular images of women in the media promote a ‘natural,’ ‘open’ and ‘unveiled’ female body which is constructed through regimes of internalised management such as diet, exercise and even plastic surgery, whilst promoting the open visibility of glamorous, white, youthful, female bodies. In striking contrast to this image stands the image of the veiled Muslim woman who is perceived to be sexually constrained, illiterate, tradition-bound, domesticated and poor. In the words of Kapur (2002: 18), ‘it is an image that is strikingly reminiscent of the colonial construction of the Eastern woman’. This approach is structured along the contours of colonial reasoning: the assumption being that women in Islam are incapable of self-determination and autonomy. Seen in this light, a body that is veiled is necessarily a victimised body to the extent that veiled Muslim women are incapable of autonomy or agency.

In concretising the symbolism of the veil as a form of gender oppression, anti-veiling discourse denies the voices of veiled Muslim women while professing a desire for their voices to be heard. Although the veil debate revolves around the right to freedom of speech and expression, the individuals are not heard, and mute symbols are often presented as ‘clear’ and in no need of interpretation or explanation. Consequently, the multiple meanings of the veil are taken to be self-evident, as representing the subordination of women in Islam, whilst the voices of the Muslim women who choose to veil are almost entirely missing from the public sphere. Ultimately, the veil as an expression of religion, a sign of personal autonomy and a display of freedom of expression is ignored. Without dismissing the fact that some women, Muslim or not, are oppressed by men and by customs, this is not the appropriate framework in which to explore veiling, particularly in liberal democratic states such as the UK.

On the one hand, women in certain Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia are forced to wear the veil and this can be a very traumatic experience. On the other hand, veiling in a liberal democratic country such as the UK (where veiling is voluntary) indicates that it is a choice, particularly as a symbol of Muslim identity. Indeed, the research literature suggests that the veil represents freedom of choice within the UK (Bullock, 2011; Hannan, 2011; Mondal, 2008; Tarlo, 2007; Franks, 2000). Echoing the same view, Ferrari (2013) states that interpreting the veil exclusively as a marker of gender oppression neglects the fact that there are women who choose to wear the veil. However, Billaud and Castro (2013) claim that the apparently autonomous decision to wear the veil is the result of a false consciousness rather than a genuine choice. This would suggest that veiled Muslim women are not simply oppressed but also ‘blind’ to their own oppression.

The failure to acknowledge the possibility of the autonomy of veiled Muslim women and girls ensures the continued representation of women in Islam as ‘voiceless victims’. Moreover, dominant perceptions about veiled Muslim women’s lack of agency further entrench dangerous notions of a ‘Muslim problem’ whereby Muslim men deny Muslim women the freedom to exercise their autonomy. As Ahmad (2010) notes, this discourse silences and obscures alternative forms of agency, repeats simplistic ‘Western’ versus ‘Muslim’ dichotomous frameworks, and contributes to the separation between ‘us’ and ‘them’. While we acknowledge that the social status and life conditions of many Muslim women needs to be improved to achieve gender equality, it should also be recognised that to consider all Muslim women as passive victims is not an accurate reflection of how many Muslim women perceive their lives. Ultimately, the articulation of the female Muslim body as the ‘victim subject’ fails to accommodate a multi-layered experience and therefore denies the possibility of choice.

Islamist terrorism

The wearing of the veil in public places in the West is stereotypically seen as a symbol of Islamist fundamentalism. In a post-9/11 climate, the West is allegedly facing a global ‘threat’ by Islamist extremism and the veil is a visual representation of that ‘threat’. Ghumman and Ryan (2013) argue that although Muslim women are perceived as oppressed and Muslim men are seen as dangerous, Muslim women are not free from popular stereotypes whereby Muslims per se are seen as terrorists or terrorist sympathisers. In particular, the veil is perceived as a danger to public safety on the basis that the covering of the face hinders identification. An example of the link between the veil and Islamist terrorism is evident in several high profile cases in the UK and elsewhere. In December 2006, Mustaf Jama, a Somali asylum seeker wanted for the murder of a British female police officer, fled the UK dressed as a woman dressed in burka and using his sister’s passport, despite being amongst the UK’s most wanted criminals at the time and Heathrow airport being in a state of alert following the 7/7 bombings (Stokes, 2006). Moreover, one of the terrorists responsible for the 7/7 bombings had allegedly fled London disguised in burka (BBC News, 2007). In November 2013, terror suspect Mohammed Ahmed Mohammed escaped surveillance in London by entering a mosque wearing Western clothes, but leaving the mosque disguised as a veiled woman (The Guardian, 2013a).

Correspondingly, the veil is stereotypically seen as a danger to public safety on the basis that it could be used as camouflage for a terrorist. In this light, banning the veil is seen as a means to ensure public safety. It is important to note that there is no veil ban in the UK but schools and educational institutions are allowed to set their own uniform guidelines. In 2005, Imperial College in London banned its students from wearing the veil on campus over security concerns raised by the terrorist attacks of 7/7 (Garner, 2005). In 2006, Birmingham University School of Medicine banned its medical students from wearing the veil when talking to patients in hospitals and surgeries, and when they were in meetings with other medical staff (Leggatt, Dixon and Milland, 2006). In September 2013 Birmingham Metropolitan College banned its students from wearing the veil on campus so that they were easily identifiable. The UK Prime Minister, David Cameron, supported this decision but the Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, stated that he was uneasy about the veil ban (BBC News, 2013). In 2010, Damian Green, then immigration minister, had stated that banning the wearing of the veil in public would be ‘un-British’ (BBC News, 2010). Birmingham Metropolitan College has later reversed its decision after more than 9,000 people signed an online petition set up by the National Union of Students (NUS) Black Students’ Campaign calling on the College to remove the ban (The Guardian, 2013b).

As a sign of Islamist terrorism and extremism, the veil is also understood as a tool of religious fundamentalism whereby it serves to proselytise non-Muslims to Islam. In this regard, the veil is seen as an act of religious propaganda with the aim to infiltrate into Western society. In the words of Tissot (2011: 43): ‘Women in niqab are the Trojan horse of extremist Islamism’. Seen in this light, the veil hides not only the face but ‘secret intentions’ as well, namely, to impose Sharia law in the West. As such, the veil represents the type of political Islamism that is also found in Iraq and Afganistan, characterising the implementation of Sharia law as interpreted by the Taliban. From this perspective, Muslim girls and women who veil in the UK are often linked to political Islam.

In 2002 Shabina Begum, aged 15 at the time, pursued a legal case against Denbigh High School in Luton on the grounds that it had unlawfully denied her the ‘right to education and to manifest her religious beliefs’ for its ban on the jilbab, a traditional Islamic dress that leaves only the hands and face exposed (Johnston, 2005). The then head teacher at Denbigh High School in Luton stated that the school maintained its jilbab b...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Introduction
• 1  Constructions of Islam, Gender and the Veil
• 2  Unveiling Islamophobic Victimisation
• 3  Researching Islamophobia and the Veil
• 4  Uncovering Islamophobic Victimisation
• 5  Impact of Islamophobic Victimisation
• 6  Conclusions and Reflections
• References
• Index