[Reader-list] ** An Islamist woman defends the Hijab **

[Sarang Shidore]

Across the Middle East and SE Asia the last 10 years have seen a huge
surge among young women who voluntarily don the hijab. Some of them
are highly educated professionals. It is an identity reaction, and is
rooted in the desire every civilization has to embrace modernity on
its own terms.

This is the need of our time, because a lot of global conflicts today
have their roots not in battles over economic resources or territory
as much as over identity. We must understand clearly that modernity
does not mean homogeneity and does not necessarily mean
Westernization.

As the civilization that invented the Enlightenment, democracy,
global colonialism, and weapons of mass destruction (and put
technology and economics at the heart of a societal quest like never
before), the West has been the leading civilization of modernity for
500 years. So much so, that modernization is often confused with
wholesale Westernization. Over the next 100 years this is likely to
change, as other civilizations progress on the arduous journey of
embracing modernity.

We must also understand clearly that pre-modern societies are not
necessarily more "backward" than modern societies. There is in fact
no value judgment at all associated with the transition to modernity.
Societies may choose to remain pre-modern and, in principle, it is an
entirely valid choice. However the ugly reality is that they are
likely to be decimated if they do so. Thus modernity is not a choice
any realistic society can make today. We must all become Moderns. The
question is how and on what terms. This is the current challenge of
the thinkers and leaders within the so-called "third world".

Sarang

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Me and My Hijab

Reflections on the Headscarf

September 2003

By Samira Ali Gutoc

Young Moro Professional Network (YMPN), Philippines

"Don't you get hot?," asks one lady seriously. I tried not to laugh,
ignoring the allusion associated with the question. This headscarf
has air conditioning, I replied.

Having a hijab on and having non-Muslim friends makes me feel
half-Muslim and half-Christian (or mestiza). In the Maranao lingo,
this would mean being partly Muslim and partly Christian (by
parentage). It is not the religion that makes me feel like I always
have to be in the middle of a religious discourse, instead the
feeling arises from the curiosity/half-acceptance I encounter in both
Muslim and Christian circles. When I am with Muslims, I have to
defend my liberal profession in the media trade. When I am with
Christians, I have to explain Islam's practices.

Hijab (headscarfing) is a personal decision I made when I was 17. No
parental guidance, no mullah lecture, no peer pressure. I read
through the Quran and saw in it the rationale for the headscarf. It
was not segregationist or purist. It was an acknowledgement that
women can work alongside any individual, men or non-Muslims, without
the superficialities of the coiffeur. I do not have to be judged
based on my physical appearance. Plus, with my hijab, (inert)
vigilance is a must, - I always have to be "good" to earn my keep for
the afterlife.

Others wear the headscarf as a matter of culture or convenience.
Having visited places in the Philippines such as Sulu, Maguindanao,
Cebu and Baguio, I have observed how the headscarf has its nuances in
every community or tribe. Women of the Tausug tribe wear their caps
with sequins, Maguindanao in colored nets, Maranao in full triangular
cover. Others have only their blackened eyes with cosmetics to match.
Western Muslim ladies I have met are more conservative alongside the
culture-bound women. No colored headscarfs and no hair can be seen.

As I read through the hijab discourse, I realised how complex the
experience was. It was not merely a spiritual experience as I and
many Moros in Marawi undergo everyday. In the Middle East, "politics
and hijab" exist alongside each other. In fact, headscarfing or
unheadscarfing was part of a "feminist struggle." During Egypt's
period of colonisation in 1899, reform laws for women on primary
education, polygamy, divorce and the abolition of the wearing of the
headscarf were sought. The choice to wear a hijab was an advocacy
alongside the call against segregation of women and men. Hijab is
also affirming the Islamic civilisation vis-a-vis the West. "Islamic
headscarfing cross-cuts power relations between Islam and the West,
modernity and tradition, secularism and religion, as well as between
men and women and women themselves," writes anthropologist, Dr.
Mohammad Talib of the Oxford Center for Islamic Studies.

The choice to wear the headscarf could sometimes spell discrimination
or suspicion in a non-Muslim setting - to the extreme, provoking
riots such as those that happened in Europe. Remember the case in
Germany where a Muslim female refused to remove her headscarf in
school? She, I think, was expelled. That sparked a national debate.
The hijab could actually be perceived as a "threat to society." In
Zamboanga, Philippines, nursing students were once disallowed from
wearing the headscarf because, according to hospital administrators,
it scares away patients. This sparked another public debate.

It is hard to be Muslim in a non-Muslim society. Well, it may be
harder for a Muslim woman, who has to undergo the daily travail of
stares, questions and suspicion in a majority non-Muslim setting.
Sometimes it is not that bad. When you get lost in a crowd and are
looking for a friend, she or he can easily find you. You do not need
designer jeans or sparkling clothes to get attention-- the headscarf
just draws eyes towards youŠ. Kidding aside, the headscarf is more of
an emotional experience than anything else. I wear it because it
helps me draw strength from within. It is power unmeasured, its
influence encompassing.