Non‐Veiled Muslim Women in the West: Sentiments and Views

2021 ◽  
Vol 111 (3) ◽  
pp. 336-357
Author(s):  
Lynda Clarke
Keyword(s):  
Muslim Women ◽  
The West

Approaches to the wardrobe challenges of Muslim women in the west

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. 1155-1173
Author(s):  
Wafaa H. Shafee
Keyword(s):  
Community Integration ◽  
Muslim Women ◽  
Western Society ◽  
Fashion Industry ◽  
Dress Code ◽  
The West ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Global Brands ◽  
Women's Clothing ◽  
Clothing Choices

Purpose This study aims to identify the challenges of Muslim women in terms of their dress code in Western society by including their clothing needs in the strategies of the fashion industry and marketing. The study focuses on wardrobe choices that have helped overcome these challenges and facilitated Muslim women’s integration into western society. Design/methodology/approach Descriptive statistics were used in this study through a questionnaire that was distributed among 265 randomly selected Muslim women in London, UK. The results have been presented in charts showing the percentages and frequencies of the different behaviors and challenges that were faced by Muslim women in the west. Findings The majority of the study sample preferred to use a variety of modern fashion trends from global brands to integrate with the community. The essential criteria for the Muslim women’s clothing choices include head hair cover and conservative full-length clothes that are non-transparent that cover the neck and chest area. Originality/value A study has investigated the clothing needs and behaviors of Muslim women in the west for their community integration. It analyzed the results and linked them with the role and contributions of designers, producers and fashion marketers in accepting the western society of Muslims and their integration with its members.

scholarly journals Relational Ethics: Volunteering and the Responsibilities of the Good Muslim

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 150
Author(s):  
Merve Kayikci
Keyword(s):  
Muslim Women ◽  
Relational Ethics ◽  
The West ◽  
Islamic Ethics ◽  
Good Citizen ◽  
Islamic Tradition ◽  
Self Formation

This article explores the ways in which female Belgian Muslim volunteers experience responsibility. It argues that responsibility consists of multiple dynamics for the volunteers, for example, the duties that are embedded in the Islamic tradition and the duties that arise from being a good citizen in a liberal/secular context. While these are often emphasized as being contentious binaries—especially for Muslims living in the West—this paper suggests that volunteering allows the Muslim women to bring these worlds together. The ways in which volunteering enables this is by introducing a relational reading of ethics and ethical self-formation. Relationality is highly significant for the female Muslim volunteer. It signifies being in touch with both (non-liberal) Islamic ethics and liberal public norms, even when pursuing a pious lifestyle. Hence, the article explores the ways in which responsibility is actualized in this framework. Finally, the last section interrogates how this idea of responsibility and relationality re-articulates binaries of the good-Muslim and the bad-Muslim.

The Study of Women in Islam and the West: A Select Bibliography

Hawwa ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 111-157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yvonne Haddad
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Muslim Women ◽  
Higher Learning ◽  
The West ◽  
Production Of Knowledge ◽  
Women In Islam ◽  
Institutions Of Higher Learning ◽  
The Social ◽  
Select Bibliography ◽  
Available Information

AbstractThis bibliography sets out to explore the topics that Muslim women in the West reflected on and researched as they joined the institutions of higher learning and began to have an input in the creation of knowledge. It also attempts to gather the available information about the experiences of Muslim women and surveys the available literature in English on Muslim women living in the West. While Muslim women have been professionally active in many fields, the bibliography is focused primarily on the production of knowledge by professors in the humanities and the social sciences and their contribution to our understanding of the debates about the women of Islam.

scholarly journals The Muslim Veil in North America

2004 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 110-112
Author(s):  
Shabana Mir
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
North America ◽  
Historical Development ◽  
Muslim Women ◽  
Basic Information ◽  
The West ◽  
Academic Texts ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Veil

When it comes to Muslims in the West, nothing is a more sensational visualsymbol than the hijab. Due to the current Muslim and non-Muslim fixationon it, scholarly examination of hijab and related issues is necessary.The Muslim Veil in North America examines some of its historical, sociological/anthropological, and theological aspects. Part 1 engages with theveil’s hyper-visibility in Canada. Since the book does not engage with theAmerican experience, I am not sure why the title refers to North America.I enjoyed part 2 immensely, and will use it as a reference on the subject.The bulk of this section explores the historical development of the veil’stheological status and nature. This book is different from, say, Maudoodi’sPurdah, which sees the veil in its contemporary form as a product of historicalprocesses.This book is dedicated to diasporic Muslim women, although introductorymaterial in various chapters addresses readers unfamiliar with Islam. Undergraduates will appreciate its accessibility in comparison tomost academic texts, and it will make the subject comprehensible to layreaders. Unfortunately, this means that the book wavers between being anacademic (education, anthropology, and sociology) and a lay read. This isnot because the entire book is tailored to different kinds of readers, butbecause its two parts are rather disjointed. Part 1 addresses a more lay andintroductory social science-related reader with basic information; part 2, onthe other hand, is a highly specialized examination of exegetical and hadithhistory.The editors, in addressing a gaping void in the literature, possiblyattempt to do too much: specialized theology, history, politics, anthropology,and sampling of “voices.” I would have preferred it to be more selective.Also, “let the voices speak” is a commendable approach, but after a certainpoint we should go beyond it. There is also a line between “reportage syndrome,”writing without an adequate theoretical framework, and skillfulacademic writing, which allows contextualized voices to be heard by fellowacademics within the social sciences. I would also have preferred that thetheology and sociology chapters be connected by common threads ...

scholarly journals Reconstruction of Cliché Image of Oriental Woman in Mohsin Hamid’s Exit West

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 61
Author(s):  
Kuğu Tekin ◽  
Zeynep Rana Turgut
Keyword(s):  
World View ◽  
Muslim Women ◽  
Muslim Woman ◽  
Control Mechanisms ◽  
Main Character ◽  
The West ◽  
Identity Reconstruction ◽  
Male Sex ◽  
The One ◽  
Western View

This paper attempts to hold a mirror to the existential struggle of an immigrant Muslim woman who is trying to survive on her journey to the west. Mohsin Hamid presents Nadia as one of the main characters in his 2017 novel Exit West. The paradox concerning Nadia is that while her preference for wearing a long black robe confirms the western misconstrued image of Muslim women, her actions, her view of the world, of life and of herself definitely refute the ingrained eastern notion of the suppressed, submissive, silenced Muslim woman. According to the dominant western view, oriental women are still under the strict control of the mechanisms of patriarchy. Among the control mechanisms of patriarchal order are traditions, norms, values and religion. However, Nadia does not fall into this western miscategorization of Muslim woman with her strong, rebellious character, and with her freethinking and insight. Indeed, it is Nadia, who safeguards, directs and in a sense, matures Saeed’s-the other main character-rather timid and naïve personality. What is unexpected in the journey of these two characters is that the one who is need of identity reconstruction is not the female but the male character, for Nadia does already have a firmly constructed identity and she has no intention to transform either her outfit or her world view for the sake of integrating herself into the western culture. In brief, through the character of Nadia, Mohsin Hamid reconstructs the cliché image of oriental woman. In Exit West, Hamid reverses stereotyped gender roles by attributing his female character all the dominant personality traits attached to the male sex.

scholarly journals Markus Dressler, Ron Geaves, and Gritt Klinkhammer, eds. Sufis in Western Society

2011 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 135-138
Author(s):  
Elliott Bazzano
Keyword(s):  
Muslim Women ◽  
Core Region ◽  
Western Society ◽  
Lived Religion ◽  
The West ◽  
False Dichotomy ◽  
2 Peter

Contributors to the volume, Raudvere and Gaši, skillfully note that “cherished,unfamiliar or rejected—attitudes of Sufism are seldom neutral”(163). If one traces the evolution of Sufism to Western lands, this aneutralityis accentuated. Thus, Sufism in the West is understandably a growing ifunderstudied field. There is a dearth of surveys on the topic, and this makesadditional attention to global networking and locality especially welcome.The authors seek to challenge the romantic and literary biases of Orientalistscholarship, and the eleven chapters rise to the occasion because mostfocus on particular living Sufi communities.The opening chapters set the methodological tone. In the Introduction,the editors emphasize “Sufism as a lived religion” and they rightly acknowledgethat Sufism often acts “as a bridge between Eastern and Westernspiritual or mystical philosophy” (4). In Chapter 2, Peter Beyer usesthe term glocalization while arguing that “as globalized structures, religionsare no longer . . . regional affairs which can be understood primarilywith reference to a particular core region” (13). He narrates a story of twoCanadian Muslim women who might experience different kinds of beliefand practice on a spectrum of religiosity. Strangely, however, only oncein the article does he mention “Sufism,” and the false dichotomy “Sufi/scriptural,” which contrasts with the major concepts in the book, such asthe primacy of the Qur’an for many Sufis ...

scholarly journals Veiled Muslim women’s responses to experiences of gendered Islamophobia in the UK

2019 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 96-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
Irene Zempi
Keyword(s):  
Hate Crime ◽  
Qualitative Interviews ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Muslim Women ◽  
Gender Performance ◽  
Terrorist Attacks ◽  
Muslim Identity ◽  
The West ◽  
And Gender ◽  
The Uk

In a post-9/11 climate, Islamophobia has increased significantly in the UK and elsewhere in the West. ISIS-inspired terrorist attacks in the UK as well as in France, Belgium, Germany and, more recently, in Sri Lanka have triggered an increase in verbal and physical attacks on Muslims. Drawing on intersectionality (as a nexus of identities that work together to render certain individuals as ‘ideal’ targets to attack), veiled Muslim women are likely to experience gendered Islamophobia in the cyber world but also in ‘real’ life due to the intersections between their ‘visible’ Muslim identity and gender performance. In the British context, although Islamophobia is recorded as a hate crime nationally, and misogyny as a hate crime locally in some police forces, veiled Muslim women are unlikely to report their experiences to the police. Drawing on qualitative interviews with Muslim women who wear the niqab (face veil), the purpose of this article is to examine the ways in which they respond to experiences of gendered Islamophobia as well as their reasons for not reporting their experiences to the police.

Nonfiction Form and the “Truth” about Muslim Women in Iranian Documentary

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-111
Author(s):  
Niki Akhavan
Keyword(s):  
Muslim Women ◽  
Political Environment ◽  
Women Filmmakers ◽  
Feminist Scholarship ◽  
Iranian Women ◽  
The West ◽  
High Stakes ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Veil

More than three decades of hostile relations between Iran and the West have meant that images about Iran and Iranian women circulate in a charged political environment. In this geopolitical context, Iranian women filmmakers have often found receptive audiences abroad who turn to documentaries as sites to reveal the truths of contemporary Iran. The enthusiasm for these works, however, also exerts pressures on filmmakers to adhere to familiar narratives about Iran and Iranian women or risk losing their audiences. Focusing on Nahid Sarvestani's Prostitution behind the Veil (2004) and Mahvash Sheikholeslami's Where Do I Belong? (2007), this article examines two tendencies in recent Iranian documentary. The former film exemplifies the prevalent trend of repeating troubling but familiar tropes about Islam and Muslim women, while the latter is an example of attempts to provide a more nuanced picture of Iran's social and political problems. Placing these films in the broader context of the history of nonfiction films in Iran, the article also draws from both feminist scholarship on representations of the Muslim world and longstanding debates within documentary studies to show the high stakes of producing films about Iran and to suggest that documentary works by and about Iranian women should be more rigorously interrogated for their ethical and political implications.

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