In October of 1989, three little girls were expelled from their middle school in Creil, France.[1] They had not committed acts of academic misconduct. They had not physically jeopardized the safety of their pupils. They were expelled for coming to school wearing scarves that covered their heads.
Hijab, the covering of one’s head with a scarf or veil, is a custom practiced by Muslim women. When the three girls of Creil refused to remove this symbol of their religious affiliation upon request and were consequently expelled, they sparked a controversy that would grow and culminate over the next fifteen years. In March of 2004, the Parliament of France passed a law forbidding students to wear explicitly religious symbols or clothing in public schools.[2] While insignia of all cultures and religions are included in the ban, the law is popularly believed to be directed at young Muslim girls who wear hijab.
Of course, the scarves themselves are not the problem. The reasoning behind the ban was a need to defend laïcité, or laicism, a French concept of secularism that cites strict universalism, that is, cultural uniformity, as essential to the security and well-being of the state. Under laicism, religious, ethnic, and other personal origins must be made irrelevant in the public sphere; in this way, all citizens can be viewed as equal.[1] Policy makers behind the headscarf ban have claimed that hijab, as a “conspicuous” marker of separation from the French norm, threatens France’s laïque cultural and political identity. This reaction is part of the larger issue of immigrant integration, which is being faced by many Western nations, including France.[2] Laicism is especially crucial to the French school setting, as, historically, it was in the school that French republican values were inculcated, integrating young students into true French citizens.[3]
French policy makers are engaging in what can be called “symbolic politics.” The need to defend laicism has developed into a two-sided battle of France against the destructive infiltration of Islam. In Republican French discourse, the entire Arab immigrant population is associated with Islam, and Islam in general is in turn associated with politically driven Islam.[4] The result is an “us against them” mentality that oversimplifies the issue and ultimately renders policies such as the headscarf ban ineffectual.
Policy makers have adopted the ideas that the Islamic veil insists on differences and divides its people, subordinates women, and symbolizes an Islamic resistance to modernity, whereas the French population should be indivisible and premised on equality and cultural progression.[5] Throughout the course of the headscarf controversies, from 1989-2004, girls who wore hijab to public schools were expelled on the grounds that they violated these principles. What makes this course of action problematic is the single set of meanings and symbols that the authorities behind the headscarf ban have attributed both to Islam and to the veil. There are no inherent meanings in objects, only social constructions. French officials have projected one set of meanings onto the veil, but it was not until Françoise Gaspard and Farhad Khosrokhavar began interviewing the expelled girls in 1995 that the girls themselves were given voices to reveal their own meanings toward the scarves they wore.[6]
This paper will compare and contrast the arguments made by opponents to hijab with the opinions of real Muslim women living in France. By listening to the voices of France’s Muslim women, it will become evident that there is no one single set of meanings and symbols that can be attributed to the veil. The range of differences that can be found from one woman’s understanding of the veil to another shows that any singular action taken toward the veil with the purpose of creating a uniform population will ultimately be ineffective.
The divergent attitude toward the veil among Muslims is immediately evident when attempting to define hijab, which can also be referred to as the Islamic headscarf or veil. The Qur’an dictates modesty for both men and women and makes reference to the veiling of Muhammad’s wives, but it is unclear whether this method of veiling applies to all Muslim women as well.[7] Also ambiguous is the areas of the body that need to be covered, with interpretations ranging from hair and bosom to the entire body excluding the face and hands.[8] Muslim women in France have found numerous ways to engage in Islamic modesty. Women can be seen wearing brightly coloured scarves that reveal their hair, unicoloured scarves pinned tightly around their faces, or in flowing attire that covers their entire faces except for the eyes. There are also Muslim women whose religion is not as immediately obvious on sight; some practice Islamic modesty by wearing long-sleeved shirts and skirts, while others adopt modest behaviour without making any specific choices in their attire.[9]
One argument opposing the veil is that it deprives girls and women of freedom and agency. In 1993, teachers in Nantua, France, protested four girls who refused to remove their headscarves on the grounds that the practice was segregationist. The parents and brother of the girls spoke for them, and self-titled Islamic authorities intervened, publicly declaring that the girls’ religion required them to cover their heads. This incident supported the Western viewpoint that families and religious leaders dictate the behaviour of girls who are forced into hijab, suggesting that veils are discriminatory by nature.[10]
In 2003, two girls from Aubervilliers, known as the Lévy sisters, converted to Islam against the wishes of their family and were expelled from school for wearing headscarves. They decided to wear headscarves to attain the modesty they believed their new religion required of them. The Lévy sisters’ father spoke publicly to keep them in school, but not out of support for Islamic customs. “I’m not in favour of the headscarf,” he said, “but I defend the right of my children to go to school.” A girl of North African background initially joined the Lévy sisters in their fight to wear hijab in school, but abandoned the effort when, according to what she told the news reporters, her father beat her for doing so. [11] These examples demonstrate that it is inaccurate to assume that all girls who wear the veil are forced by their families.
A third case especially highlights individual agency in girls who wear hijab as part of an independent journey toward Islamic faith. Schérazade, a high school senior from Grenobles, decided to follow the message of a Qur’an that she read in French. She convinced her father to follow Islamic practice and began to wear a headscarf. Upon expulsion for refusing to remove the scarf, Schérazade parked an RV in front of her school and embarked on a twenty-two day hunger strike.[12]
A strong Western feminist movement views hijab as anti-emancipation of women. Renowned feminist Elisabeth Badinter called the headscarf a symbol of patriarchal domination over Muslim women.[13] Those who tolerate or support the veiling of Muslim women have been accused of “dangerous cultural relativism” toward a practice that will impede the personal and social development of women.[14] Merve Kavkci, a former Turkish MP who was stripped of her citizenship for wearing hijab in parliament, argues that this feminist position is indicative of growing misunderstandings between Muslim women and the rest of the world.[15] French concern with gender inequality ignores Western cultures that permit female subordination as if patriarchy were unique to Islam.[16] Souad, a woman self-taught in Islam, says that Western media gives the impression that the only oppressed women in the world are women who are veiled. “[T]here are women who die from conjugal violence every day,” she said, “[who] are not necessarily in veils, but no one talks about them...people only talk about veiled women...but not about others who experience discrimination.”[17] Instead of imposing prejudices on all Muslim women, Kavakci would like to see Western feminists honouring the Muslim woman’s right to choose for herself.[18]
Badinter and her colleague, Catherine Millet, have been recorded as saying, “The Islamic veil sends us all – Muslim and non-Muslim – back to a discrimination against women that is intolerable.” Kavakci refutes this claim, stating that in many Muslim societies, gender inequality has less to do with religious requirements than with cultural practices that arose after the time of the Prophet when many women were prominent members of society. Repression experienced by women in Saudi Arabia and under the Taliban in Afghanistan, she says, are modern deteriorations of equality, and not representative of the lifestyles or values of early Muslims.[19]
The veil has been accused of backwardness, of standing as a barrier between Muslims and modernity.[20] Contrarily, many Muslim women of the younger generation adopt the veil as a symbol of modernity and liberation. In a 1998 study, Jocelyne Cesari has noticed a common desire among many Muslim women to remove themselves from the Islam of their parents, in which practices are followed blindly and without meaning. Instead, these women seek to be more progressive than their mothers with a “self-consciously Islamic life” that includes the adoption of headscarves as well as fewer rituals and more heartfelt prayer.[21]
The rising global attention paid to international political Islam since the 1990’s has resulted in an increased fear and association of Islamic dress to terrorism. In 1989, magazines discussing political Islam featured Iranian women in Islamic attire on their covers; Maryam, a Muslim woman who does not wear hijab complains that according to the media, “it is as if the only two Muslim countries in the world are Afghanistan and Iran.” [22]
North African Muslim women have revealed opinions in interviews that actions such as bans on headscarves would be ineffective in combating Islamic terrorism. Nour, a 34 year-old Algerian women, believes that if a student came to class in a headscarf, it would provide the class with an opportunity to discuss why some students do or don’t wear certain religious garments. Open discussion, she says, could prevent immigrant children from growing up fanatic and intolerant, instead of exclusion, which reinforces the pitting of Islam against the West.
Leila, a 43 year-old Tunisian woman, says that excluding Muslim students from schools for religious practices leaves a hole in their lives that political Islamic recruiters will be able to manipulate. If a student is alienated from their school, country, and society, they can be persuaded to turn to their religion. “That’s when people harden their attitudes,” says Leila, “[political Islamists] will have lots of young people join them.”[23] In this way, such a thing as the headscarf ban of 2004 could have the effect of creating political enemies of their citizens when they intended to integrate them. Nour supports this argument, saying that if a Muslim man were to, for example, be forced to shave his beard, he would want to grow it even more, only now it would be a “beard of hate.” She says the French don’t seem to see the dangerous potential of their actions “because they don’t look further.”[24]
The law of 2004 prohibits only “ostentatious” religious symbols from schools, defining those as signs that appear to be religious propaganda or that pressure other students to adopt them.[25] Fariba, a woman who has worn hijab since the age of fifteen, denies that her apparel has anything to do with the thoughts or opinions of those around her.“I do not wear it to make evident my religious leanings. If I could wear it while hiding it, I would...you should do things for God, not for other people.” When asked whether women who cover themselves more than others are “better” Muslims, Fariba said that she considered that a difference of interpretation on what modesty is required, and that women who wear the burqa or niqab – garments that cover the entire body or the entire face – are not necessarily more pious. [26]
A large population of Muslim women do not even recognize the veil as religiously symbolic, or at least not as a symbol that is especially Islamic. Merve Kavakci points out that the other Abrahmic religions dictate modesty; many Christian and Jewish women also wear headscarves.[27] Some immigrant women were accustomed to wearing headscarves in their home countries and continued to wear them in France out of habit. “It was natural for her,” says Maryam about her mother, “Wearing [her scarf] outside was like taking her purse.”[28] Others have found more practical reasons to wear headscarves. Some young Muslim women find they are less likely to be harassed or subjected to unwelcome advances from men when they are veiled, and Souad admits to knowing several women who wear veils to attract men interested in marriage.[29] When it comes to modesty, several women don’t believe headscarves are necessary to being Islamic. “[It] does not matter how you hide the parts you wish to hide,” claims Souad, “An eskimo wears hijab.”[30] “The headscarf, the shirt – it’s the same thing,” says a Maghrebin woman named Bahia, “If the girls are nice and work hard, why is their veil a problem for anyone?”[31]
Muslim women like Keltoum and Nour see the public schools’ concern for religious imposition from veiled girls as misdirected effort. “I prefer to see veiled girls than girls who are troubled in other ways,” says Keltoum. She explains her disappointment that schools are trying to solve “minimal” problems like how a girl is dressed, instead of paying attention to children who actively cause disturbances in other ways, such as carrying knives.[32] Nour thinks the “secular” French school is hypocritical, referencing schools in the suburbs that are over 80% Maghrebin, but celebrate Easter and Christmas in class. “That’s not fair,” she says, supporting an belief that the public schools are only secular in that they are not doctrinally Christian.[33]
Aside from religious conviction, the headscarf is also associated by many Muslims with adulthood and authority. Some Islamic communities promote the concealment of women’s physical allure with veils so that the women are freed from judgement based on how they look and can be recognized for other qualities, such as intellect and contributions to society. “We’re feminists, too,” says Kavakci.[34] The interviews conducted by Gaspard and Khosrokhavar revealed the use of hijab to help girls with the transitions of puberty or adult womanhood. Some of the younger girls wore the veil in middle school, but abandoned it in high school. Others adopted the veil as they entered high school or after they graduated. The veil helped these girls and young women come to terms with growing up and to define themselves in Islamic terms as they entered post-secondary education or the workforce. Souad, who did not adopt the veil until high school, describes the decision as part of her process of growing out of her tomboyish childhood and becoming a woman.[35]
What many Western politicians, feminists, and everyday citizens oppose about hijab is its mandate as a religious requirement that all Muslim women must obey without exception. While there are Muslims who hold this view, this particular aversion does not account for the independent interpretation of religion and Islamic modesty that varies from one individual Muslim to the next. A significant number of Muslim women reject the notion of hijab as mandatory, insisting that other aspects of Islam are more important than what is worn on one’s head, and that “faith is in the heart.”[36] “It is not because I wear the voile that I am [a] better or [a] worse Muslim,” says Fariba, “It is a personal choice.”[37]
This emphasis on Islamic faith over Islamic dress has lead some Muslim women to agree with Western officials that headscarves should be removed in school, proving that the symbolic battle being fought is a simple matter of Muslims vs. France. A woman named Fatima believes since the point of Islamic dress is modesty, veils should be abandoned if they are going to draw attention to the wearer.[38] Another woman, Minouna, asserts that a woman can be a better Muslim if she is educated than she can be if she is veiled, but uneducated: “You can take off the veil and [still] do lots of good things...studies open many doors, to help people.”[39]
Other women support the abandonment of headscarves on cultural over religious grounds. Roughly a third of the women in a particular survey of North Africans felt that if immigrants cannot learn to adopt the customs of France, then they should go back to where they came from. “[W]hen you are somewhere, you try to blend in,” says Cherifa, a 44 year-old Moroccan. Rym, a 32 year-old Moroccan agrees, saying that people should “respect [French] customs and their habits.”[40]
A close examination of the opinions of these Muslim women reveals that the veil itself is not an accurate marker of the degree of an immigrant Muslim’s “integration.” All of the arguments presented by the women above display evidence of French integration, whether they support headscarves in public schools or not.
The Maghrebin women in these interviews who oppose headscarves in public are generally immigrants of an older generation who came to France with their husbands to find work and intended to return home after the work was complete. They saw no reason to purposely mark themselves as foreigners during what they saw as a temporary stay. For these women, traditional veiling was about demarcating men’s space from women’s. Since the public sphere belonged to the men, women veiled themselves in the streets; they removed the veil at home, because the private sphere was their own. Many of the women accustomed to this method of practicing hijab adopted the idea of Islam and the veil as private affairs. Their acknowledgement of the French public sphere as French space and relegation of scarves and religion to the home are evidence of cultural adaptation.[41]
The argument that hijab is a matter of personal choice and religious freedom that should be respected by the state is typically held by Muslim women who are young and educated. They are using a Western discourse of rights and equality to their advantage, affirming the right of Muslims to express their individual identities. This manipulation of Western arguments indicates that they have adopted a noticeably Western worldview. The older, less educated population uses Maghrebin arguments in favour of the veil and do not refer to laicism. Instead, they stress that Islam is between oneself and God, and not a matter of how one dresses or how one is seen by others. While these women may not have fully absorbed the viewpoints of the Western authorities, their assertion that veils should not be an issue is proof of a level of their integration, having redefined what it means to be a good Muslim after having immigrated. Finally, those who support the rejection of hijab have adopted French public opinion.[42]
If the goal of the French government is to see immigrants integrated into French values and fully able to participate in public life, then exclusionary policies with regards to women and hijab can only bring harm. Hayat, a 32 year-old Algerian, argues that there are Muslim parents who would rather keep their daughter home than allow her to go out in public, including to school, without a veil. This girl will be denied an education through no fault of her own, and the government will be “destroying her future.”[43] The victim, in cases such as this, is the one being punished.[44] On the other hand, if the girl is wearing hijab out of her own choice, then upon expulsion, she will turn to a religious school or to an early marriage. This does not remove the differences between citizens that the state of France wants, but aggravates the differences by indirectly forcing the students to segregate. The solution of expelling girls in hijab makes it appear that France is less concerned with integrating its citizens than it is with separating the non-conformists from those who have already “integrated.”[45]
A 58 year-old Algerian named Warda demands that the West consider who is ultimately more important to society, a girl with a baccalaureate or a girl who took off her veil? She says it is not effective to make decisions based solely on principle – in this case, the principle of laicism. Warda argues that instead, societies have to make decisions based on concrete realities.[46] The reality as revealed by the voices of France’s Muslim women is that an issue as multi-faceted as immigrant women’s place in France cannot be solved with policies that silence their unique perspectives into a singular identity with a singular meaning. The headscarf ban intends to free women from patriarchal oppression, inculcate ideals of secularism, and stamp out political extremism; yet expulsion oppressively deprives the women of education, causes them to cling more strongly to religion, and has the potential to embitter them toward the state and drive them to fundamentalist behaviour. The practical consequences of exclusionary policies do not match the intended effects.
Instead of demanding that its citizens choose between headscarves and public education or Islam and the French Republic, the state of France should recognize that there is potential for its citizens to be both Muslim and French. By taking their original ethnicity and adapting it to the French culture, Muslim immigrants are developing an Islam that is uniquely French.[47] Islam does not have to be associated with a foreign country by definition, but can become part of France if the two cultures can negotiate and work together. This sentiment is exemplified by a Muslim girl who professed, “I became a practicing Muslim thanks to France...I am glad to have come to know my religion, true Islam, because “back there” [the country from whence she emigrated] it is too traditional and troublesome.”[48] Women like her speak French, consider themselves culturally French, and claim to have found “true Islam” in France. But without listening to their voices, French policy will continue to conflate them with “Arabs” and to ignore their positions in society. Only when they are able to recognize their immigrant citizens as people with complex ideals and desires and abandon their singular collections of abstract labels will Western nations like France be able to develop functional models of integration and achieve social peace.
 |
| Image from "Hijab Protest Day," Jan. 17, 2004 Courtesy of http://www.inminds.com/hijab-the-war-on-freedom.html |
[1] Scott, 11, 15.
[2] Jonathan Laurence and Justin Vaisse, Integrating Islam: Political and Religious Challenges in Contemporary France (Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 2006), 1.
[3] Nalini Rajan, “French Secularism, Headscarves, and Indian Schoolchildren: Anthropological Concerns of Political Philosophy.” Economic and Political Weekly. Vol. 39, No. 36 (Sep. 4-10, 2004), 3968.
[4] Scott, 40.
[5] Ibid, 1.
[6] Caitlin Killian, “The Other Side of the Veil: North African Women in France Respond to the Headscarf Affair.” Gender and Society. Vol. 17, No. 4 (Aug., 2003), 572.
[7] Killian, 570.
[8] Bowen, 70.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Ibid, 87.
[11] Scott, 31.
[12] Bowen, 88.
[13] Rajan, 3968.
[14] Scott, 33.
[15] Merve Kavakci, “Headscarf Heresy.” Foreign Policy. No. 142 (May-Jun., 2004), 66.
[16] Scott, 4.
[17] Bowen, 79.
[18] Kavakci, 67.
[19] Ibid.
[20] Ibid, 66.
[21] Bowen, 71.
[22] Killian, 81; Bowen, 79.
[23] Killian, 577.
[24] Killian, 582.
[25] Bowen, 86.
[26] Ibid, 78.
[27] Kavakci, 67.
[28] Ibid, 70, 78.
[29] Ibid, 80.
[30] Bowen, 77.
[31] Killian, 575.
[32] Ibid, 577.
[33] Rajan, 3968.
[34] Kavakci, 67.
[35] Bowen, 70, 77.
[36] Ibid.
[37] Ibid.
[38] Killian, 584.
[39] Ibid, 585.
[40] Killian, 582.
[41] Ibid, 584.
[42] Killian, 588.
[43] Ibid, 572.
[44] Scott, 33.
[45] Bowen, 91.
[46] Killian, 580.
[47] Jonathan Laurence and Justin Vaisse, Integrating Islam: Political and Religious Challenges in Contemporary France, (Washington: Brookings Institution Press, 2006), 18.
[48] Bowen, 72.
[1] Joan Wallach Scott, Politics of the Veil (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2007), 21.
[2] John R. Bowen, Why the French Don’t Like Headscarves: Islam, the State, and Public Space (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2007), 86.
