Veiling

Veiling loosely refers to the worldwide variety of dress codes and styles associated with shielding portions of the body from view, particularly the upper body, scalp hair, and/or face. Veiling signals both difference and affiliation, variably and often simultaneously, over religious, cultural, generational, sexed, gendered, class, historical-political, and (consequently) personal lines. The relationship between gender and veiling has received much attention in recent decades but remains an important source of disagreement among feminists, scholars, and politicians. This entry provides a brief overview of the history of veiling and discusses some of the responses from feminist and gender scholars.

The spatial and temporal regimentation of veiling, unveiling, and nonveiling has at times been ritual and at other times political and is variably prescribed by local, familial, or state law or canon; scripture; or fashion. Gender-specific or sex-exclusive practices of veiling are tied to the ordering of gendered relations across domestic/public spaces (Islam and the Middle East), ceremonial occasions (e.g., funerals, weddings, consummation of the martial bond), states or offices of dedication or worship (nuns and monks), and other local concerns (e.g., protection from the sun in order to keep skin fair) or needs (e.g., as a guerrilla tactic, male Taliban fighters have been known to wear burqas, covering the entire body and face. Veiling has historically been associated mostly with female, married, elite, urban (or nonlaboring) status. It is often the mark of adult status; anthropologically, this means the nubile or nuptial (marriageable or married), reproductive, and/or heterosexually alluring status considered to necessitate social regulation. In many ethnographic reports from well into the 20th century, full veiling was found to become mandatory at pubescence or slightly before. In some cases, veiling prescriptions become less strict for elderly women.

In both Christianity and Islam, ultimate functions of veiling and the conditions for its requirement have been and continue to be subject to exegetical debate as well as historical anthropological inquiry. Body parts that should be covered (awrah in Arabic) according to Islamic teaching lie between the navel and the knee for males, but for women, rules vary depending on their company and by consequence create the most controversy. In Islam, veiling translates to complex gendered concepts such as purdah (“curtain,” consisting of physical segregation of the sexes and covering of the body), hijab (“covering,” with wider connotations for both sexes of modesty and a moral sense of privacy), and libas (“dress,” with implications of sheltering and protection). The embattlement of its contemporary meanings has often been located at the intersection of overarching historical trajectories, such as decolonization, modernization, secularization, feminism, and globalization.

Feminists have recognized the following, often polarized, interpretations: (a) gender-inflected delimitation of nondomestic mobility versus enablement of women's participation, (b) gender-exclusive eradication of identity versus optional identification with custom or law, (c) deprivation of women's autonomy versus expression of choice, (d) objectification of women versus women's political agency and personal voice, and (e) eroticization of women's bodies versus [Page 872]restraint of any expressive potential. Political argument reflects eclectically on these options and usually focuses on state regulation of women's headdress in certain public offices and professions (teaching), state-sponsored institutes (public schools, universities), or secured objects (polling places, airports) rather than public space generally. Acute politiciza-tion and legal reconsiderations of the “Islamic veil” typically seen in Turkey and Tunisia and throughout late 20th century and later Western Europe can be interpreted variably in terms of a feminist-egalitarianist-democratic gesture to (migrant) women or as an appeal to male Islamist authorities—and often, by extension, as a commentary to instances of mobilization by both men and women taking place in the name of Islam. Controversies over veiling, however, are generally of mixed thematic and legal anchorage: the issue of gender, the principle of state secularity, and the right of religious expression. Gender-focused criticism may often feed tensions that ultimately have more to do with immigration and “integration” policy, national identity, multiculturalism, and perceived cultural drift (“Islamization”).

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