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Asian Journal of Social Psychology

Asian Journal of Social Psychology (2016), 19, 198–208

DOI: 10.1111/ajsp.12141

Meanings of the Hijab: Views of Canadian Muslim women Rashelle V. H. Litchmore* and Saba Safdar

1

Department of Psychology, University of Guelph,

This study demonstrates the individualized phenomenological experiences of Muslim-Canadian women through their relationships with head covering, most commonly known as the hijab. By conducting in-depth interviews with ten women, five who cover and five who do not, we sought to understand their day-to-day experiences with covering, and how their interpretations of these experiences were related to them as individuals, as well as to broader social contexts. Through the use of Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, we found that the women’s experiences can be regarded as an interplay between internal experience, that is, the personal meanings that the women placed on wearing or not wearing a headscarf, and external experience, that is, their interpretations of outside events and treatment by others as related to the headscarf. Their experiences were also embedded in the contexts of their cultural and religious communities, and broader Canadian society. Consistent with previous work, themes such as Muslim identity, religiosity and modesty were highlighted by the women, however, rather than focusing on general experiences across participants, we give primary attention to how these themes unfolded in the individual women’s lives. © 2016 John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd, Asian Association of Social Psychology and Beijing Normal University Key words: Muslim women, Canada, hijab, phenomenology, psychology.

Although studies on Muslim populations in Western nations have increased since the 11 September 2001 (9/11) terrorist attacks in the USA in 2001 (Reid, 2007), there has been a steady stream of research for decades on Muslim women’s head covering (Khan, 1995; Read & Bartkowski, 2000; Zine, 2002; Badr, 2004; Kilic, Sawitri, & Sauer, 2008). Many studies have highlighted the negative perceptions of, and sometimes strong public opposition to, this practice in Europe and North America (McDonough, 2003; BodyGendrot, 2007; Syed, 2013). The perception of the Muslim headscarf as patriarchal, anti-feminist, and counter to Correspondence: Rashelle V. H. Litchmore, Department of Psychology, 025A MacKinnon Building, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario Canada, N1G 2 W1. Email: [email protected]

The second author carried out subsequent analysis of the transcripts with the assistance of two senior undergraduate students. All the themes were reviewed, their meanings were examined, and each theme was organized with reference to relevant quotations and narratives from the transcripts. Subsequently, the three researchers (i.e., the second author and the two students who were both familiar with Islamic practices) developed items for a new scale based on participants’ narratives. This process identified the same themes that are presented here, which has increased our confidence in the reliability of our findings. Received 17 October 2015; revision 29 February 2016; accepted 9 March 2016

‘Western values’ is still quite prevalent (Afshar, 2008). However counter to these representations are critical analyses of this subject (e.g., Bilge, 2010; Zine, 2002), as well as an increasing number of studies that prioritize the voices and experiences of Muslim women themselves. In Canada, much of the research on the topic has focused on the legal and political issues that have arisen surrounding the headscarf (e.g., Zine, 2009; Choudhury, 2012). Some work has also looked at Muslim Canadian women’s experiences from their own perspectives (e.g., Ruby, 2006; Zine, 2006). The research presented here expands on existing studies by taking a markedly psychological approach to investigating the meanings of, and experiences with, covering among Muslim women living in an urban setting in the province of Ontario. Representations of Hijab in western contexts Zine (2002) argues that the representations of Muslim women in Western contexts have been embedded in the political relationships between ‘the West’ and Islamic societies throughout history. The images of Muslim women who cover put forward by Western nations over the centuries has consequently been far from consistent. These images have ranged from depicting Muslim women as powerful, sexually fetishized, and as victims of ‘heathen and barbaric societies’ (Macdonald, 2006; Zine, 2002 p. 4). Although it is well known that some instances of forced covering have occurred in Islamic countries (Bullock, 2000), studies have demonstrated that Muslim women all over the world treat

© 2016 John Wiley & Sons Australia, Ltd, Asian Association of Social Psychology and Beijing Normal University

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covering as multi-purposed, agentic, and often political (Afshar, 2008; Jamal, 2011). Canada as a whole is officially multicultural, with an emphasis on encouraging cultural groups to maintain their heritage cultures and religious affiliations while adapting to Canada (see, Berry, 2006; Syed, 2013). As such, Muslim Canadians appear to be fairly satisfied with their experiences (Adams, 2009). However it has also been found that Muslim women perceive greater discrimination against their religious and ethnic groups than Muslim men (Litchmore & Safdar, 2014). This suggests some complexity in the Canadian context. Zine (2009) notes that after the 9/11 attacks, the general attitude towards Muslim Canadians became decidedly more negative both in public opinion and national policy. For example Arat-Koc (2005) demonstrates that Canadian identity was redefined after the attacks as being a part of ‘the West’, with ‘Western civilization’ being diametrically opposed to Islamic ‘culture’. Arat-Koc calls this a ‘re-whitening’ of Canadian identity despite the long existence of official multicultural policy in the country. The province of Quebec in Canada is in a unique position of having to balance between the official multicultural polices of English-speaking Canada, as well as the tradition of secularism inherited from France (Stemp-Morlock, 2012; Wayland, 1997). In 1994, a ban on hijabs in public schools was enacted (Syed, 2013). However the broader Canadian emphasis on immigrant cultural retention and human rights facilitated the subsequent overturn of this ruling (Wayland, 1997). Despite this initial reversal, Quebec has had repeated controversies pertaining to Islamic headscarves over the years, which has led to the introductions of Bill 94 and the Quebec Charter of Values (Choudhury, 2012; Quebec, 2013). The Charter, for example, includes specific prohibition of face coverings when receiving public services and, therefore, directly applies to Muslim women who wear niqabs (Quebec). Negative attitudes toward Muslims, and particularly Muslim women wearing head coverings, is not unique to Canada. The anti-hijab campaign is also evident in many European countries (e.g., France, Belgium, the Netherlands) and elsewhere. In New Zealand, two Muslim women were ordered by a judge to remove their burqas in order to show their faces as witnesses in an insurance fraud case (Morris, 2012). Similarly in Sweden, the mayor of a small town announced that the niqab should be banned and compared the face veil to slavery (The Local, 2015). Women’s perspectives on covering There are currently a number of studies that give priority to the meanings that women place on covering. This research has demonstrated not only the diverse meanings that the women attribute to their practices but, importantly, how these interact with the various cultural contexts within which these

women are situated (Mishra & Shirazi, 2010; Wagner, Sen, Permanadeli, & Howarth, 2012). In a study conducted in the USA prior to 9/11, participants reported that individuals often mistook their hijab as cultural attire and regarded it as exotic. Many participants attributed wearing hijabs to being a ‘good Muslim woman’, and as a means by which to be modest and to express Muslim identity. However, some described their initiation of wearing a headscarf as stemming from pressure from family and community members, with some participants subsequently choosing to take off the hijab (Cole & Ahmadia, 2003). Conversely, in a study conducted in the USA after 9/11, some participants reported making the decision to cover as a means of portraying Islam as a religion of peace, in order to counter the negative media coverage of Muslims since the terrorist attacks (Badr, 2004). In a French study, women reported using their hijab as a symbol of their Muslim identity, as well as to give them a feeling of safety and security in public. The women also reported donning the hijab in protest of the 2004 ban on head scarves in public schools (Croucher, 2008). Therefore in the context of the USA and France, we see women deliberately taking up the hijab in reaction to events in their social context. Fewer studies from the perspectives of Muslim women are available in Canada. Zine (2006) argues that the wearing of the Muslim headscarf is complex both with regards to the multiple reasons that it is worn and with regards to the diverse reactions that it elicits. In her ethnographic analysis of an Islamic high school in Toronto, Zine found that although her study took place before 9/11, the girls still had the experience of being labelled as terrorists. The girls also spoke of their hijabs as signifying Muslim identity and as protecting them from the male gaze. Similarly in a study based in Saskatchewan, participants spoke of the hijab as providing protection from sexual mistreatment, as a marker of Muslim identity, and as a means through which to be modest (Ruby, 2006). Atasoy (2006) highlighted the importance of the Canadian context in women’s experiences with covering. By doing in-depth analyses of single cases, Atasoy demonstrated, for example, how one participant felt more liberated to wear a hijab in Canada than in her home country of Pakistan. In the same vein, the participant discussed conflict that she encountered over her headscarf when attempting to take her driver’s licence photo within the Canadian context. The narratives in this study demonstrated the contradiction between freedom afforded to religious minorities in Canada, and the restrictions that are placed on attempts to publicly express non-majority religions in this context. Building from this research, our study sought to uncover the phenomenological experience of head covering, and of living as a Muslim woman who does not cover, in an adult sample of Muslim women in the General Toronto Area. Given the established consistency of meanings that women place on wearing headscarves, even across national contexts,


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we sought to gain a deeper understanding of women’s day-today experiences as they negotiate their multiple social settings. Interpretative phenomenological analysis Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA, Smith & Osborn, 2003) was the method of analysis used in our study. This approach involves a detailed look at an individual’s experiences and ‘life-world’ (Smith & Osborn, 2003, p. 51). Rather than attempting to produce an objective account of an experience or event, IPA is more concerned with examining the participant’s perceptions and interpretations of the phenomenon in question (Smith & Osborn, 2003). IPA involves a double hermeneutic, where the participant is attempting to make sense of his or her world, and the researcher is also attempting to interpret the participant’s interpretations. Therefore causal relationships or generalizations cannot be established in this work (Larkin & Thompson, 2011). IPA also involves the researcher’s consideration of her or his own perspectives and experiences. However rather than attempting to ‘bracket’ these perspectives as earlier versions of phenomenology, IPA encourages researchers to explore how their personal perspectives contribute to the interpretation of the data (Larkin & Thompson, 2011). This approach also focuses on grounded analysis, that is, giving priority to the data while making interpretations, rather than on external theoretical positions (Smith, 2004). IPA is useful for recognizing and seeking to understand the gap that can exist between an object and a person’s interpretation of that object (Smith, 1996). An analyst, therefore, has the ability to compare multiple accounts of experiences with an object, in order to understand the subjective processes at work in an individual’s interpretation of their experience. It is, therefore, a highly useful approach for the subject of our study. Additionally, small sample sizes are appropriate for this approach in order to lend more detailed attention to individual cases (Larkin & Thompson, 2011). IPA has been widely used in psychology, for example, to investigate individuals’ experiences with eating disorders (Mulveen & Hepworth, 2006) and to understand women’s experience with anger and aggression (Eatough, Smith, & Shaw, 2008). To the authors’ knowledge, no Canadian studies have been conducted on Islamic head covering using IPA.

Method Participants A community sample of ten women, aged 24 to 56, was interviewed on one occasion each. Five of the participants described their religious clothing as the hijab, which customarily includes a headscarf that covers the hair, neck,

and ears, and can be accompanied by a shapeless gown called an abaya, or modest Western clothing. However the women often referred to only the headscarf as the hijab. We will therefore use this term for the remainder of the paper when referring to the women’s headscarves. The other five participants did not wear a headscarf. All women selfidentified as practising Muslims. Five of our participants were second generation Canadian, having been born in Canada or arrived before the age of six years (see Table 1). One participant, Jessica, had recently converted to Islam, and was a multi-generational Canadian of European background. Two sets of our participants were related. Hifza, who did not wear a hijab, was mother to Reham, who did. Their background was Pakistani. Amaal and her mother Bilan, both wore hijabs, and their background was Somali (all participant names are fictitious). This added an interesting perspective on family dynamics as it pertained to the research topic. Most of the women were highly educated. All ten women resided in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) at the time of the interview. Procedure The study received ethics approval from the authors’ university Ethics Board prior to data collection. Snowball and purposive sampling to connect with women who both wore and did not wear a hijab was used as the recruitment method for this study. In order to protect participants’ privacy, semi-structured interviews were conducted in each participant’s home, or at private locations chosen by each woman. Prior to each interview, participants were sent an electronic copy of an informed consent form to review, which was then discussed with them in person at the beginning of the interview. The women were assured that they could refuse to answer any question and could withdraw from the interview at any time. A small incentive was offered to each woman for participation and they were assured that they would receive the incentive regardless of whether they chose to complete the interview or not. For each interview, participants were asked to describe Islamic religious clothing in general, and the participants who wore hijabs were asked to describe their own clothing in detail. Additional questions were: ‘What is the religious significance of covering?’, ‘Have you ever had any experiences that you think are directly related to your clothing?’, ‘When did you first begin to cover?’. Demographic and background questions were also asked, and in presenting the findings we only utilize the personal information of the participants that is necessary for making the narratives comprehensible. Participants were encouraged to elaborate on their responses and follow-up questions were asked where necessary. Each interview lasted between an hour to an hour and 15 minutes. They were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim.



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Table 1 Demographic Information

Women with Hijabs

Women with no Hijab

Name

Age

Education

Heritage Cultures

Age of initiation of hijab

Amaal Bilan Elham Reham Zarifa Deeba Hifza Ishtar Jessica Selam

27 50 24 28 24 27 56 33 29 24

Bachelor’s High school College diploma Master’s Bachelor’s (in progress) Master’s (in progress) High school Masters Bachelor’s Bachelor’s

Somali Somali Guyanese Pakistani Ethiopian and Yemini Indian Pakistani Egyptian European Eritrean

14 Under age 10 7 9 22 N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A

Data analysis In order to analyze the data obtained, the first author read one transcript and identified themes throughout the text using NVIVO software. The additional transcripts were then analyzed around these initial themes, and additional themes were added where necessary. Once this initial analysis was complete, the second author reviewed the specific coding and themes to determine how well they mapped onto one another. Each transcript was subsequently reread and the themes were refined and organized based on their coherent relationships. This process of rereading and organizing continued throughout the entire writing process. We determined that our themes were reliable based on the consistency of experiences across participants, as well as the consistency of our findings with the extant literature. Smith (2004) notes that in IPA, a reader should be able to interpret the report through both the themes that connect all the cases in the study, as well as through linking the information presented in order to make sense of each individual case. We therefore present our findings with these aims in mind. Authors’ positioning. The first author conducted all of the interviews. She is a Black female, a first generation Canadian of Caribbean background, who has lived in Canada for a shorter time period than all of the participants. As a PhD student, her level of formal education is higher than all of the participants in the study. Additionally, her religious upbringing is Christian. The first author’s positioning as an immigrant woman of colour with a religious upbringing facilitated rapport with the participants as well as some interpretation of their narratives. The differences between her and each woman facilitated further questioning for clarification both during the interviews and during interpretation of the data. The second author is an Iranianborn Canadian-educated researcher who is familiar with Islamic practices although does not identify as a Muslim woman. This further facilitated interpretation of the data.

She supervised the project but had no contact with participants.

Results and analysis We found five overarching themes in the narratives of all ten of our participants. These were: (1) the women’s choice to wear or not wear a hijab; (2) religiosity; (3) Muslim identity; (4) modesty, beauty, and fashion; and (5) protection and restriction. We found that for each of these themes, the phenomenological experiences of these women could be interpreted as being an interplay between the internal meanings that they placed on the hijab and their experiences with it, external events and their interpretations of these events, and wider social and national contexts. Consequently, we argue that the widespread religious and cultural practices of wearing hijabs and other Islamic attire were in fact highly individualized experiences for each woman. Choice to cover or not to cover Each of the women who wore a hijab began doing so at different stages of their lives. Although they all described their commitment to the religion as a primary internal motivation to cover, the women also described external circumstances that influenced their decisions. For example Zarifa explained her relatively recent decision as follows:I went back home to Ethiopia and Yemen, um, in 2010. And, so, I felt like so disconnected with my culture, my religion, everything, I wasn’t practising at all, I wasn’t dressing like a Muslim. You wouldn’t, if you saw me on the street, you wouldn’t know that I was Muslim, right? … so when I came back here to Canada, I, I did more research, um I’ve had like really random interactions with co-workers where they’ll ask me questions … like whenever I’d say something about religion, they would just disregard it, just because I’m not wearing the hijab … I did more research and it was after Ramadan, like uh


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the holy month, where we fast. And I just thought, I was you know, I thought I was practising and I was going to the mosque, praying, and I’d cover here-like whenever I felt like it, and, um, yeah I was just ready … As a second-generation Canadian, Zarifa framed the experience of travelling back to her heritage countries as the catalyst for her decision-making process. This trip brought about an awareness of the cultural and religious communities to which she should have had access, but from which she was disconnected due to her lack of practice of her religion. We can also see that she regarded wearing the hijab as an important part of Islamic religious practice. Not wearing a hijab at the time was, therefore, integral to her feelings of exclusion. Upon her return to Canada, Zarifa took the time to solidify her internal commitment to the faith by engaging in an active and thoughtful process of research and participation in religious activities. Deciding to permanently put on her hijab is framed as the final step in her path to religious commitment. The interplay of internal and external experiences, as well as the role of broader contexts is clear in Zarifa’s account. As Canada is a non-Muslim majority country, it is understandable that Zarifa could have conducted her day-to-day life without constant reminders of her lack of religious practice. However in Ethiopia, which is 50% Muslim, and Yemen, a Muslim majority country, religious and cultural practice of Islam would have been more easily accessible to Zarifa, rendering her lack of practice more apparent. The experience of being excluded from cultural and religious activities in Canada, coupled with the perspective that she gained from her international travels, can be seen as working together to inspire Zarifa’s internal desire to explore her religion further and commit to wearing the hijab. Similarly, Reham described making the decision to cover while attending Islamic classes as a child and was, therefore, also in the process of learning about her religion. … I was still learning how to read the Qur’an, and so I asked my mom I was like, ‘mom where’s my hijab?’ and she was like, ‘why? Get ready for school’. And like ‘I actually wanna start wearing it’, and she was like ‘ok’. And … she said like, if you start wearing it you can’t stop wearing it … Reham described her motivation as sudden, and can be read here as a spiritual motivation given the context of her learning about the religion. However, we also see an initial resistance from her mother Hifza, who does not herself cover. Despite this resistance, Reham’s choice to ask her mother for the hijab can be read as indicative of Hifza’s support for her daughter’s religious development. Even Hifza’s warning to Reham that she could not stop wearing the hijab once she began, can be read as one of support rather than of discouragement as here, Hifza is signalling to her daughter


the seriousness of the decision. Hifza’s role in Reham’s decision can, therefore, be interpreted as a complex external influence, one that perhaps triggered the internal seriousness with which she took on the hijab. This is evidenced by Reham’s subsequent comment that she has continuously worn her hijab after that point. However, Hifza, as an external influence, could have potentially served as a source of discouragement, as she initially resisted her daughter’s decision, and does not herself model the behaviour that Reham sought to take on. Notably, the women who did not wear hijabs in our sample did not express an overall opposition to the practice. Instead they all discussed why it was not appropriate for them at that particular point in their lives. Three of the women, Deeba, Selam, and Jessica expressed an interest in wearing a hijab in the future. For example Deeba: I really think about it a lot of times ‘cause I, I am a very strong believer in the religion, it’s practices, I’m very strong uh (pause) I don’t know, it makes me uncomfortable … At some point I think I would like to, and that I will eventually at some point in my life. The reasons why I don’t today is because I don’t know if I would be able to keep up with it, if it will just be, uh something like a fad … something that I put on in a phase. I don’t want to disrespect that … Um I’m also quite concerned about how you’re perceived. About um people attaching a lot of meanings to you when they look at you. Um often judgmental attitudes, discriminatory behaviour Deeba speaks of having a strong and internal commitment to her religion. Similar to Zarifa, she regards the hijab as a demonstration of her religious commitment and states that she does not want to treat the decision to cover lightly. Additionally, her awareness of potential prejudicial treatment in the wider Canadian context also contributes to her hesitation. As much of Deeba’s interview surrounded the discrimination that she faced as an immigrant to Canada from India, it is understandable that she would be hesitant to make a commitment that could lead to additional mistreatment. Therefore, both her internal doubts about her ability to maintain commitment, coupled with her perceptions of external treatment, impacted her ability to make a full commitment to wearing the hijab. Her hesitation is also indicative of how seriously she takes religious practice. Not all participants who did not wear hijabs viewed the practice as integral to Islam. Ishtar, for example, argued that the interpretations of passages in the Qur’an that appear to prescribe head covering are somewhat ambiguous. Ishtar had travelled frequently between Egypt and Canada and possessed a critical understanding of contextual and interpretative variations in Islam. For example she argued that in Egypt, women who dressed in full Islamic attire could move about more freely in public, whereas wearing a t-shirt, something that would be innocuous in the Canadian context,



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could garner unwanted sexual attention from men. She used this example to demonstrate how Islamic clothing can serve both religious and cultural purposes and argued that such historical ambiguities, as well as ambiguities in the Qur’an itself, made it difficult for her to determine if the hijab is indeed a religious requirement. She was, however, not critical of women who saw wearing a hijab as right for them. The individualized decision-making processes of the women in our study has been highlighted in previous Canadian work. For example, in a study of women who wear the niqab, a veil that covers most of the face aside from the eyes, one-third of participants (n = 81) came from families where no other women wore Islamic attire (Clarke, 2013). We also see that the women’s decisions were made through a combination of internal and external influences, which is also supported by previous research (Ali, 2005; Atasoy, 2006). For example, Atasoy described how one participant’s decision to wear a hijab was not singularly based in her own desire to do so but was a means by which to cope with her bulimia, as well as due to encouragement by members of her school’s Muslim Students Association. The general support of hijabs by the women who did not wear a headscarf is also supported in the literature (Mishra & Shirazi, 2010), as is the finding that some women who do not cover do not regard covering as required in Islam (Read & Bartkowski, 2000; Ruby, 2006). It is, therefore, difficult to make generalizations about support for, or opposition to covering across Islamic communities. The women’s stories instead shed light on the simultaneous social as well as individual processes that play into their decisions to wear or not wear a headscarf.

Religiosity From the preceding discussion, it is clear that the women interviewed spoke of the hijab as being related to their religiosity, or a symbol of religious practice. Amaal, who described herself as ‘could be more practising’ (i.e., not practising her religion as much as she could be), spoke of wearing the headscarf as not only a mandatory part of her religious practice, but as directly related to her levels of religiosity:Like, if I wear a niqab now, and if I wear, a jilbab, to me, to me, it’s, well I don’t know how, I don’t know how to, but to me, it’s like another level … So, I feel like my actions are not as strong, so I feel like if I wore that, I’m not, I’m not quite there. Do you get what I’m saying? I’m not as religious. Like I said I go to work, I pray, but sometimes I miss my prayers … Here Amaal references the possibility of wearing the niqab when she feels she is at that ‘level’. At the time of our interview, her religious attire consisted of a hijab and what would be considered modest ‘western’ clothing. For her, wearing the niqab and jilbab, a large shapeless gown, would

represent a higher level of religiosity. As with all of the other participants, for Amaal, religiosity included particular actions and practices that they framed as being required by the religion. However, throughout the interview, Amaal repeatedly commented on her struggle with maintaining her practice and consistently wearing the hijab. She reported incidents of not wearing her hijab to particular events such as weddings, or when on vacation abroad with her friends. Her internal feelings of religiosity would, therefore, fluctuate, as would shifts in her clothing in accordance with the social context. She was the most conflicted of all our participants, while being the only one to endorse a possibility of wearing the niqab. She suggested that she would first have to improve her practice of the religion before attempting to don what she considered to be more conservative Islamic attire. Hifza, who stated that wearing hijabs was not a common practice when she was growing up in Pakistan, expressed satisfaction with how she conducted herself religiously (i.e., praying, dressing modestly, and doing ‘good things’). However, she also expressed some discomfort at the thought that perhaps covering was a necessity of the religion. For example, she states ‘… so if I’m not wearing that, you know, like um, maybe I’m not doing anything wrong’. Her use of the terms ‘maybe’, and ‘wrong’ suggests that she was not entirely secure in her decision, despite having never worn the hijab. As Hifza was a committed Muslim and earnest in her practice, this insecurity appeared to be grounded in an awareness that many in the present day Pakistani-Canadian community, including her daughter Reham, endorsed the hijab as integral to Islam. She commented that many would say ‘oh, we, you have to wear hijab and you have to wear duparta and you have to wear this. But sometimes … they wear everything but they don’t practise’. We can see this statement as Hifza’s attempt to resist potential judgements of others by calling attention to inconsistencies between dress and practice among this community of women. However, similar to Hifza’s support of her daughter’s decision to wear a hijab, Reham was also quite supportive of Hifza not wearing one, recognizing that it was not a part of her mother’s upbringing. Reham noted that her mother was one of the most devout Muslims in her life. It is, therefore, unsurprising that Hifza expresses a sense of conflict in her practice of not wearing the hijab. Her internal desires and family support, coupled with the potential judgement from outsiders appears to leave her with a sense of guilt, which she in turn resists by pointing to the inconsistences between dress and practice in her community. The observation that a woman’s religious practice is often perceived as tied to her dress was noted by all of the women in our sample. Previous research has also demonstrated that the use of the hijab as a religious symbol is almost ubiquitous for women living in non-Muslim societies (Droogsma, 2007; Croucher, 2008). However, the women’s narratives also revealed that it was difficult if not impossible to determine


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a direct one-to-one relationship between the two. Instead, we see that the individual woman’s relationship to her hijab in the context of her religious practice becomes layered with her other life experiences. We also see that the negotiation of their internal motivations and perceptions of external judgements left them with feelings of guilt and conflict. Other research supports our finding that Muslim women’s level of religiosity is often judged in accordance with the clothing that they choose to wear (e.g., Ruby, 2006). The existence of such judgements for the women in our study, both internally and externally, meant that wearing or not wearing the hijab was never a singular and sustained achievement of religiosity. Rather, it can be treated as just one moment among many ongoing moments of negotiation between their own intentions and the desires, and interpretations and judgements of others. Muslim identity As was seen in Zarifa’s description of her initiation into wearing the hijab, the headscarf can be a strong marker of Muslim identity. Just as she described a feeling of exclusion from her religious and cultural groups due to not wearing the headscarf, other women reported a feeling of inclusion due to the identifiability of their religious clothing. For example Elham reported travelling to other cities and feeling an ‘automatic connection’ with other Muslim women, and used the headscarf as a point of entry to converse with these women. On the other hand, Selam, who does not wear a hijab, did not report a feeling of exclusion. Instead, she noted that she did not hesitate to initiate conversation with women in hijabs by the traditional greeting of As-salamu alaykum, to signify her Muslim identity. Therefore, although she acknowledged that the hijab helps to make one more identifiable as Muslim, her own strong internal identification with the religion allowed her to reach out to other women and avoid feelings of exclusion. Interestingly Jessica, who did not wear a hijab on a day-to-day basis, noted that she liked wearing a headscarf in the mosque as it covered her blond hair. She noted that it allowed her to avoid being stared at as a ‘non-Muslim born [person]’. She, therefore, sought inclusion through ‘anonymity’ as she stated, which was of course related to status as a White Canadian convert. Rather than emphasizing her identifiability to other Muslims, Reham used her hijab as a political signifier to the non-Muslim public. She stated: Because, especially working in an environment where there’s primarily um, White administration um, and, in all honesty White privilege … it’s a way to kind of counter orientalism for me in the sense of, because there’s a lot of assumptions associated with when you wear a hijab … the assumption is that, you’re passive, your submissive … there’s a lot of assumptions that, your decisions are


made for you … but it’s a way for me to counter that you know, I’m an educated, professional, um, that has a voice of my own, um, yea so I think for me, as a religious identity, it’s also, a political stance um, and resistance Here we see an example of how an external display of Muslim identity serves internal purposes for the participant. Aware of the negative and one-dimensional representations of Muslim women that exist in North American society, Reham uses her position as an ‘educated professional’ who also happens to wear a headscarf to counter those representations. This is a deliberate undertaking for her and she expresses a sense of pride in the effect that she seeks to have. Later in the interview she explained that she had taken an active role in educating her co-workers on Islamic traditions and practices to the point where they now recognize when some activities in the office may be uncomfortable for her. Fully aware and critical of the context within which she worked, Reham both passively and actively worked to change ideas of Muslim women that were imposed on her by others. Although the women named various benefits to being identifiable as Muslim, all of the women recognized that this identifiability also made them potential targets of discrimination. For example, Elham reported having two men yell at her and her younger sister to ‘take those towels off your head’ when they were playing in their front yard as children. Bilan continuously spoke of being presumed to be ignorant and being mistreated on account of her hijab, as well as her immigrant status as a Black woman from Somalia. The women who wore hijabs appeared to have an expectation that these types acts would occur, whereas the women who did not wear hijabs expressed concern for their friends and family members who wore Islamic attire and who could, therefore, be more easily identified as targets for discrimination. For all of the women, there was an overall awareness that wearing the hijab made them more easily identifiable as Muslim. The use of the hijab as a marker of Muslim identity is also well documented in the literature and quite possibly the most often cited reason for wearing it (Badr, 2004; Atasoy, 2006; Droogsma, 2007). The particular manner in which women utilized this identifiability, often to serve social and political functions, was intimately related to their internal beliefs, individual lifestyles, and social locations. We therefore see both commonalities and notable differences in the women’s approaches. Women’s experience or expectations of prejudice as a result of their identifiability as Muslim is also well understood (Badr, 2004; Cole & Ahmadia, 2003; Litchmore & Safdar, 2014). Identifiability as Muslim, therefore, proved to be a double-edged sword, the dangers of which all of the women recognized, but with which most were willing to contend for the sake of their religious practice and social intentions.



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Modesty, beauty and fashion The utility of wearing the headscarf as a means by which to be modest was discussed extensively in the interviews. Participants used terms like ‘conceal your beauty’ to describe the purpose of wearing the hijab. However, many of the women noted that the word hijab represented overall modest clothing and demeanour, not simply the headscarf. The specific meanings that one could attribute to modesty were, therefore, quite varied. For example, whereas Hifza reported shopping in plus sized sections to get clothing for her petite frame, her daughter Reham reported wearing skinny jeans as a regular part of her attire. International context was also cited by some women. Jessica described an instance of desiring modesty while swimming, but of dismissing the thought of wearing a burkini – swimwear that covers a woman’s entire body, neck and hair – in Canada. She noted that wearing such attire in the Canadian context would likely draw more attention to her than regular Western swimwear, despite her desire not to show much of her body. Participants also discussed taking pleasure in hijab ‘fashion’. Reham for example discussed wearing ‘all colours of the rainbow’ and ‘a lot of make-up’, and even argued that her use of bright colours was not simply for her own pleasure, but as a part of her act of resistance (i.e., to be easily identifiable as Muslim by the general public). Zarifa stated that she was ‘really into fashion’ and that it was a part of women’s nature to ‘get dolled up’. However, Amaal, a selfdeclared ‘modern Muslim’, noted that she wore trendy, but subtle clothing in order to strike a balance between her love of fashion and her desire for modesty. These women also noted that people were often critical of how standards of beauty should be maintained. For example Zarifa quoted a Sheik as saying: ‘what’s the point of wearing a hijab when you’re attracting so much attention to you? You’re sparkling and, and your heels are clicking on the ground …’. In response to this, she argues that as women, they do their part in covering and the onus is also on the men to manage how they look at women. This is something that was brought up by both groups of women. They argued that it was also the responsibility of men to ‘keep their eyes down’ in order to maintain standards of modesty and respect between men and women in their religion. For Jessica, Deeba, and Selam, the desire to maintain some level of self-expressed style in their day to day appearance, and specifically their hair, was discussed as a contributing factor to their hesitation to take on the headscarf at this point in their lives. However, all of the women who did not wear hijabs noted that they dressed modestly on a day-to-day basis. That is, they did not wear extremely form fitting clothing nor show a great deal of their skin. Therefore, for all of the women in our study, modesty, beauty, and fashion were still concerns for them, albeit expressed in varying ways.

Overall, the women in our study, and particularly the younger women, all appeared to be negotiating between maintaining their interpretations of Islamic standards of modesty, while also maintaining self-defined standards of beauty and attractiveness. These individualized standards have also been demonstrated in previous research (Mishra & Shirazi, 2010). The women in our study were also consistently faced with the task of managing others’ impressions of their appearance. Generally speaking, the women appeared to make conscious decisions about their appearance and self-presentation and appeared to be comfortable with these decisions overall. However, it was also clear that the task of managing one’s appearance in the face of potential external critique was a continuous source of concern for many of the women. Restriction and protection For the women in our study, feelings of restriction and protection proved to be two sides of the same coin. Elham spoke of feeling left out of particular activities, such as clubbing, in which her non-Muslim friends would participate. However, Zarifa described her hijab as protective for these purposes. She explained that now that she wears the headscarf, it protects her from ‘sinning’. She stated that rather than going to the club or similar activities, she sought to have fun in a ‘halal way’, that is, in ways that she felt aligned with her religious beliefs. On the other hand, Zarifa described feelings of restriction when attempting to participate in other types of activities. She described an incident where she decided against expressing an opinion in class due to her belief that her classmates would be dismissive of her views: Or just like lecture, yeah, when, if I’m commenting in lectures, like we have this discussion on um exotic dancers, and a lot of the people were agreeing with the fact that like, like stripper, I guess, yeah strippers, um, paying for tuition, they’re like you know, good for them, it’s, you know, liberation, and all that stuff. So like they were agreeing with that. I don’t agree with it. I didn’t agree with it before I wore the hijab, and it’s not, it has nothing to do with the religion. But I decided to stay quiet because I felt like if I said things people would be like ‘look at that crazy Muslim religious girl’, who’s so against, you know, freedom and all that, so I just decided to stay quiet. Here, Zarifa acknowledges the impression that members of the general public may have of Muslims as ultra conservative and restrictive. She maintains that her opinion regarding exotic dancers was one that she held even prior to wearing the headscarf and was not solely reflective of her religious views. However, she was aware that her classmates might have been inclined to dismiss her opinion as based in the religion, which is perceived as being counter to Western values of freedom. She implies that if she had expressed her opinion prior to wearing the headscarf, it would have perhaps


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been entertained more easily. However, she felt that the headscarf acted as a medium through which people would judge her as a fanatic. Reham, on the other hand, did not regard her hijab as restrictive in any sense. She stated that she deliberately participates in the types of activities that her fellow participants view as off limits, such as going to clubs and lounges, and on vacation to Las Vegas. She explained that she does not participate in activities that would be seen as unIslamic in these venues. She states: ‘I’m gonna [go] … everywhere that I wanna go with the same identity’, This also ties into her arguments of using her appearance as a form of resistance. Rather than allowing herself to feel restricted, she describes balancing her Islamic identity and lifestyle with living in and fitting into wider Canadian society. Her identity as a Muslim Canadian woman was, therefore, not segmented, or adjusted to fit the situation. It was instead maintained in order for her to demonstrate that she could be a fully functioning member of the society within which she was raised, without having to compromise her morals and values as a Muslim. Finally, all of the women spoke of the role of the headscarf in providing protection from the unwanted advances of men, or as a conduit for more respectful treatment by men. This is a finding that has also been found in other contexts (Read & Bartkowski, 2000; Ruby, 2006; Droogsma, 2007). For example, Selam reported that she noticed differences in how she was treated by men as a woman who did not wear a hijab, as compared to women who did. However, Amaal reported that even when she is fully covered, she would be propositioned by both Muslim and non-Muslim men, particularly men from her cultural group. Conversely, Jessica and Reham commented on their potential courtship experiences with men, where Reham was judged as too traditional, or not ‘modern’ for wearing her hijab, and Jessica was judged as being either very liberal as a White convert who does not wear a hijab, or as too traditional when she expressed to potential suitors her intention of wearing the hijab at some point in the future. For Amaal, the intent of protection was ineffective, whereas for Jessica and Reham, protection was not an explicit desire in particular courtship experiences. The hijab instead served as an undesirable barrier for men in these interactions. Overall, we see that the women’s experiences of protection and restriction were entirely integrated into both the individual woman’s internal commitment to the hijab and the meanings that they placed on it. The finding that women often use covering for these purposes, that is, as a means of protection, and as a reminder of the expectations of Islamic behaviour, is supported in the literature (Atasoy, 2006; Droogsma, 2007). However our study demonstrates these experiences are highly individualized, and that the women were faced with having to negotiate their internal beliefs and intentions in the face of how others perceived and treated


them. What we are consequently left with is variable and often contradictory experiences of protection and restriction.

Discussion and conclusion Khan (1995) notes that Muslim women are often viewed as part of the undifferentiated group, which is entrenched in both clichéd and conflicting images that are aligned with the perspectives of those invested in this image. Our study works to excavate these undifferentiated viewpoints, by attending to the relationship that our sample of women had with the hijab. Previous work has also highlighted the political implications of Muslim headscarves, both for the women who wear them and for the national contexts within which these women reside (Reid, 2007; Kilic et al., 2008). Our study brings closer attention to the phenomenological experiences of these women, to their day-to-day negotiations and their individualized journeys with wearing, or not wearing headscarves. In attending to these individualized processes, our findings align with work by Baerveldt (2015), who argues that the hijab should not be interpreted as simply a marker of identity or resistance in non-Muslim majority contexts. Instead Baerveldt treats the hijab as a component of the overall ‘expressive style’ of individual women, tied directly to their individual bodies and life histories. This, therefore, affords these women agency in that they cannot be situated in or alongside static and generalized meanings of the headscarf. Additionally, for all of the internal meanings that the women in our sample placed on their practices of covering, we discussed how these interacted with external experiences, and their interpretations of how they were treated, or anticipated being treated by others. The internal and external experiences were sometimes congruent but often contradictory. Similarly, intended meanings in one domain, such as a desire for modesty, would conflict with another desire, for example to be ‘dolled up’. However, although as outside observers we make note of these contradictions, the women themselves more often displayed comfort, rather than discomfort with these contradictions. Reham, for example, embraced the contradiction of the requirement to refrain from particular activities as a practising Muslim, while actively participating in them to serve her political purposes. As illustrated in the narratives, it is within immediate and broader social contexts that the internal and external experiences of Muslim women are shaped and influenced. The Canadian national context, in particular, although similar in some ways to other Western countries such as, the USA, France, and Australia (e.g., secular, Western, non-Muslim majority), is different from these nations in other respects (e.g., official multicultural policy, fewer restrictions for women who wear hijab). For example, in countries such as France, where there is a recognized



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government effort to regulate covering practices, women cite resistance as a motivational factor for covering (Croucher, 2008). However, only one of our participants actively cited resistance as a reason for wearing a hijab or dressing in a particular way. Perhaps the relative inclusivity of the Canadian context, with the exception of Quebec, toward Muslims, and the official multiculturalism policy are contributing factors to the comfort levels of Muslim women in their covering practices. The recent court victory of a Muslim woman who fought to wear her niqab while taking the Canadian oath of citizenship despite three years of trials, and the conservative government’s advocacy against the niqab, is evidence of Canadian inclusivity at work (Barber, 2015). Similarly, Clarke (2013) reported that Muslim women wearing niqabs relate their covering to freedom and multiculturalism in Canada. In sum, our findings are in line with other Canadian studies that have identified a range of meanings associated with the hijab, including religiosity, Muslim identity, modesty, protection from unwanted attention and protection from one’s own potentially sinful actions (Atasoy, 2006; Ruby, 2006; Zine, 2006). However the narratives in our study, although indicative of the experiences of our participants, may not be reminiscent of the experiences of

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Supporting information Additional Supporting Information may be found in the online version of this article at the publisher’s website.
