Subject: RE: [BOU:] Re: veiling and islam From: Josh Robinson <jmr59-AT-hermes.cam.ac.uk> Date: Mon, 05 Jan 2004 18:23:28 +0000 <unlurks> part of teh problem is about who's doing the oppressing: many Muslim women -choose- to wear the veil, and see it as a symbol of their religious identity (or, more accurately, as a sign of purity rather than of their religion). of course the culture that forces - or even encourages - them to do this is repressive, but i don't think that's what's at stake here. in Iran, many progressive women refuse to wear the veil as a symbol of resistance to patriarchy. conversely, many progressive Muslim women in western Europe -choose- to wear it in order to 'assert' their religious identity, (some have said as a symbol of resistance to Anglo-American imperialism). it's partly about the resistance to authority - if women are forced to wear the veil, the 'rebellious' thing is not to wear it; if it is banned, many will see the state as their enemy and choose to. i don't think the issue is as simple as you make out, John: of course we must do all we can to make sure that women aren't -forced- to wear a veil, but couldn't banning it (especially if the ban is implemented by a predominantly white legislature) be counterproductive? josh On Mon, 2004-01-05 at 17:51, john.kaman wrote: > Dear Emrah, > > I don't know where you are coming from, my friend. In arguing that Muslims > are being oppressed by not being allowed to oppress their women in French > territory you twist things about as much as they can be twisted. The veil > has been and will always be a symbol of oppression and as such it has no > place in a republican state. Scholarship seems to have fallen to a level > where whoever can develop the most distorted version of reality wins. Atre > we so bereft of ideas that we have to make up crap like this in order to get > tenure? At base, that's really what this is all about--coming up with some > new phoney interpretation of reality so that everyone, not wishing to > embaress themselves will say "Hrrumph, unintelligible--he must deserve > tenure." If you and others like you really believed what you are putting > out you'd become additional American Talibans but that's just the problem> You don't believe it--you're just trying to get or to keep a job. > > John > > -----Original Message----- > From: owner-bourdieu-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU > [mailto:owner-bourdieu-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU]On Behalf Of Emrah > Goker > Sent: dimanche 4 janvier 2004 22:55 > To: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU > Subject: [BOU:] Re: veiling and islam > > > Good thing my blurb provoked discussion. Bad thing the power of the > western-civilizationist doxa made its presence felt even on this list so > rapidly. It won't be admitted easily ("What me biased? My best friends are > Muslim! The majority of Muslims are good!"), but read between the lines of a > couple of messages sent, it is lurking there. > > I ally myself with Ozgur and Batoul and others who are sensitive about the > injustices done towards North America's and Europe's Muslim immigrant > communities, as well as about the racisms perpetuated at the very moment by > the occupations of Iraq and Palestine. > > First, a couple of replies I felt urged to make: > > Erik -- > > I couldn't put a finger on the reason for your reactionarism, maybe it's > your rhetorical style. First, dubbing the full-body veil as "ninja outfit" > is common in the right-wing Turkish journalistic field (that includes > fascist, Kemalist, neoliberal and other western-civilizationist positions), > and well, for irreligious socialists like me, not to mention for most > religious citizens, men or women, it is regarded as a racist obscenity. I > can only hope that you tried to distance yourself from those positions with > the quotation marks. > > Second, it would be useful to present some evidence for your other claims > about the relation between class distinction and veiling, homesickness and > veiling, non-integration and Islam, etc. Not that I am skeptical, I want to > learn. As it stands, your imagination of Islam in Europe is misleading: as > if all generations of Muslim immigrants believe that Europe is a battlefield > and that they have to prepare themselves for a war. Now, this is > Berlusconi's or Blair's or Bush's vision of Islam, true, but how > sociological is it? > > Third, yes, oppression and inequality are properties of certain relations > among Muslims. But the journalistic/scholastic argument used by right-wing > French (or Turkish) Republicans to support discrimination against young > Muslim women ("We are trying to liberate them from their male fundamentalist > oppressors by removing their foluard/turban") is only an excuse for the > state elites' nationalist/irredentist angst. Moreover, it is not difficult > to detect the homology between this civilizing desire of "liberation" and > the imperialist one (the latter's consequences are still unfolding in > Afghanistan and Iraq). Sociologically, one needs to show, if they exist, the > properly "Islamic" mechanisms of oppression whose removal will necessarily > end racism, xenophobia, injustice and inequality in, say, France. In that > vein, one needs to be clear about what an appropriate path for "integration" > of a Muslim immigrant in a European country. > > [Interviews in Bourdieu et. al.'s "The Weight of the World" frequently > expose the problems with the "integration of Arabs". Mahmood Mamdani further > exposes the other fallacy of the western-civilizationist distinction between > "good" and "bad" Muslims; see his "Good Muslim, Bad Muslim – An African > Perspective", http://www.ssrc.org/sept11/essays/mamdani.htm] > > John -- > > You write: "Furthermore to say that secularism or laicism is a right wing > movement is not ignorant; it is stupid." And in another message, you note > that anti-laicist Muslims who are "trying to make inroads into the > progressive institutions of the French state", are "in the minority of > Islam, as the leader of the sunnite sect Friday approved France's position > for muslims in France, arguing that the veil was mandatory in a muslim > country but elsewhere one does as in Rome." > > I agree that "laicism" is not a movement, but in the case of especially > France and Turkey, it is a dirigiste social technology, a source of > political and bureaucratic capital, that can be used differently by > different governments. In Turkey, as Ozgur also mentioned, the Army and > left- or right-wing governments have mobilized this technology to > undermine/control/oppress the representations of Islam which were beyond the > state's reach. Like the Turkish Directorate of Religious Affairs, which is a > state institution designed to discipline Islam and profess the official > version, after 1960s the French Consultative Council of Muslim Communities > was designed to establish a similar disciplining of the "unruly" Algerian > Muslims. Like the cooperation between German governments and Turkish ones to > empower "official Islam" against "fundamentalist Islam", the French > governments also cooperated with Tunisian, Algerian and Moroccan governments > for the management of religious services. It is not surprising that the > domesticized leaders of Sunni communities will anxiously declare that they > are "good" Muslims, that they want no trouble, and that they are willing to > tolerate discrimination in order not to appear as a threat to France's > "national security and unity". > > ... > > For me, defending young Muslim women's rights is a matter of justice. > Forbidding veiling in schools, universities, public institutions, etc. > constitutes an unjust treatment of a religious community. The ban enforces, > in France, unjust majority communitarianism, which denies the equivalent > treatment of young Muslim women in education. As far as I know, there is no > analogous ban against Christian insignia. The principle of equal > participation is denied here. Now, defenders of the foulard must also > establish that permitting it will not exacerbate female subordination among > the citizenship at large. As far as I know, there is no conclusive evidence > that all diverse female Muslim representations of the veil are univocally > subordinated to something called "Islamic patriarchy". The meanings are > contested, and other than numerous testimonies like that of Batoul, there is > a rich social scientific literature that supports this. [One among many > examples, concerning the diverse representations in Turkey, is Nilufer > Gole's book, "The Forbidden Modern".] > > Emrah > > _________________________________________________________________ > Working moms: Find helpful tips here on managing kids, home, work — and > yourself. http://special.msn.com/msnbc/workingmom.armx > > ********************************************************************** > Contributions: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu > Commands: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu > Requests: bourdieu-approval-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu > > ********************************************************************** > Contributions: bourdieu-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu > Commands: majordomo-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu > Requests: bourdieu-approval-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu --- StripMime Warning -- MIME attachments removed --- This message may have contained attachments which were removed. 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