A Desire To Look

Sahar

Unfortunately I’m extremely busy at the moment so could not write an entire piece on this list of the the hottest Muslim women  in the world , but Muslima Media Watch  has written a good post on it so check it out.  I myself could not help but make a comment on the politics of this list.

I had no idea most of these women were Muslim–mainly because they do not stress this aspect of their identity so much;  to have them on this list was somewhat baffling. It was disturbing to note their inviting poses and their nudity.  I’m reminded of European colonialism’s insatiable desire to unveil the Muslim woman, due to its obsession with looking. The colonised world was an exhibition for the European gaze, and the native as a spectacle.  The veiled Muslim woman of this period frustrated Europeans because she violated their right to look and undermined their world of exhibition.  Moreover, she refused to be exposed, made vulnerable–her existence dissected by white eyes.  Importantly, she could look without being seen and this politicised her presence.

It was not a surprise then that the veiled Muslim woman became a focus of both the coloniser’s quest to unveil and thus dominate her (by extension the Muslim society to which she belonged to) –and a symbol of national resistance.  

The Europeans in turn demonized the veil– or in today’s context–the hijab.  They forced her to unveil, to show them what she was hiding. In revenge, they unveiled her in paintings where her body was laid bare for them to see. She was also photographed in the same way. These paintings and photographs were disseminated throughout Europe and evoked sexual imagery of a feminised Orient being penetrated by a lustful Europe.

The message was clear: The exotic woman of the Orient had given herself up for the white man. She would be saved from the brutality of her world which the veil became a metaphor for.

This list of Muslim women, with not one of them in hijab, exoticised and nude,  is a modern attempt to possess the Muslim woman. In fact, the article on the list of Muslim women ends with the reminder “And the good news is, you can look at them any time of day…”.  There is a sense of excitement in it because the Muslim woman is available for them to see, and there are no barriers (veil). Such an attempt is made even more apparent in that it is a supposed ‘celebration’ of the holy month of Ramadan for Muslims.  By exposing her to the Western gaze a similar message is being sent: the Muslim woman is under the control of Western capitalism. She has been unveiled and objectified,  and here lies the real attraction of such a list.

Orientalism, Culture and Appropriation: Part 2

The Translation of Orientalism into the Vernacular

Farah

Unidentified artist, Orient Delights Orient's Most Famous Sweets, c. 1920

How did the high art Oriental depictions of harems, turbans, hyper-sexualised women in transparent veils and sheiks make its way into mass culture? A lot of it has to do with timing. In early 20th century Orientalist fine art was still in its heyday. There was a rapid spread of Orientalist imagery. Victorian suffragettes like Frances Wright were adopting Oriental-style dress to challenge the era’s rigid sexual mores and to advance women’s rights (See Pantaloons & Power by Gayle V. Fischer. It’s a terrible title but the book makes the point.) Everyone who was anyone was going to the Near East to fulfil their own Orientalist fantasies, bringing back and writing about wild stories of naked women in harems and camels and exotic clothing and food. The problem was that high art was (and is still) seen to be bought at the price of the exclusion of the lower classes. But the rise in a mass consumer culture in the 1920’s changed that. It cemented the commodification of Orientalist imagery and suddenly the lower classes were no longer excluded from the Oriental phenomenon. The ‘Orient’ was excorporated from high art, and incorporated into the language of mass culture.

In “The Schema of Mass Culture” Theodor Adorno provides a scathing critique of mass culture. He stated that mass culture was adaptation, its artefacts were ‘pre-digested’ like baby food, and its audience were those who could not appreciate anything but the pre-digested artefacts mass culture offered them. The Orient was adapted and incorporated from its high art leanings into mass consumption. The images presented to the audience were assimilated into its context. By using this imagery cultural producers were reflecting society’s orientalist fantasies back onto itself. In the words of Adorno, “the difference between ‘serious’ and ‘light’ culture is either eroded or expressly organised and thus incorporated into the almighty totality.”

Orientalist imagery proliferated through artefacts including photographs, colour prints, pictorial advertisements, and movies. The advertising business in particular used Orientalism to sell everything from tobacco to pulp fiction magazines. And who can forget Disney’s Aladdin? In the ad below for “Fatima Turkish Blend Cigarettes”, the Oriental woman is shown holding a pack of cigarettes.

Unidentified artist, Fatima Sign (advertisement) c.1920

In a clear continuity with Orientalist fine art (see “Almeh with Pipe” in the first post), the women is simultaneously veiled, and not veiled. Though turbaned, the veil over her mouth is transparent, leaving the viewer to see her seductive smile. This imagery complicates the interpretation of the text accompanying the image. In the top right corner, the audience is asked; “Have you had the pleasure?” The ambiguity is clear: the pleasure of what exactly? Coupled with the Oriental woman smiling at us through her transparent veil, somehow I doubt they are referring to just smoking cigarettes.

The pulp fiction magazine cover below operates within the same discourse. The image on the left shows a ‘typical’ Arab man in the background with scimitar in hand; ready to ravage the helpless Western woman.

Unidentified artist, pulp fiction magazine covers, c.1920

She in turn is being protected by her Western man. It therefore operates dually; both to demonise Arab men and to subjectify the western woman. Similarly, the cover on the left is just as titillating as any of the fine art pieces explored previously. Like the image of Fatima Turkish cigarettes, the woman is hyper-sexualised; kohl-rimmed eyes, ruby lips, gaudy jewellery. Again, her transparent veil serves to both cover her and uncover her. The veil is there, but beneath the veil she is naked, giving the viewer a glimpse of the forbidden.

These advertisements and mass culture goods are marketed and produced for the Western gaze, further subjectifying the Oriental woman. They operate as fantasies and as imaginings of what women and life is like “over there”. In this way they are much like Gerome’s depiction of prayer or Ingres’ portrayal of harem life and continue the endless re-production of imagined Orientalist imagery. With most cultural artefacts, they then lend themselves to re-appropriation by high art. Matisse’s “Odalisque with Magnolias” was produced during the height of the mass culture boom (see below). Matisse is considered to be a fore-runner of the modernist movement. He experimented with colour, composition and perspective. His style was less realist (realist as in technically realist, not socially) than previous Orientalist paintings but like Gerome and Ingres one can see a repetition of Orientalist imagery; in this piece it is the fabled odalisque. The problem with Matisse was that when he first travelled to Morocco in 1912 he could find no women to pose for him. In Feminism in Contemporary Art, Isaak observes that Matisse found that “Nice on the sunny Mediterranean could provide the voluptuous sensuality he had desired from the Orient without the strain of an actual encounter with a foreign culture.” He re-created an experience with the Orient as he wanted it to be by decorating his house with souvenirs brought back from North Africa, and employing suitably dark-skinned models to pose for him. Matisse claimed that he was working from ‘reality’; he had supposedly seen naked women but as Isaak again notes he was claiming an authenticity over what he actually saw. Like the artists before him Matisse never stepped foot in a harem, let alone met an odalisque. He was to a large extent re-creating assumptions based on the Orientalist paintings produced in the late 19th century, and the imagery produced in booming mass culture which appropriated and re-produced the imagery of the sexualised Oriental woman. Echoing Said’s criticisms, Isaak states that “Matisse’s harem paintings were part of a fashionable colonial discourse in which the erotic management of human subjects in cultural production thinly disguises a collective assertion of control over human subjects, territory and property.”

Orientalism surrounds us. Harem pants as fashion. Middle-Eastern inspired bars and clubs. The appropriation of the keffiyeh. Its images are constantly imported, incorporated, appropriated and re-invented for the mass market. The big question therefore is whether any authentic cultural form can exist for long without being transformed into self-annihilating simulations or mimicries of themselves for mass consumption.

Next week I will look at the consequences of cultural appropriation and commodification, and the inherent danger both processes pose in replicating the colonial project through mass culture.

Orientalism, Culture and Appropriation: Part 1

Portrayals of the ‘Other’ in Fine Art and Mass Media

Farah

This is the first in a 3-part series discussing the portrayal of the ‘Other’ through Western cultural artefacts. In this post I will establish the theoretical framework, and discuss the role of the Orient in fine art during the first wave of colonialism in the late 1800’s.

All images sourced from the Orientalist Gallery, run by American artist Enzie Shahmiri.

Harem girls, merchants smoking sheesha, lavish clothes, harem girls, odalisques bathed by African slaves, mosque interiors….harem girls, spice merchants… and some more harem girls; a (wide) array of figures and images were employed by the West to represent and know the Oriental Other. The Oriental ‘period’ in fine art rose during the late 19th century and involved artists from a number of countries including America, Britain, France, Italy and Spain. However, since Said’s Orientalism critics have re-engaging with Oriental art. Said drew on Foucault’s ideas of power and argued that the knowledge production process of the Orient and the process of its subjection by the colonial power were processes that were intimately connected. In light of Said’s work it is asked therefore whether Oriental art was (in the words of art historian Gerald Ackerman) a “wonderful, direct, immediate response of one civilisation to another”? Or was the western desire to represent the Other intimately connected with the colonists will to power?

As Linda Nochlin notes, “for… artists [the Near East] existed as a project of the imagination, a fantasy space or screen onto which strong desires – erotic, sadistic, or both – could be projected with impunity.” In Jean-Léon Gérôme’s “Almeh with Pipe” (1873) (below) the Orient woman stands seductively. Gerome visually seduces the viewer to fulfil the role of the ‘client’; her head tilted is upwards but her gaze is directed to us.
Perhaps more important is his depiction of her veil; she is simultaneously veiled and not veiled. In this way the transparent veil operates as a dual discursive construct; it both ‘covers’ her but allows us to gaze upon her as a hyper-sexualised being. Rudolf Ernst’s “The Favourite” (1872) (below) operates within a similar context. In it he shows a timid, (pale) girl, juxtaposed with a tall, standing (dark) man. The man is an active participant within the scene and is (tentatively) removing the girl’s veil. She is seated, hands folded in her lap, passive and compliant. The man is in charge of the scene and is unveiling the Orient women to fulfil his sexual fantasy.
This depiction juxtaposes the man’s power over the girl’s powerlessness. Ernst has also drawn his subjects out of proportion to emphasise the power relationship. Note I also refer to them as ‘girl’ and ‘man’ because he has clearly painted them with a significant age difference – her face is youthful, fresh and bright, whereas he is tall and commanding.

We are enticed into thinking that these images function as realism because (as Ackerman suggests above) such images seem to record the interactions between one civilisation and another. It’s clear however that these images serve an alternative and an almost opposite function. These painters were satisfying the public’s curiosity for the unknown and the exotic by depicting forbidden spaces of the mosque and the harem, and in many instances doing so inaccurately. Consider Jean-Léon Gérôme’s “Rustem Pasha Mosque” (date unknown) (below). He was clearly captivated by Islamic art and architecture and somewhat faithfully depicts its style. However, as a non-Muslim he would not be allowed inside the mosque and can only re-create what he thinks is inside. This, along with his inaccurate depiction of prayer further undermines the piece as a ‘historical’ image. Gerome’s work can only be understood with reference to France’s colonial operations in North Africa. France reduced the Orient to a concubine, an indolent heathen and ready to be colonized. The Orient was depicted by artists as a feminized and exotic entity, waiting to be conquered.

Similar inaccuracies plague the artists’ depiction of the harem and life within it. Traditionally operating as a women’s space, men would not have been granted access to them. Depictions of the harem therefore operated as a fantasy through which artists imagined the lives of the women they could not see. What was projected was a voyeuristic, hyper-sexualised setting. In “La piscine du harem” (1888) (below) Gérôme’s women are casually seated in a marbled, carpeted environment. The African slave offers them both sheesha. A woman in the background turns her head to the scene with interest. Gerome depicts these women as almost casual about their nakedness. Both are removed from the viewer, their heads turned with interest to what the slave has to offer. Jean August Dominique Ingres’s “Turkish Bath” (1863) (below) also operates within the same context. The viewer is again detached from the piece but he provides us with a titillating, voyeuristic view of the harem. Again, these harem girls are engaged with casual, light entertainment, aided by two dark slave women.
What is even more surprising (well, not really surprising given the context of our discussion) is that all women in both works are also surprisingly pale for women who should technically be North African.

The above has largely focused on French Oriental art. A number of academics note that American and British Oriental fine art was less overtly imperial and political than its French counterparts. Holly Edwards notes that American Frederick Bridgman eschewed hyper-sexuality and instead depicted more domesticated scenes of beautiful women, no less desirable than Gerome’s but less obviously so. In “The Siesta” (1878) (below) Bridgman presents us with a woman reclining in a lush, opulent setting. Her ‘role’ is more ambiguous than in the art noted above (the title does not suggest her status, nor does her surrounding or clothing), but still there are suggestions of danger.
The half-open doorway hints at voyeurism (though less so than Gerome’s work) and the monkey suggests debauchery, but this element is removed from her and presented in animal form. For a further discussion on British and American Oriental fine art I’ll direct you “Visions of the Harem” by Ahdaf Soueif and Emily Salcedo’s brief introduction on the subject. Another excellent discussion by Linda Nochlin is in her book The Politics of Vision: Essays on Nineteenth Century Art and Society, Chapter 3 – “The Imaginary Orient”.

There are many ways to represent the Orient, and each is subject to conditions of time and place. Ultimately, this period sparked the creation and consumption of a fabled, exotic and imaginary world. And while the artists themselves may not have believed in the colonial powers ‘civilisation’ mission, they are nevertheless intimately bound within this framework and must be understood as such. Artists like Jean-Léon Gérôme, Jean August Dominique Ingres, Frederick Arthur Bridgman, and later into the 20th century, Henri Mattise and Pablo Picasso appropriated cultural artefacts and re-produced them for the colonial high art gaze, helping to create and solidify perceptions of the exotic Orient.

For more images from the artists mentioned above visit Shahmiri’s blog. Next week I will be looking at the boom of consumer culture in the 20th century and the uses of Orientalist imagery by marketers and manufacturers, marking its transition from high culture to mass culture.

Nahid Persson’s “Prostitution Behind the Veil”

Farah

Mina and Fariba (top right) and Nahid Persson (bottom right)

Iran has always been a country I’d love to sit down and read up on. When I first started uni I wrote a (terrible) essay on the causes of the Iranian Revolution and I got too caught up in names, dates and places and I never really learnt anything. So my knowledge of the area is a little limited, but I try to read/watch/listen when I can. A couple of months ago I read about documentary film-maker Nahid Persson, an Iranian exile who fled from Iran to Sweden after the Revolution. I *cough* downloaded *cough* a documentary called Prostitution Behind The Veil with the intention of posting my thoughts, but watching it made me a bit…. ambivalent. Alicia over at MMW has posted up her thoughts, so I thought maybe it was time.

My first problem with the documentary is the title. It really wasn’t necessary to perpetuate the public/private orientalist discourse, and neither is the music that the documentary opens with. There other problems that I have with the documentary are how Persson has chosen to construct her subject matter and her voiceover.

Initially we are introduced to Habib, a man who sells fortunes using birds. The story then follows two heroin addicted prostitutes who live in the same bedsit, Mina (20) and Fariba (24). Both their husbands are in jail and have to support children. Persson’s documentary follows Mina and Fariba through their daily routine; we are shown around their homes, introduced to their children, watch them getting high, and follow them onto the street and watch clients pick them up. My main issue with the documentary is the lack of information we are given regarding their situation. Fariba shows us photos of her life six months prior to shooting the documentary; it is clear she was living a middle class lifestyle. Later on it is suggested that she was involved in prostitution while she was still married to earn money for the family. Similarly, Mina tells us that her husband got her addicted to heroin and was jailed when Mina was two months pregnant. Considering her daughter is still a baby that wouldn’t have been that long ago. Now, prostitution and sex trafficking is a big issue for a lot of countries. A number of factors contribute to its perpetuation including lack of social welfare, continuous warfare, lack of employment opportunities, weak government, but Persson does not address this. Instead if you rely on her voiceover alone she suggests that the whole problem can be boiled down to the Revolution. She tells the viewer that

“the Iranian Revolution started as a dream for a better society. The enormous oil wealth would be distributed. Democracy and freedom of speech would be implemented. But it didn’t happen. Instead, a new religious hierarchy developed. And a bureaucracy fuelled by bribes. Today, 25 years later, there are no dreams left.”
(at 10:02 – 10-23)

Persson’s voiceover simplifies the social and economic conditions of women both prior to and after the Revolution. She pushes the viewer to make a number of unhelpful assumptions about the contemporary state of Iran by framing her documentary solely within the scope of the Revolution. This includes assuming the negative impact on women under Islamic law and undermining the strong role women played in outsing the Shah. Indeed, the Revolution did change the social, economic and political make up of Iran. However, a number of other events have occurred since then which probably haven’t helped to improve the status of women. The Iran-Iraq war, sanctions (which have further isolated the country economically), and the spate of anti-Islamic rhetoric in recent years further marginalised the government. All these contribute to the current situation of Mina and Fariba, and other women in the same situation.

My second major problem with the documentary is that she has structured her subject matter around an obvious Orientalist discourse. I’ve already mentioned the title (and the music) above, but it goes beyond that. The way certain scenes are presented really plays into a public/private dichotomy. Inside the house, Mina and Fariba are shown as sexual beings, laughing and joking with each other about sex and condoms, they get high in the privacy of their house, and they dance and sing for their husbands. On the outside of the house they are demure, head bowed, wearing a chador and hijab. In an early scene Mina takes off her hijab laughing as she says “Damn veil.”*If this reflects the way in which women live in Iran (which it probably does), then say so. Identify the power structures women are subjected to and tell us the wider problems that women face. Don’t just tell me unhelpful generalisations like “men and women can’t shake hands.” And above all don’t let your own documentary participate within the same structures which subjugate women to being with.

I am acutely aware that I am the same age as Fariba and live in circumstances totally removed from her life. And even with its faults Persson did highlight a major issue in Iran, the extent of which I didn’t know about. But at the end, the documentary leaves you with really nothing to grab onto (well, it does have a very poignant close up of the ladies only entrance at the airport). Yes, there are marginalised and disempowered women in Iran but I would have appreciated both a fuller discussion of the reasons behind their descent into the sex trade and maybe toning down the Orientalist assumptions.

*Note when Mina says “Damn veil” she is referring to her hijab, I watched a sub-titled version which translated “hijab” as “veil”.

What it Means to be Feminine

Sahar

For a female, growing up in an Afghan household is not always a walk in the park. One has to deal with conservative expectations of what a woman is, how she should behave and how she must present herself in her community. Expectations of women’s behaviour aren’t exactly limited to Afghanis or Muslim households, but also apply in the broader Western society we live in. With minor variations, there are particular qualities that signify ‘feminine’ and are attributable to women.

I’ve always been considered quite a ‘masculine’ girl. During high school, I was mouthy, had a bit of an attitude and was quite opinionated. I found myself cringing or getting defensive in response to anyone who would point out that I was not behaving like a woman. As a result, I developed a bit of a complex. What is interesting though, it was not necessarily my appearance that triggered these responses but my behaviour. “Why don’t you ever act like a woman Sahar”? Male friends always keep telling me. “You know, you’d make a great woman if you just get over your penis envy”. In my university years, I remember Muslim male friends getting together talking about politics and telling me to “shut up and look pretty”. Politics was male domain and my presence was more of a display, an exhibition.

These suggestions typify the responses from many men I’ve known over the years. It was not until much later that I started to understand such remarks.

Although my appearance identifies me as a woman, and to some men, even an attractive one (go figure). I have long hair, dress well and generally take care of my appearance. There are aspects of my personality that for many men do not fit aptly with my appearance. So there really isn’t anything ‘butch’ about my appearance. I am, however, politically active, confrontational at times, opinionated, ambitious, and independent. I know how to defend myself; in other words, I’m competent. These qualities aren’t normally identified with women and aren’t recognised as ‘feminine’. So being ‘feminine’ means not only to look ‘feminine’ but behave in a particular way as well. Being ‘feminine’ usually connotes lacking an intelligent opinion, dependent, passive/timid, incompetent, and so on. If you lack these qualities, the signifiers of ‘femininity’, you’re either deemed unattractive or just ‘masculine’

It is not that I don’t think there is an intrinsic difference in men and women, and that it does not translate into different types of behaviour—I’m increasingly realizing that difference does indeed exist. Aside from biological differences, there are certain inherent behavioral differences. Within feminist circles, that’s a controversial statement to make. I agree with feminist psychologist Carol Gilligan who argues that behavioural differences in men and women do exist. Socialization cannot simply explain them. However, I contest the exploitation of our differences in society. Certain types of qualities are only attributed to men, and these qualities are often valued more in society. That is where the socialisation role has its affect.

‘Masculine’ attributes, like independence, competitive drive, ambition, being learned are considered the ‘tools’ in order to get ahead. These qualities we identify with those who are successful; and success is often considered a male domain. This is why many women feel they need to practically mimic men’s behaviour to have any credibility in positions of power. Women’s qualities are meant to be complementary to this and not as valued. In fact, the limited attributes that define femininity are perceived pejoratively. Femininity conjures up weakness, submission, coyness. In other words, women are socialized and identified by a more subordinate femininity.

A subordinate femininity is not the example set by the first Muslim women in our tradition. They provide us with an example of what it is to be a woman. We have the example of Nuseiba who the blog is named after. She fought in battles and was known for her courage and bravery. The qualities that she possessed and was praised for, even by the Prophet himself, are qualities we associate with men. Then there is Aisha, one of the wives of the Prophet, who was a highly learned woman and narrated over 2000 hadith. The Prophet’s first wife, Khadija, was a confident business woman who even proposed to the Prophet. These are examples of women who weren’t caught up in the superficial experiences of what is considered to be ‘womanhood’, but showed strength, intelligence, leadership and a type of femininity that was valued in the community. History seems to have been re-written, and the image of these women seems to have been moulded into something different. Today, the prevailing image of what is truly feminine does not go beyond the domestic.

Ignoring this tradition, it is interesting to see how Muslim men are intimidated by women who are ambitious, successful and confident. Initially, they find them attractive or curious, but this attraction eventuates into either shunning them or moulding them into what they believe a woman should be like.

Islam’s female figures remind us that there is more to femininity than what is commonly understood. While women do have distinctive qualities, for instance, being more in tune with human emotion and compassionate, which enables better ethics; however, they can also be strong, independent, assertive, confident and successful. That is what femininity is all about. It’s time we stop seeing femininity in submissive terms.

So rather than the reactionary feminine attributes that are always presented in pink, giggly, shopaholic, too emotionally dependent, and timid forms, it’ll be nice to go beyond these and recognize qualities in women that fosters an understanding of their genuine contribution to society. Perhaps then maybe men won’t find it so perplexing to encounter a woman who prioritises developing her mind and contributing to her community than say, shopping and getting dolled up.

A Response to Mojha Kahf

Written by Farah B for Nuseiba

A couple of weeks ago The Washington Post featured a piece written by Mojha Kahf entitled “Spare Me the Sermon on Muslim Women”. Sobia from Muslimah Media Watch posted (a mostly positive) response here, MMW then featured a more negative analysis from Muse here (which has since been retracted) and another response from Crypto-Muslim here. While a fourth response could be seen as over-kill, there are two major issues that the writers did not address in great detail.

Admittedly, I’d never heard of Kahf prior to reading the article. From what I’ve now read she’s published some books, written about women and sexuality and lives in the US. Looking at the article in detail, it is written extremely informally in a style more akin to spoken English which doesn’t really help for clarity. Nevertheless, her main argument is quite clear; Muslim women are not oppressed or exploited. Islam grants women a number of rights whose collary are not found in Christianity.

There are two major problems I have with Kahf’s piece; firstly her one dimensional portrayal of Muslim women, and secondly her lack of analysis of the relationship between the rights Islam grants us and whether or not women actually enjoy those rights.

Firstly, her portrayal of Muslim women. She talks extensively about “Muslim” women having access to mahr, “Muslim” women having a legal right to orgasm, “Muslim” women having access to abortion. Now, I don’t have any problem with any of the sentiments raised. Similarly, I am not rejecting the idea that Muslims can claim a broader Muslim identity, or that such a collective experience can’t be constructed. My main issue here is that a Muslim identity is not the only identity she inhabits and yet, she repeatedly reduces her experiences to those of just being Muslim. The reality is that communities from Islamic cultures, while originating in countries dominated by Islamic laws and religious practices, are extremely varied in their experiences, social relations, values and world views. I find myself at odds with representations of Muslim-majority countries that frequently depict Islam as the sole engine of those countries. Consequently, diasporas and immigrants living in other countries are thus no longer Pakistani or Malay but rather treated as “Muslim”. Women are then reduced to being solely “Muslim” women in search of a “Muslim woman’s identity”. Like I said, I am all for searching for a common Muslim women’s identity. However, such an undertaking must be done by acknowledging our differences as well as our commonalities. Kahf’s failure to highlight the nexus between religion and ethnicity really undermines the sentiment of the article.

The second major issue that I have with her article is that (aside from one or two throw away comments) she does not identify that the rights she describes are far from being enjoyed by Muslim women everywhere. In one paragraph she discusses at length her own marriage and the marriage of her friends. They had to sign their consent; otherwise the contract would be invalid under law. They chose their own husbands. However, the reality is that the large majority of women are powerless to actually claim those rights, especially woman from a lower socio-economic background. Indeed, the freedom she enjoyed could probably be attributed to the fact that she came from a middle-class background and enjoyed a certain level of social mobility which meant that she could claim those rights. Nevertheless, she does at one point state that “if patriarchal customs have overridden Islam and whittled away this blessing in many Muslim locales, it’s still there, available, in the law.” The way she’s phrased the sentence suggests that the laws are still there, it’s just that women don’t claim them. To a certain extent she is correct; those laws are in Islam. However it becomes less about what is available at law and more about that the laws should be available to women in all in countries who have sharia legal systems; systems that have been erroneously interpreted by political and religious elites. Similar criticisms can be levelled at her discussion about Islam’s position on openness towards sexuality and the relationship between husband and wife. Interpretations of sexuality are necessarily bound up within dominate sexual discourses in specific countries. Without any discussion of such discourses and interpretations, any mention in her article to sexuality is ineffective to really explore and discuss at length the role of sexuality within Islam.

In her final paragraph Kahf mentions a number of Muslim-majority countries who have elected women leaders, citing it as a triumph over Western countries. While the election of female leaders is indeed praise worthy, the reality is much more complicated. I don’t know the internal politics of Bangladesh, Turkey or Pakistan. She does mention Indonesia though as a country where a female leader (Megawati Sukarnoputri) was elected “democratically”. At this point her lack of research is glaringly obvious to anyone with even a basic knowledge of politics in Indonesia. Presidents in Indonesia are voted into office by the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR), the legislative branch of the Indonesian government not the general population (unlike the USA). Now, being democratically elected by proxy doesn’t diminish the fact that a woman in a Muslim majority country was able to gain majority support within the MPR to successfully become President. However, it must be highlight that it was only after Megawati’s second bid at the Presidential position that she succeeded in gaining office. Her first bid was defeated largely by Islamic political parties in the MPR who supported Abdurrahman Wahid. They maintained that the rejection of Megawati was based on Islamic teachings that a woman should not lead men. For months there was controversy, and Wahid was defeated because of the wide spread inefficacies of his term. Unfortunately, therefore, her examples do not give her argument the “final punch” that Sobia claims that it does.

Such examples, and actually, the whole article, shows that Kahf provides what can only be described as a superficial discussion on the wonders of being a Muslim woman. Above all that however, what really doesn’t make any sense at all, is that in the introduction to her book “Western Representations of the Muslim Women” (Introduction available here via Google scholar); she mentions both of my criticism above, namely, the problems with reducing Muslim to just being “Muslim” (page 3), and acknowledging that the study of the social condition of Muslim women is a “serious and complex topic” (page 2). What I find even more irritating than the unnecessary use of an informal writing style in a formal context, are people who change their minds and write something that, given their earlier statements, they would obviously criticise as being too narrow.

Wonder Woman, Suicide Bombers & Gliberal Feminists

Second World War is generally understood as the most liberating and empowering period for western women. While men were away war fighting, women were fighting a different kind of war at home. Rosie the Riveter, Wendy the Welder and Josephine the Plumber became the new faces of a working class previously dominated by men. It was here, amidst women who were popping rivets on the West Coast, making bombers and fighters for aeronautical companies like Boeing, that Wonder Woman was born. Her creator William Moulton Marston, a psychologist by profession and the inventor of the polygraph, designed her to represent a particular form of feminism that believed women had the potential to be superior to men.

“Not even girls want to be girls so long as our feminine archetype lacks force, strength, and power. Not wanting to be girls, they don’t want to be tender, submissive, peace-loving as good women are. Women’s strong qualities have become despised because of their weakness. The obvious remedy is to create a feminine character with all the strength of Superman plus all the allure of a good and beautiful woman.”

Essentially, what he succeeded in creating was exactly the inverse of an empowered woman. The comic’s relentless message was appallingly male-centered: an overtly sensual Amazonian warrior who was as “beautiful as Aphrodite, wise as Athena, swifter than Hermes, and stronger than Hercules” sent as an ambassador to “Man’s World” or “Patriarch’s World” ( i.e. America, described as “the last citadel of democracy” and thus “America, liberty and freedom must be preserved!”). Aphrodite, in Greek history, is the goddess of love, lust, beauty, prostitution and sexual reproduction. Athena is exactly the opposite, her austere observance of sexual modesty gaining her the name “Athena Parthenos” (Virgin Athena). Isn’t this Athenian (her civilian identity as Diana Prince the secretary) yet Amazonian (Wonder Woman) portrayal precisely the stuff of male fantasy, a prelude to sex? Does it not act as a fantasmatic supplement feeding the predominantly male audience’s sexuality- nay, pornosexuality? I say pornosexuality because in reality men would prefer an Athenian woman – in this case a quiet, diligent secretary – for marriage and bearing children. A brazen Amazonian hussy would strictly be confined to fantasies, most of them ending with the man, the true alpha, successfully taming the wild vixen. Testament to this are the numerous scenes where Wonder Woman is tied up and drawn in provocative positions. In one issue when her wrist bracelets (symbol of bondage?) get broken, she loses total control and shatters into absolute madness. “Power without self-control tears a girl to pieces,” she sighs.

So the comic’s supposed ‘feminism’ was of course anything but. Curiously this doesn’t seem to upset western feminists. In fact, they embrace Wonder Woman as a super-hero and are proud of the fact she kicks ass better than a man does. And even more curiously, while heroes like Wonder Woman, Sheena, She-Ra and Elektra are widely praised as strong, beautiful, competent and altruistic, veiled Muslim women with guns blazing, bombs in hands, ready to take on any villain in order to save their families and people are usually described in terms of “economical necessity”, “jilted love”, “failed marriages”, “personal despair” and “moral transgressions needing redemption through a martyr’s death”. It never occurs to the gliberal feminists that these women could actually be politically driven and that politics alone can sufficiently describe their actions. The idea that a Muslim woman would be interested in preserving her country, liberty and freedom is utterly unconceivable. That she doesn’t need to be saved from the libidinal economics of uncivilized, gynophobic Muslim men is met with absolute disbelief.

Perhaps this is because western feminists are increasingly realizing that they are the ones in need of rescuing. “The sexuality that has been freed is male (porno)sexuality,” Germaine Greer bravely acknowledges. Gender revolution and sexual liberation has actually harmed women more than the vast majority of feminists care to acknowledge. The female sexuality has been stringently neutralized- what Irigaray calls “a genocide more radical than any form of destruction there has ever been in History”. She believes men and women cannot be equal and any attempts to do so would be futile. She gives an example from the workplace: “I fail to see how a woman can pass for a man at work. She can, of course, dress like a man, stop making love or doing the housework, no longer have children, change her voice, etc. Something of this sort occurs from time to time as a symptom of the neutralization of the sexes in modern times. What should be asked is whether this is due to the choice of particular women or to the necessities of a world men construct, a world women do not choose but tolerate. They do not become women; they become men. This is what the male world demands of them by failing to recognize female identity.”

And so Wonder Woman is not really a woman. In fact, the veiled suicide bomber is more woman precisely because she denies the hetero-normative gender in its usual construction. This probably scares the hell out of feminists.

-F

The liberating catwalk

Last week was ‘Fashion Week’ here in New Zealand, where both emerging and established designers show off their ‘creation’ on long impressive catwalks; a moment of ego basking in the glory of all of New Zealand’s fashionistas. Not surprisingly, I hadn’t taken much notice of this ridiculous display of unnecessary expenses; shamelessly paraded before its admiring audience, until I was notified to check out an article in our national paper on one designer in particular.  This designer was new to the industry and claimed she was ‘inspired’ by Afghan culture. I groaned upon reading this, knowing what it really meant.  To my utter disgust, the article came with images of models wearing traditional Afghani clothing walking down the catwalk. I was furious. Not because I could not be part of this oh-so momentous and proud moment of Afghan ‘triumph’—which I’m sure many would deem it such. On the contrary, it was yet another horrendous appropriation of a culture for the benefit of the fashion industry. Like the appropriation of the Palestinian symbol of self-determination and cultural identity, the keffiyeh–  worn from Hollywood celebrities to their tragic 14 year old mimics–  this designer has taken upon herself to do the same; to appropriate Afghan culture and make it more ‘fashion friendly’, repackaged, and easily consumable.

It became clear from the images I saw, the exoticisiation of Afghan culture was the dominant image– with models wearing brightly coloured, extravagant clothing, on display like ornaments in a museum. The implication here is, this disconnects Afghans from the broader daily world and marginalizes them as exotic Others wearing ‘costumes’ (as oppose to clothes in the West), existing to quench the insatiable Western desire to look, and ready to ‘inspire’ and serve Western political and artistic needs. Afghan culture, which is in reality, rich and complex, is reduced to orientalist caricatures. Essentially, these ‘exotic’ traditional dresses (as well as the burqa) summarises everything the Westerner needs to know about Afghan culture and its people.

But there’s more. The show itself began with a model removing a burqa before she strutted boldly down the catwalk in her skimpy outfit.  The burqa here is immediately presented in classic orientalist terms: oppressive and inhibiting. Chandra Mohanty observes how the ‘third world woman’ is produced in all of her stereotypical glory often using such orientalist iconography, in order to maintain the discursive contrasting representation of Western women being liberated and advanced. The burqa here is used to produce the Islamic otherness—the silent Afghan woman, who lacks agency and lives a life of subordination. Grotesque media images of women in burqa, stoned or shot to death under the brutal Taliban regime are invoked. As Judith Butler has described, the burqa is seen as not human. By removing the burqa, she is unveiling the Afghan woman to mark her ‘liberation’. This gesture reflects the neo-colonial sentiment to ‘humanise’ (Westernise) the Islamic other, so she becomes like her ‘liberated’ Western sister.

These neo-colonialist frameworks produce what the Western capitalist gaze deems as the ‘norm’ of how a woman should present herself: Like her Western sister, she must paint her face, wear the latest fashion attire– buying into the Western signifiers of what it is to be woman. In other words, to display the female body for all to see, freed for manipulation for the new capitalist economy. The Afghan woman, upon removing the burqa, is then convincing her audience she is participating in the consumer market, just like the rest. To make the female body more accessible to the market, ready to dissect her and repackage her in accordance with the markets. French philosopher and activist Alain Badiou highlights this crushing objectification of Western women, when he states she “must show what she’s got to sell. She’s got to show her goods. She’s got to indicate that, henceforth, the circulation of women abides by the generalized model, and not by restricted exchange”. And continues “Whoever covers up what she puts on the market is not a loyal merchant”.

Through her participation in the consumer market, the Afghan (Muslim) woman is proving she is a ‘loyal merchant’, and is therefore feminised– as opposed to the non-person in the burqa.  Using such reductive imagery, the East is stereotypically produced for Western consumption.  Conveniently, the wars raging in Afghanistan and Iraq are legitimised and rationalised to the Western audience, the only audience.  The atrocities of the coalition and American presence in Iraq become justified, all for a ‘good’ cause. Imbued with these ideas of emancipation through the removal of the burqa on stage, the Western consumer observer is thus persuaded that this fashion production is part of a philanthropic mission. That even the fashion industry is doing their bit!

-Sahar