Veiling in Africa

Description

The Islamic practice of veiling on the African continent

The tradition of the veil, which refers to various cloth coverings of the head, face, and body, has been little studied in Africa, where Islam has been present for more than a thousand years. These lively essays raise questions about what is distinctive about veiling in Africa, what religious histories or practices are reflected in particular uses of the veil, and how styles of veils have changed in response to contemporary events. Together, they explore the diversity of meanings and experiences with the veil, revealing it as both an object of Muslim piety and an expression of glamorous fashion.

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Veiling/Counter-Veiling in sub-Saharan Africa Elisha Renne

Part I. Veiling Histories & Modernities
1. Veiling, Fashion and Social Mobility: A Century of Change in Zanzibar Laura Fair
2. Veiling Without Veils: Modesty and Reserve in Tuareg Cultural Encounters Susan Rasmussen
3. Interwined Veiling Histories in Nigeria Elisha Renne

Part II. Veiling & Fashion
4. Religious Modesty, Fashionable Glamour, and Cultural Text: Veiling in Senegal
Leslie Rabine
5. Modest Bodies, Stylish Selves: Fashioning Virtue in Niger Adeline Masquelier
6. "Should a Good Muslim Cover Her Face?" Pilgrimage, Veiling, and Fundamentalisms in Cameroon José C. M. van Santen

Part III. Veiling/Counter-Veiling
7. Invoking Hijab: The Power Politics of Spaces and Employment in Nigeria
Hauwa Mahdi
8. "We Grew Up Free but Here We Have to Cover Our Faces": Veiling among Oromo Refugees in Eastleigh, Kenya Peri M. Klemm
9. Vulnerability Unveiled: Lubna's Pants and Humanitarian Visibility on the Verge of Sudan's Secession Amal Hassan Fadlalla

List of Contributors

Index

Sujets

• African Studies
• African
• History of art
• African people
• Art
• Islam

Informations

• Publié par: Indiana University Press
• Date de parution: 04 juin 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780253008282
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

VEILING IN AFRICA

AFRICAN EXPRESSIVE CULTURES
Patrick McNaughton, editor
Associate editors
Catherine M. Cole
Barbara G. Hoffman
Eileen Julien
Kassim Kon
D. A. Masolo
Elisha Renne
Zo Strother

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Manufactured in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Veiling in Africa / edited by Elisha P. Renne.
p. cm. - (African expressive cultures)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-253-00814-5 (cloth : alk. paper) - ISBN 978-0-253-00820-6 (pbk. : alk. paper) - ISBN 978-0-253-00828-2 (e-book) 1. Hijab (Islamic clothing)-Africa, Sub-Saharan. 2. Veils-Social aspects-Africa, Sub-Saharan. 3. Muslim women-Clothing-Africa, Sub-Saharan. 4. Muslim women-Africa, Sub-Saharan-Social conditions-21st century. I. Renne, Elisha P. II. Series:
African expressive cultures.
BP190.5.H44V45 2013
391.20882970967-dc23
2012049581
1 2 3 4 5 18 17 16 15 14 13
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Veiling/Counter-Veiling in Sub-Saharan Africa ELISHA P. RENNE
PART 1 Veiling Histories and Modernities
ONE Veiling, Fashion, and Social Mobility: A Century of Change in Zanzibar LAURA FAIR
TWO Veiling without Veils: Modesty and Reserve in Tuareg Cultural Encounters SUSAN J. RASMUSSEN
THREE Intertwined Veiling Histories in Nigeria ELISHA P. RENNE
PART 2 Veiling and Fashion
FOUR Religious Modesty, Fashionable Glamour, and Cultural Text: Veiling in Senegal LESLIE W. RABINE
FIVE Modest Bodies, Stylish Selves: Fashioning Virtue in Niger ADELINE MASQUELIER
SIX Should a Good Muslim Cover Her Face? Pilgrimage, Veiling, and Fundamentalisms in Cameroon JOS C. M. VAN SANTEN
PART 3 Veiling/Counter-Veiling
SEVEN Invoking Hijab: The Power Politics of Spaces and Employment in Nigeria HAUWA MAHDI
EIGHT We Grew Up Free but Here We Have to Cover Our Faces : Veiling among Oromo Refugees in Eastleigh, Kenya PERI M. KLEMM
NINE Vulnerability Unveiled: Lubna s Pants and Humanitarian Visibility on the Verge of Sudan s Secession AMAL HASSAN FADLALLA
List of Contributors
Index
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This volume grew out of a panel on veiling in Africa at the African Studies Association annual meeting in San Francisco in November 2010. The enthusiasm of the panelists and the interest of the audience encouraged me to invite others to contribute to an edited volume on this topic-which has been under-examined, at least, in the African context. I would like to thank all the contributors, whose prompt and thoughtful responses to my numerous queries have been much appreciated. Special thanks go to Nene Ly, who granted permission for the use of her image on the volume cover, and to Leslie Rabine for taking this photograph. I am likewise grateful to the editorial staff of Indiana University Press, especially Sarah Jacobi, June Silay, and our copyeditor Carrie Jadud, as well as design staff members-all of whose kind but firm organization facilitated the publication process. Dee Mortensen, Senior Sponsoring Editor at Indiana University Press, continues to provide outstanding support for African studies. Finally, I thank the University of Michigan Office of the Vice President for Research for a publication subvention grant for the color plates, which give readers a more vivid view of veiling in Africa.
VEILING IN AFRICA

INTRODUCTION
Veiling/Counter-Veiling in Sub-Saharan Africa
ELISHA P. RENNE
The little white gauze veil clung to the oval of a face full of contours. Samba Diallo had been fascinated by this countenance the first time he had beheld it: it was like a living page from the history of the Diallob country. All the features were in long lines, on the axis of a slightly aquiline nose. The mouth was large and strong, without exaggeration. An extraordinary luminous gaze bestowed a kind of imperious luster upon this face. All the rest disappeared under the gauze, which, more than a coiffure would have done, took on here a distinct significance. Islam restrained the formidable turbulence of those features, in the same way that the little veil hemmed them in .
- CHEIKH HAMIDOU KANE , Ambiguous Adventure
Much has been made of the practice of veiling in Europe, particularly in France and Great Britain (Asad 2006; Bowen 2007; Dwyer 1999; Scott 2005; Tarlo 2010; Werbner 2007), and to a lesser extent in Canada, Egypt, Turkey, and Indonesia (Atasoy 2006; Brenner 1996; inar 2008; MacLeod 1991; Mahmood 2005). There is also a considerable art historical literature on veiling related to Islamic dress and textiles in the Middle East (Lombard 1978; Stillman 2000; Vogelsang-Eastwood and Vogelsang 2008). Yet as the Senegalese author Cheikh Hamidou Kane s description of the framing of the face of the Most Royal Lady, an older sister of a Diallob chief, by a little white gauze veil suggests, veiling has a long and complex history which, nonetheless, has infrequently been examined in sub-Saharan Africa. This lack of discussion of veiling, an ambiguous term which refers to a range of cloth coverings of the head, face, and body-including the hijab and nikab , but also headscarves and shawls, all of which may be conflated as veiling (Scott 2007), reflects the more general association of Islam with the Middle East as well as Western preoccupation with Muslims residing in former colonial metropoles. Yet many Muslim women in sub-Saharan Africa wear veils of some sort (LeBlanc 2000; Fair 2001; Masquelier 2009; Rasmussen 1991; Schulz 2007), which reflects not only the particular history of Islam in various parts of sub-Saharan Africa but also the relations of African Muslims with Islam globally and with the West. As such, the veil may be referred to as a key symbol (Ortner 1973; see also Delaney 1991:32), in this case a thing whose meanings are associated with particular ideas, events, and actions which link important aspects of social life and which often have a specific moral cast. These meanings may be invoked by different Muslim groups and by state officials and may change over time. These two qualities of symbols-their ability to represent connections between seemingly disparate aspects of social life as well as their polyvalent quality- underscore the importance of examining processes whereby meanings of things are contested and/or revised. As with face veils such as the niq b , and a range of related head and body coverings- hijab , headscarves, abaya , and jilbab or jelabiya -worn by Muslim women around the world, African women who veil may be seen, depending on the viewer s perspective, as devout and modest followers of Islam, as subordinated women forced to hide their bodies and sexuality, or as threatening beings whose presence challenges democratic, secular ideals (Lewis 2003). While covering one s head, body, and sometimes face with cloth may be framed as the antithesis of social action by women, who are viewed as succumbing to social pressures determined by male advocates of veiling (Lazreg 2009:13), veiling in Africa, as elsewhere, reflects a response to a range of complex religious and political situations which have social, gender, and historical dimensions (Mahmood 2005).
Indeed, for some Muslim women in sub-Saharan Africa, veiling may be seen as their choice as proper Muslim women, which furthermore offers them protection and a certain freedom, enabling them to negotiate public space without fear of sexual harassment (Alidou 2005). While dismantling the dichotomy of free unveiled women and suppressed veiled ones was an important analytical advance (El Guindi 1999), an examination of veiling in Africa today reveals the many meanings of veiling there, which have been contested-between Muslims and non-Muslims, as well as within the Muslim community itself, by both men and women-and which have changed over time. Furthermore, historical associations between veiling and independence movements may make it an important aspect of national identity (Akou 2004), unlike in Turkey, where the wearing of headscarves has been viewed as countering secular ideals of the state (Tavernise 2008a,b). Thus veiling (and related types of Muslim-associated dress) may not be the inflammatory issue it is in Turkey (Pamuk 2004) or in Europe (Scott 2007; Shadid and van Koningsveld 2005), but rather may be viewed as beneficial in the context of national concerns about indecency and nudity (Allman 2004).
Veiling may also be seen as a type of fashionable dress (Moors and Tarlo 2007), which suggests the interconnected dynamics of covered modesty and alluring attractiveness associated with new styles of veiling (Meneley 2007). What is particularly interesting about recent writing on veiling and fashion is the way that this work juxtaposes what is ostensibly traditional-veiling and religion-with modernity, secularism, and fashion (Tarlo 2010; Van Santen 2010). This configuration has particular resonance for the study of dress and veiling in Africa, since, as Jean Allman (2004:3) has noted, Africans have, until recently, been represented as the people without fashion, who dress within the constraints of timeless and unchanging religious practice, the a