Women and Veiling

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CRITICAL REVIEW ESSAY – MUSLIM WOMEN AND VEILING Veiling of Muslim women is one of the most controversial topics that have been debated for over decades. However, for several reasons, many non-Muslims and feminists activists such as liberal feminists, radical feminists, and Muslim feminists hold different views on the symbolization of the veiling towards the Muslim women. Even though their opinions are multi-dimensional, it all concludes that Islam oppresses women and veiled women represent the women who have no rights. Veiling for Muslim women is mandatory because it protects them from non-Muslim men and it is an important factor for a female believer. This critical review will examine two different articles and evaluate it based on a set of a certain criteria. The first one is “Islam and Body politics: Inscribing (Im) morality”, this is an article from of a conference by Asma Barlas held in University of Iceland. The second article is “Rethinking Muslim women and the veil: challenging historical & modern stereotypes”, this is an introduction piece of a book published by Katherine Bullock. Both these articles has been written in a Muslim women’s point of view and discusses the controversial issue of women and veiling, the importance of covering and addresses westerner’s wrongful perception of the oppressed community. Their main argument is that the non-Muslim world doesn’t seem to properly under actual reasoning behind veiling and that they jump to conclusion based on stereotyping. Veiling in English language known the act of concealing the face or protecting against the sun with a less or more transparent fabric. The veil is usually attached to a women’s hat or etc. (Bullock, 2002). Veiling is Muslim context refers to phenomenon of women covering their face; this piece of garment is referred to as niqab in the Arabic community. Hijab is another piece of

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