Post on Killian- Alexa Campagna

Prior to reading this article, I never understood the extent to which the headscarf is considered such a controversial article of clothing worn by Muslim women. As soon as I was introduced to the “headscarf affair” and the starkly contrasting opinions as to whether they should or should not be permitted in schools, a distant memory from a family trip to Paris resurfaced. While dining at a stereotypically Parisian restaurant, I witnessed a group of Muslim, headscarf-donning women sitting quietly at a table apart from a table of men, whom I presume to have been their husbands, wearing no such religious or cultural markers that would clearly distinguish them from the French. I recall feeling saddened for these women for having to wear such oppressive garb and for not having the freedom of identity expression that I felt fortunate enough to have been afforded as an American girl born in the United States. This article proved to me that my hasty conclusions about the nature of headscarves were very shortsighted and based on the ignorant assumption that every culture should be similar to my own. I feel that this ethnocentrism is the impetus behind the infamous “headscarf affair” and the primary reason that many French citizens do not approve of this article of clothing in schools.

            Although I immediately determined the headscarf as a means of female oppression in Muslim women, I did not realize that disallowing the wearing of a veil would be a means of cultural oppression. Although some aspects of a foreign culture may seem unjust, archaic, or unsettling to members of a host society, it would be even more disturbing to pretend as though we do not live in a culturally diverse world. By banning the headscarf in schools, which many people claim to be a way to “integrate” Muslim women into the French culture, the schools are not exposing the students to the realistic diversity that each student will undoubtedly experience as a member of any society. I was especially disheartened by the argument that Muslim girls, especially those who are second- or third- generation North African immigrants, face an “identity crisis” when they are not allowed to wear the headscarf, one of the most important aesthetics that help to preserve their sense of self in a foreign culture. What I found most fascinating was the fact that those who supported headscarf banning in schools were older immigrants who did not “…understand the identity struggles of the generation born in France” (584).

In my abnormal psychology class we were learning about the multicultural factors that may contribute to depression, one of which was one’s status as an immigrant or as a child of an immigrant born within the host country. Those who were born within the host country were more susceptible to developing depression because they had to deal with reconciling their cultural beliefs and values with those of the host country. I can imagine that this could be an issue that contributes to the banning of headscarves in schools as “doing more harm than good” in the long run.

            I definitely found myself most vigorously nodding my head in agreement to the opinion of some of the interviewees who expressed the sentiment that the banning of headscarves promotes “racism and hypocrisy.” If schools respect the Jewish Sabbath and the Catholic tradition of Lent Friday, then why wouldn’t they try to incorporate Islamic traditions into the school curriculum? I agree that expression of religious traditions in schools should be all-or-nothing and that one religion should not be privileged (or underprivileged) over others.