A friend of mine recently posted this article on her blog. I thought it would be perfect to share with the class given the recent readings we did about Arab women. Though the circumstances are unfortunate, it made me really happy to see that there are still people out there who try to understand.
My questions from the article is, do you think these girls would have gotten a different reaction had they been Nuns with covered hair? Had they been Jewish with scarves/ wigs?
The girl in the photo is very American looking compared to other Arabs, so do you think the woman even noticed her face or just the scarf? Do you think she got that reaction because of the scarf or because of what it implies?
http://shahira-k.tumblr.com/post/34894688142/168cm-farahhhh-imperfectwriting-i-went-to
Alya Fetyani
That blog post is shocking. It is unbelievable that just because she wore a scarf on her head she was looked at differently. I honestly believe that is the only reason the little girl asked her mother if the girls were terrorists. Nuns, in my opinion, are looked at differently because they have a certain attire that people are already used to seeing, just like people are used to seeing Muslims with hijabs and automatically thing that because someone is wearing a scarf they are Muslim.
ReplyDeleteThis media moment was really great since it connects to what we will be discussing in class. I don’t think that nuns would have gotten the same reaction as these two girls did. I think like discussed in the articles on Middle Eastern women and their representation in the media, that Western societies have a distinct view on the Muslim culture and Middle Eastern people in general, we tend to stereotype this group of people in a negative way. I think in this situation the scarf was what was noticed before anything else. Like mentioned in the article we read The Veil in Their Minds and On our Heads Hoodfar writes, “…part of the problem was that the veil has become such an important symbol of women’s oppression that most people have difficulty reducing it simply to an article of clothing.”(14) This quote is relevant to the situation of this girl. Today I believe that most people automatically make assumptions of what the representation of the scarf is instead of the person wearing it. This can also be connected to men who wear turbans, and how often they get stereotyped as “terrorists” as well. So to answer your question, I believe that she got the reaction because of what the scarf “implies”.
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