For the purpose of this piece, and to make things simpler, I will make the assumption that purdah is mandatory for a Muslim woman. Although a hotly debated topic in itself, the intention is not to debate whether or not Holy scripture demands a woman’s ‘modesty’; it is the political implications of that same purdah that must be addressed in a world that is seemingly wrought between tradition and modernity.
Mohanty argues, throughout her piece, that women must not, cannot, be homogenized to ‘make things easier’ to understand. To facilitate a ‘deeper’ understanding of the life of the Third World Woman (without learning of her lived reality). Woman and not woman, because a figure presented as part of a paradigm and a woman as a living, historically situated being, are two very different things.
Mohanty briefly talks about “women and religious ideologies”; her brief albeit very powerful description of infantilization is what this piece will seek to address, through two competing political ideologies: theology and Western feminism.
The debate presides over the question of what is modern and what is tradition and whether the two are compatible in a (supposedly) modern world. This debate, rather this apparent attack on tradition, on culture, manifests itself in and implicates, by extension, the body of a woman. Not a woman as an individual, as a human being, but the bodyof a woman as the ground on which religious fundamentalist Mullahs and left leaning White People compete for intellectual domination, for the right to point fingers and say that they won. The argument itself, as one will realize, has nothing to do with women themselves.
A Muslim women, as a hegemonic entity, is apparently considered the ideal candidate for such politically motivated discourse because, for all intents and purposes, her faith manifests itself (or is supposed to manifest itself) physically. The argument, in other words, revolves around the purdah, or the hijab, or the niqab- or all of those mentioned; the kind of purdah she is in is arbitrary as long as it distinguishes her as a Muslim.
This purdah, in all its varieties, is reduced to a single word, to make things easier, to make the argument accessible without wasting too much time and energy on what are apparently minor details. The kind of purdah a woman dons is of no importance, but the fact that she covers herself is the only objective taken into account. Why are both sides so quick to dismiss exactly what it is she wears? Does that say nothing about her identity? For the sake of the argument, again, we gloss over the details and present a Woman in purdah as the object of discourse.
The argument presented by theologians maintains that purdah is for a woman’s protection, for modesty, for her own good. Did anyone ever bother to ask a woman whether she felt protected in purdah? That question is apparently irrelevant, so long as Men can vouch for Women. Questions of honour, of safety, of modesty are all answered by men. If something is endorsed in the word of God, what does it matter who conveys the message; the information after all, is the same. Or so we are made to assume.
The Western feminist will argue, as per the redundant scheme, that the purdah is an overt expression of patriarchal oppression. It prevents women from navigating the world as ordinary people.To unveil a Muslim woman then becomes a symbol of emancipation; the piece of cloth once removed, allows her to navigate life on her own terms as a free (new) woman. There is no denying the fact that to remove the veil, might indeed be a liberating experience, given that the woman in question chooses to remove the veil herself. What can, instead, be said for the woman who chooses to keep it on?
Herein lies the contention among both sides that claim to have Women’s interests at heart. They neglect, deliberately or perhaps intentionally, the women who are motivated to make educated decisions based on their personal experiences. But when they do not conform to the paradigm that is perpetuated by either side, their narrative is left unaccounted. One might ask: does putting on a veil, after personal deliberation, not qualify as empowerment? Why is this the case, when putting one on or taking one off are essentially equally liberating, given that the woman has chosen it for herself. By eliminating deviations from the equation, both sides try to present a picture that is entirely in the favour of their argument without bringing into consideration the actual women implicated in the process.
Either way, both sides end up reducing a woman’s experience to something they can say either does or does not align with their agenda, undermining and infantilizing women in the process of delivering the truth about Women. Conveniently looking the other way when a brown girl decides to take off what she thought stifled her identity or when a white woman finds comfort in a head scarf. Because at the end of the day, as Mohanty claims, there is no such thing as “apolitical scholarship”. The idea of the Woman is conflated with women whose lived reality is poles apart from the way they are perceived, reduced to one dimensional figures are either “affected or not affected by Islam”.
Decoloniality and Decolonization 