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Enright on Ireland and the Hijab

Máiréad Enright (University of Kent, Canterbury) has posted Girl Interrupted: Citizenship and the Irish Hijab Debate. The abstract follows.

This article discusses the case of Shekinah Egan, an Irish Muslim girl who asked to be allowed to wear the hijab to school. It traces the media and government response to her demand, and frames that demand as a citizenship claim. It focuses in particular on a peculiarity of the Irish response; that the government was disinclined to legislate for the headscarf in the classroom. It argues that – perhaps counter-intuitively – the refusal to make law around the hijab operated to silence the citizenship claims at the heart of the Egan case. To this extent, it was a very particular instance of a broader and ongoing pattern of exclusion of the children of migrants from the Irish public sphere.

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Aziz on Terror(izing) the Muslim Veil

Sahar F. Aziz (Texas Wesleyan University School of Law) has posted Terror(izing) the Muslim Veil. The abstract follows.

The September 11th terrorist attacks transformed the meaning of the Muslim headscarf. No longer is the crux of the debate whether the “veil” is used to oppress women by controlling their sexuality, and by extension, their personal freedoms and life choices. Rather, a Muslim headscarf “marks” her as a representative of the suspicious, inherently violent, and forever foreign “Terrorist other” in our midst.

In the post-9/11 era, Muslim women donning a headscarf find themselves trapped at the intersection of bias against Islam, the racialized Muslim, and women. In contrast to their male counterparts, Muslim women face unique forms of discrimination not adequately addressed by Muslim civil rights advocacy organizations, women’s rights organizations, or civil liberties Read more

Posted on by Marc O. DeGirolami

Swiss Strife

This is a fascinating story detailing the recent history of conflict in Switzerland between various Muslim and state/non-Muslim interests.  The newest controversy is the result of Muslim agitation to remove the white cross from the Swiss flag, ostensibly in order both to reflect the “separation of church and state” and Switzerland’s increasing “cultural diversity.”  The group prefers a flag with colors and patterns resembling the flags of Bolivia and Ghana.

Switzerland has been the site of increasing strife stimulated by the dramatic increase in its Muslim immigrant population, which the story reports has quintupled since 1980.  Among the many interesting conflicts reported in the story (including the minaret controversy) is the successful lawsuit by Muslim parents demanding the right to dress their children in full-body bathing suits (“burkinis”) during co-ed swimming lessons.  — MOD

Posted on by Mark Movsesian

Laborde on Religious Dress

More on banning religious attire: Cecile Laborde (University College London) has posted State Paternalism and Religious Dress. The abstract follows. — MLM

This paper criticises the paternalist argument for bans on gender-specific restrictive religious dress. This posits that the prohibition on the wearing of hijab in schools assists the emancipation and autonomy of young girls. In the first section, I briefly summarize the republican paternalist position against the hijab, and explain why it is flawed, in light of a critical republican ideal of non-domination. In the second section of the paper, I expand the argument, and apply it to recent controversies about the wearing of the niqab (full face covering). I argue that the so-called ‘burqa ban’ in France (13 July 2010) suffers from even graver flaws than the 2004 hijab ban, to the extent that it extends paternalistic coercion from children to adults. More generally I explore the question as to whether, if there are relevant differences between hijab and niqab, they have a bearing on the normative case against legal regulation.

 

Posted on by Marc O. DeGirolami

French Veil Ban Provokes Resistance

Here is an interesting story about resistance to the ban on veils instituted in France.  The story reminds me of the line in the novel, Snow, by Orhan Pamuk, where one of the female characters says, “To play the rebel heroine in Turkey, you don’t pull off your scarf, you put it on.”

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Calo on Headscarves, Pluralism, and Human Rights

Zachary Calo (Valparaiso) has posted a new piece, Islamic Headscarves, Religious Pluralism, and Secular Human Rights.  The  abstract follows. — MLM

This paper considers the Article 9 religious freedom jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights. It opens by looking at recent decisions involving Islam that stand in tension with the Court’s endorsement of normative religious pluralism. It is argued that the inability of the Court to construct a satisfying account of the place of public Islam within a religiously pluralistic order reflects inherent limitations of the liberal tradition of religious freedom. In particular, the Court’s approach to these cases reveals ways in which the category of human rights has become tethered to a normative secularity that cannot ultimately support a vigorous promotion of religious pluralism. This being the case, the challenge confronting the European Court of Human Rights in its treatment of religious pluralism might be understood as not merely jurisprudential but moral, ontological, and finally, theological. That is, the problematic that must be identified and critiqued concerns the deep ways in which law has been formulated in relation to religion within the modern order. With this in mind, the paper turns in its final section to discussing conceptual jurisprudential alternatives. It is revealing that some of the most creative alternatives, particularly addressing the status of Islam, are being advanced by theologians positioned to think about certain elemental matters outside the sphere of normal jurisprudential considerations. As a point of entry into these conversations, the concluding section considers two of the most important recent reflections on this topic by Rowan Williams and John Milbank.

Posted on by Marc O. DeGirolami

Of Amusement Parks and Head Scarves

This controversy hit extremely close to my home.  A fight broke out yesterday at Rye Playland Park when a number of Muslim women were told by park staff members that they would not be permitted to wear their head scarves on certain rides.  The park had received a number of Muslim visitors who were celebrating the end of Ramadan.  A scuffle broke out after the refusal to allow some of the women to ride without removing their hijabs, and there was also some kind of report that a park employee touched one of the women.

The park has a safety policy against the wearing of any “headgear.”  I’ve been to Playland a number of times with my own family, and I’ve been required to take off my hat when I went on some of the faster rides. 

What makes this a possible constitutional question is that Playland Park is government owned and operated.  It is, in fact, the only such amusement park in the United States.  But I cannot see any way in which, should a law suit be brought against Westchester County, the plaintiffs would win.  This policy is clearly a law of general application, it is not targeted at any group, and it is overwhelmingly justified by serious safety concerns.  The rides to which the policy applies (and those that the Muslim customers report being barred from  riding) are extremely fast moving and jerky (I hate “Crazy Mouse” for this reason).  Any First Amendment claim would almost surely fail.  A sad episode nonetheless.  — MOD (picture of the excellent 1929 “Dragon Coaster” at Rye Playland Park) (x-posted MOJ).