The Hij?b at Cross-Purposes: Conflicting Models of the Erotic in Popular Islamic Advice Literature

Abstract

An examination of popular advice literature geared toward Muslims living in the West, such as the type commonly available in U.S. mosques and at online Islamic bookstores, indicates that there exist at least two potentially conflicting narratives regarding the ḥijāb (the veil or headcovering) as a pious practice. The first narrative presents female sexuality as a natural and positive force, as long as it is properly channeled. The ḥijāb, in this narrative, is not meant to categorically repress women's erotic nature, but is a pragmatic social practice meant to avoid eroticism in the public sphere, where it would be a source of temptation and disorder. Often corresponding to this narrative is a notion of (female) sexuality as static, and a gender ideology that deemphasizes difference. A second narrative presents erotic desire and fulfillment as a marker of attachment to the world and an assertion of the ego (nafs), and therefore negative. In this view, the ḥijāb is an ascetic practice, a means by which a woman may discipline her self and develop a greater spiritual-moral faculty. This narrative frames sexuality as malleable, and also tends to emphasize gender difference. This paper seeks to tease out the conflicting models of the erotic that emerge in this genre of writing. It further demonstrates how authorial deviations from a text's core argument regarding veiling and eroticism can reflect an instrumental use of these narratives and models in favor of the predetermined conclusion, which is the obligation to veil, and to which end both models of eroticism and both narratives of veiling are bent.

Decolonizing the hijab: An interpretive exploration by two Muslim psychotherapists

“…Being covered allows a woman to interact in public without tempting men with her sexual potential. On a personal or subjective level, the hijab is also discursively constructed as a personal jihad (struggle) that a woman endures as she tries to contain the desires of the nafs (self/ego) (Azam, 2009), for example sacrificing vanity over modesty or obedience to God. Much work has also been done on the hijab as an indicator of piety, faith and/or identity (Topal, 2017).…”