Veiling in Africa

Three: Intertwined Veiling Histories in Nigeria

tHree intertwined Veiling Histories in nigeria elisHA P. renne “Hijab is my pride” —Packaged hijab, sold at Ojaʼba Market, Ibadan, 31 May 2011 “God instructs us to wear hijab, is it not the Prophet who said we should wear it?” —Woman interviewed in Zaria City, 25 April 2001 Veiling in nigeriA—a practice which consists of wearing a cloth which may cover the head, body, and at times, the face, feet, and hands—reflects a complex set of social relationships that have religious, political, and historical dimensions. In Nigeria, Muslim women with different ethnic backgrounds wear a range of veiling styles. In the southwest, some Yoruba Muslim women wear the all-encompassing black burqa-like garment worn by women known as ẹlẹẹha (Plate 3) while the majority wears the more common stole-like iborun over gele headties. More recently, some have worn different styles of hijab. In the north, Hausa Muslim women are more likely to wear the hijab worn in a range of styles, including the recent “fashion hijab,” although some still prefer the style of headtie and gyale style similar to those worn in the southwest. In both the north and south, women’s thinking about veiling and their decisions about what types of veils they wear reflect the specific histories of Islam and of Islamic organizations in Yorubaland and Hausaland respectively. in this chapter, i consider the social and political contexts of particular types of veils and veiling practices which have historically been associated with two religious reform movements in Nigeria—the Ansar-Ud-deen Society of Nigeria (Jamʻiyyat Ansar ad-din Naijiriya), originating in the INTERTWINEd VEILING HISTORIES IN NIGERIA 59 south, and Jamāʻat Izālat al-Bidʻa wa Iqāmat al-Sunna (the Society for the Removal of Innovation and the Reinstatement of Tradition), colloquially known as Izala, originating in the north. This comparative approach, however fraught, underscores the complex meanings of veiling associated with religious belief, ethnicity, and place in Nigeria as well as the myriad styles of veils worn and the frequent changes in veiling regimes. While these movements emerged at different times in the twentieth century—AnsarUd -deen was founded in Lagos in 1923; Izala was founded in Jos in 1978— and had distinctive but not unrelated emphases, both groups included reforms which focused on the education of married women. The doctrinal importance of women’s education for these movements had differing consequences for the practice of seclusion and veiling for Yoruba and Hausa Muslim women in Nigeria. Yet despite reformist intersections, veiling has also been used to distinguish Muslim women’s ethnic identity. On the one hand, Yoruba Muslims have tended to stress forms of veiling which are compatible with cultural ideals of progress-in-time and social integration in southwestern Nigeria, where there are approximately equal numbers of Yoruba Muslims and Christians. On the other, ideals of Islamic authenticity prevail among Hausa Muslims in northern Nigeria, where the population is largely Muslim and where veiling practices may be used to distinguish wearers’ ideological interpretations in relation to time—e.g., the time of the Prophet. Thus in both northern and southwestern Nigeria, Muslim women may wear various types of veils, which include a headtie (gele, Yoruba) and stole (iborun, Yoruba; gyale, Hausa) combination, or more recently the hijab, although for different reasons. In the north, where seclusion is considered part of the modest behavior prescribed by the Qurʼān, veiling, and more specifically wearing a hijab, enables married Muslim women in Hausa society to extend their mobility by delineating a moral space outside of their homes (Renne, forthcoming). In the southwest, women may veil in order to visually express a pious Islamic identity—as with ẹlẹẹha women—or to maintain their acceptance of aspects of Western modernity while asserting their presence as equal members of multi-religious Yoruba society. These distinctive dynamics, the expression of a proper, Islamic identity in a Christian context, may be seen in the recent demands of young Muslim women—in both Oyo State in southwestern Nigeria and in Kaduna State in the north—to incorporate veils into school uniforms, initially introduced by British colonial officials and missionaries. In this chapter, I consider how veiling in southwestern Nigeria—mainly in Ibadan, in Oyo State—and in northern Nigeria—mainly in Zaria City (the old walled section of the northern Nigerian town of Zaria), in Kaduna State—has had distinct but [18.117.142.128] Project MUSE (2024-04-26 10...