Rethinking Muslim Women and the Veil: Challenging Historical & Modern Stereotypes

Katherine Bullock

Jan. 2007 · IIIT

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Until now the bulk of the literature about the veil has been written by outsiders who do not themselves veil. This literature often assumes a condescending tone about veiled women, assuming that they are making uninformed decisions choices about veiling makes them subservient to a patriarchal culture and religion. “Rethinking Muslim Women and the Veil” offers an alternative viewpoint, based on the thoughts and experiences of Muslim women themselves.

This is the first time a clear and concise book-length argument has been made for the compatibility between veiling and modernity. Katherine Bullock uncovers positive aspects of the veil that are frequently not perceived by outsiders.

“Rethinking Muslim Women and the Veil” looks at the colonial roots of the negative Western stereotype of the veil. It presents interviews with Muslim women to discover their thoughts and experiences with the veil in Canada. The book also offers a positive theory of veiling. The author argues that in consumer capitalist cultures, women can find wearing the veil a liberation from the stifling beauty game that promotes unsafe and unhealthy ideal body images for women. This book also includes an extensive bibliography on topics related to Muslim women and the veil.

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Katherine Bullock is an alumna of the University of Toronto, where she earned her doctorate in Political Science in 1999. It was during her doctoral studies that she embraced Islam. Her Ph.D. dissertation was on “Politics on the Veil” and she has spoken on this, and other topics relevant to Muslim women, to academic and church circles in Canada, the USA and Australia, and now lives in California with her husband and son. (2007).