Foreign natives: on practices of wearing of a Muslim headscarf in a non-Muslim region of Russia

Abstract

Using gender approach, the article describes mutually excluding standards for Muslim women who wear hijab in everyday life in one of the non-Muslim regions of Russia — Tyumen region. On the one hand, secular society imposes restrictions on wearing hijabs. On the other hand, Muslim women and Muslim community basing on religious norms insist that a woman must be «covered» when being in public. Besides, within the Muslim community it is discussed how a hijab should look, and the parties involved in this discussion stigmatize each other. In this regard, the issue of interest is to clarify what wearing a religious headscarf means for young Muslim women. What impact do hijab restrictions have on their daily lives?

Keywords

• Islam
• a Muslim headscarf
• hijab
• woman
• Muslim
• gender
• everyday practices
• Tyumen region