Images of the uprising following the death of 22-year-old Martha Amini on September 16, 2022, perhaps the most iconic, aside from images of Amini herself, were taken from behind facing police barricades. It is an image of an Iranian woman who has taken off the veil. Or raise her fist at the scene of a mass protest.
The widespread use of images of Iranian women protesters without headscarves in the Western media highlights that the veil is often seen as the single most important measure of women’s rights and well-being. increase.
In fact, outside Iran, wearing the veil is often seen as oppression, and removing the veil is seen as liberation and freedom. It ignores the complex history of mandatory veils and unveilings in Iran in the 20th and 21st centuries.
Islamic Republic and the Bale
During the 1979 revolution, the veil became a symbol of resistance to the Pahlavi monarchy, which ruled from 1925 to 1979. During the Revolution, for many the veil was a symbol of authentic national identity. It was used to oppose the westernization and erosion of Iranian values that ignited the revolution.
The veil became mandatory after the Islamic Republic, led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, came to power. , certain veil forms have come to be seen as denoting membership in or support for the Islamic Republic.
Less inclusive forms of veils, such as rusaris and headscarves, and knee-length tunics and coats known as lupushes, are understood to be signs of minimal cooperation and likely to reject Islamic Republic norms. increase. These types of veils allow the wearer to adjust the amount of hair displayed, the fit and length of the tunic. This type of veil is usually used.
However, in Iran before 1979, wearing a veil did not necessarily mean that a woman was “religious.” Instead, it may indicate a variety of other social meanings, such as being conservative, upholding traditional values, or showing personal humility.
Paflavis and the Age of Modernization
In fact, 40 years before the establishment of the Islamic Republic, Iran’s Shah Reza Pahlavi forced women to remove their veils through the 1936 Compulsory Veil Removal Act.
Pahlavi, who ascended to the throne in 1925 after overthrowing the Qajar monarchy, saw the admission of unveiled women into public life as an integral part of a modernization modeled on Western norms.
A 1936 law prohibited women from wearing a veil in public. Refusal to comply resulted in sometimes violent coercion and removal of offending clothing. It was a woman’s body that was inside.
Pahlavi’s complex modernization project included legal and educational reforms, and the abolition of gender segregation in many public spaces. This reform gave women greater rights and protections if their husbands chose to divorce, and opened up new educational opportunities. However, Pahlavi believed that the presence of unveiled women in public was essential to inform these changes.
In my book Burying the Beloved, I examine how ideas about women’s personalities and rights were explored during this period by Iranian novelists, especially through stories about marriage. This era saw the publication of both the first novels by women and the first female protagonists in Persian fiction. Novels from this period revealed social unrest over legislative changes that gave women a greater role in society and more rights in marriage.
Pahlavi abdicated in 1941 during World War II, and his son, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who took the throne, took a more lenient stance on the law. He didn’t withdraw it, but he didn’t force it violently either. At the same time, the modernity his regime promoted was marked by a cosmopolitan secularism: the diverse social, political and economic sectors sponsored and governed by the monarchy during his rule that lasted until 1979. And the veiled woman could not hope to progress.
Social and familial pressures dominated women’s veils, accompanied by changes in cultural practices facilitated by the virtually massive adoption of Western tailoring styles, films and other media.
Don’t want to show your hair?
Over the past few weeks, I have repeatedly seen comments on news articles claiming that “Iranian women are literally dying to show off their hair!” But refusing to head her scarf in the context of these protests is not a simple request for individual liberty.
Instead, it should be understood as a rejection of many. Iranian protesters have refused to accept dissent and oppose an oppressive regime that has destroyed the voice of reform through imprisonment, exile, or death. doing. They also oppose the law’s long history of using the female body as a symbol of political ideology, beginning before her 1979 revolution.
The veil being removed, therefore, asserts not only the right to individual liberty and expression (although it may be to those seeking to remove it), but both the pre-revolutionary regime and society. It is also a rejection of the patriarchal norms that have activated the Islamic Republic.
