Becoming The “Other” as a Muslim in Turkey: Turkish Women vs. Islamist Women

Abstract

The covering of women has become the mark of Islam's new visibility in urban Turkey since the 1980s. Women wearing long, loose overcoats and headscarves tightly framing their faces and covering their necks and bosoms are now a familiar part of the urban scene, as well as of university campuses. They are usually referred to asİslamci(Islamist) women, sometimes also asdinci(religionist),gerici(regressive),irticacı(reactionary),kara peçeli(black veiled)or türbanlı(turbaned). Thus in the lexicon of Turkish identity, these women constitute a group defined through oppositional terms, similar to such ephitets as “leftist” women and “femininist” women. The words “Kemalist” and/or “Atatürkist” women have concurrently gained new political significance in denoting women (often professional elites) who, as against the so-called Islamist women, proclaim their allegience to Atatürk andhisprinciples, i.e. speak from a pro-western, pro-state, secular-nationalistic and gender egalitarian position.