Seite - 91 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Band 02/01

Images of the Muslim Woman | 91www.jrfm.eu 2016, 2/1, 91–110 Elham Manea Images of the Muslim Woman and the Construction of Muslim Identity The Essentialist Paradigm ABSTRACT This article argues that much of the postmodern discourse on the Muslim woman and her veil is symptomatic of what I call the “essentialist paradigm”. The world is seen through the prism of a group’s religious/cultural identity and eventually constructs a Muslim identity – and with it an image of the Muslim Woman. The image of the op- pressed veiled Muslim Woman and the treatment of a piece of cloth as synonymous with her whole identity and being are products of this paradigm of thought. Using an interdisciplinary approach that combines discourse analysis and a case study of the construction of the British Muslim community, this article argues that the essentialist paradigm ignores the context of its subject matter with all its accompanying power structures, political and social factors, and the roles played by both the state and fun- damentalist Islam in constructing a Muslim identity and with it the Muslim Woman and her dress code. KEYWORDS veil, Islam, group identity, essentialist paradigm, Muslim Woman, British Muslim community BIOGRAPHY PD Dr. Elham Manea is an Associate Professor of Politics at Zurich University. Her re- search interests include legal pluralism and Islamic Law, Political Islam, politics of the Arabian Peninsula, especially Yemen, and gender and politics in the Arab MENA region. THREE IMAGES First image: A woman in a burqa,1 a convert to Islam; she is the Women’s Representa- tive of the Islamic Central Council of Switzerland. She is participating in a 2013 podium 1 The burqa is a full-body cloak worn by some Muslim women that covers the face as well. Wearing the burqa is a custom imported from Najd, a region in Saudi Arabia and the power base of Salafi Islam.