Underneath The Veil

Underneath the Veil

In the Middle East, a Moslem woman wearing head and body coverings isn't anything out of the ordinary. In fact, it is a way of life for them in many aspects. Just ask the author of the writing, The Afghan Woman's "Chaadaree": An Evocative Religious Expression?, and she'll tell you. Her name is M. Catherine Daly and she is an Afghani herself. She talks about what it's like for women in Afghanistan to wear "veils". The veil is a much more meaningful piece of clothing than a person would think it to be.

In some ways the "veils", or burqas, are known for their cultural divisions. In other ways, they are meant to be worn for religious and social reasons. This is demonstrated during hejab, their head and body covering practices. The hejab shows the religious aspects of clothing, rather than the cultural side. Wearing it shows where they stand with their religion and being Moslem. It is also closely related to purdah, otherwise known as female seclusion.

Along with wearing the burqa comes a misconception. There are several different styles of coverings. Their variations in coverings are similar to the different styles of clothes we wear. If we are going out in public we would dress much nicer than if we were in the comfort of our own home. They wear their full body coverings for a reason similar to ours. The Moslem women prefer to be as private as they are at home,

and for this reason they cover themselves. The most admired covering of theirs is the chaadar, which is worn by the women as their everyday clothing. It is a partial head

covering and they only wear it when they're out in public. They will also wear it after their pilgrimage to Mecca and during their five daily prayers. They wear the chaadaree too, or the full-body covering that is pleated and worn with the chaadar. Its level of admiration is the same as the chaadars. The purpose of it is to cover the entire body from the view of observers, protecting both their personal and family identities.

Since the 1920's, the chaadaree has been more associated with the social, economic, and political aspects of dress. On the more political side of things, the Taliban is in control of the women's clothes. If the Taliban catches women out in public without the proper clothing they will use physical or verbal abuse on them. Then if the woman refuses to follow their orders her husband or male relative(s) have a chance of being punished. The women aren't responsible for the way they appear in public, the male family members are. The Taliban base their decisions on the verses contained in the Qur'an.

The veil reveals a lot about the social side of things too. Afghan women do not like referring to "wearing it". They think that if their husbands didn't give them a chaadaree when married then they weren't appreciated. The veils relieve social pressures and determined social classes. This depends on the quality of the chaadaree and its number of pleats and details on it.

To support her claim Daly uses many logos. She does it when she is emphasizing how many women were refugees in Afghanistan. Doing this, she uses the numbers of how many women there are out of the number of refugees there are total. She even goes on to state the percentile of them and where she received these facts. She compiled this bit of information from the ACBAR (1995). In her writing Catherine also includes input on the topics from other women. One woman describes how unappreciated she would have felt if her husband hadn't bought her a new chaadaree when they got married. Daly also showed a few italicized articles from pieces of several reference books. This was done when she was proving how the veil and outfit explains the gender and regional aspects.

My article is most definitely a combination of logical and ethical support methods. From the ethical side of things Daly explains how much the clothing of Afghan women relates to religion. Supporting this statement she adds how they believe in modesty. Although there is some ethical support, there is much more logical. For every statement she writes she also has information on where it came from. For instance, she gives facts for what the Taliban's reasoning's are when they made the new laws. She