C I S C I S uLturaL dentIty tudIeS To Veil or not to Veil Europe’s Shape-Shifting ‘Other’ K a m Kamakshi P. Murti Immigration has become a contentious issue in Europe in recent decades, a with immigrants being accused of resisting integration and threatening the k s h secular fabric of nationhood. The most extreme form of this unease has i invented and demonized an Islamic ‘other’ within Europe. This book poses P . central questions about this global staging of difference. How has such anxiety M u increased exponentially since 9/11? Why has the Muslim veil been singled out r t as a metaphor in debates about citizenship? Lastly, and most fundamentally, i who sets the criteria for constructing the ideal citizen? T o This study explores the issue of gender and immigration in the national V e contexts of Germany and France, where the largest minority populations i l are from Turkey and North Africa, respectively. The author analyzes fictional o r works by the Turkish-German writers Emine Sevgi Özdamar and Zafer S¸enocak n o and by Francophone writer Malika Mokeddem. All three deconstruct binary t t oppositions and envision an alternate third space that allows them to break o out of the confines of organized religion. In the latter part of the book, the V e voices of young Muslim women are foregrounded through interviews. The il concluding chapter on the pedagogical tool Deliberative Dialogue suggests ways to navigate such contentious issues in the Humanities classroom. Kamakshi P. Murti is Professor Emerita of German at Middlebury College. She has published extensively on German colonialism and imperialism, CIS minorities discourse, and second- and foreign-language education. She is the author of India: The Seductive and Seduced ‘Other’ of German Orientalism (2001). P e te r L a n g ISBN 978-3-0343-0859-5 P L www.peterlang.com eter ang C I S C I S uLturaL dentIty tudIeS To Veil or not to Veil Europe’s Shape-Shifting ‘Other’ K a m Kamakshi P. Murti Immigration has become a contentious issue in Europe in recent decades, a with immigrants being accused of resisting integration and threatening the k s h secular fabric of nationhood. The most extreme form of this unease has i invented and demonized an Islamic ‘other’ within Europe. This book poses P . central questions about this global staging of difference. How has such anxiety M u increased exponentially since 9/11? Why has the Muslim veil been singled out r t as a metaphor in debates about citizenship? Lastly, and most fundamentally, i who sets the criteria for constructing the ideal citizen? T o This study explores the issue of gender and immigration in the national V e contexts of Germany and France, where the largest minority populations i l are from Turkey and North Africa, respectively. The author analyzes fictional o r works by the Turkish-German writers Emine Sevgi Özdamar and Zafer S¸enocak n o and by Francophone writer Malika Mokeddem. All three deconstruct binary t t oppositions and envision an alternate third space that allows them to break o out of the confines of organized religion. In the latter part of the book, the V e voices of young Muslim women are foregrounded through interviews. The il concluding chapter on the pedagogical tool Deliberative Dialogue suggests ways to navigate such contentious issues in the Humanities classroom. Kamakshi P. Murti is Professor Emerita of German at Middlebury College. She has published extensively on German colonialism and imperialism, CIS minorities discourse, and second- and foreign-language education. She is the author of India: The Seductive and Seduced ‘Other’ of German Orientalism (2001). P e te r L a n g ISBN 978-3-0343-0859-5 P L www.peterlang.com eter ang To Veil or not to Veil Cultural Identity Studies Volume 26 Edited by Helen Chambers PETER LANG Oxford • Bern • Berlin • Bruxelles • Frankfurt am Main • New York • Wien Kamakshi P. Murti To Veil or not to Veil Europe’s Shape-Shifting ‘Other’ PETER LANG Oxford • Bern • Berlin • Bruxelles • Frankfurt am Main • New York • Wien Bibliographic information published by Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek. Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche National- bibliografie; detailed bibliographic data is available on the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data: Murti, Kamakshi P. To veil or not to veil : Europe’s shape-shifting “other” / Murti, Kamakshi P. p. cm. -- (Cultural identity studies ; v. 26) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-3-0343-0859-5 (alk. paper) 1. European literature--21st century--History and criticism. 2. Emigration and immigration in literature. 3. Other (Philosophy) in literature. 4. Identity (Psychology)--Cross-cultural studies. I. Title. PN780.5.M87 2012 809’.933552--dc23 2012039219 Cover image: Adriana Czernin, Untitled, 2006. Coloured pencil, pencil on paper. 73 × 51 cm. Courtesy of Galerie Martin Janda, Vienna. ISSN 1661-3252 ISBN 978-3-0343-0859-5 (print) ISBN 978-3-0353-0405-3 (eBook) © Peter Lang AG, International Academic Publishers, Bern 2013 Hochfeldstrasse 32, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland [email protected], www.peterlang.com, www.peterlang.net All rights reserved. All parts of this publication are protected by copyright. Any utilisation outside the strict limits of the copyright law, without the permission of the publisher, is forbidden and liable to prosecution. This applies in particular to reproductions, translations, microfilming, and storage and processing in electronic retrieval systems. Printed in Germany for my three parents lallu (1919–1979) daddy (1910–1982) amma (1917–1994) Contents Acknowledgements ix Introduction Borderlands and Identities 1 CHAPTER I France, Germany, and Islamophobia 17 CHAPTER II “Tolerance” and Germany’s Ignoble Minorities? 29 CHAPTER III The Ungrievable Writings of Özdamar and Şenocak 41 CHAPTER IV France and its banlieues défavorisées 101 CHAPTER V The Hijab as Metaphor for Linguistic Terrorism 125 A Pedagogical Afterword Deliberative Dialogue and Social Justice 181 Appendix I Deliberative Dialogue and Excerpts from Student Papers 193 viii Appendix II Syllabus “To Veil or not to Veil: Germany and Islam” 211 Bibliography 219 Index 231