Fashion, performance and the politics of belonging among Muslim women in Cape Town

• Main Author: Hendricks, Hibah
• Other Authors: Becker, Heike
• Language: en
• Published: University of the Western Cape 2015
• Subjects: Muslim women; Cape Malay; Islamic wear; Hijab fashion; Self stylisation; Performance; Belonging; International Umma; Cape Town; South Africa
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11394/3968

Magister Artium - MA === This thesis explores how the hijab fashion market has emerged in Cape Town and how Capetonian Muslim women are appropriating hijab fashion as a means of redefining themselves as Muslim South Africans instead of ‘Cape Malays’, the ethnic label given to Muslims in the Western Cape during the apartheid era. I argue that through self stylisation Cape Malay women are performatively rejecting the ethnicisation of Islam during apartheid. I show that ‘Cape Malay’ women are using hijab fashion to perform their ‘Muslimness’ in order to claim a positive and legitimate spot in the ‘rainbow nation’ as Muslims as a religious-cultural category, and not as ‘Malays’, an ethnic category, while simultaneously claiming their belonging to the global umma (Muslim community)