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Jacopo Cimmino
Italy
The first time I came here in Turkey was in 2013, and since the very beginning my attention has been captured by so many women wearing the hijab.The first time I came here in Turkey was in 2013, and since the very beginning my attention has been captured by so many women wearing the hijab. I was not used at all as I come from Italy, historically a Christian country. I always wanted to understand more about it, what is beyond it. Many questions came to my mind that day, the first one in Turkey of course. I was asking myself: “Is it a choice to wear it? Or does it come from any kind of family’s or community’s recommendation? Why do some women wear it and some others not?”. Five years and a half later I am here in System and Generation office writing about it, and I would say that now I know and I understand a bit more about it, but recently those kind of questions came back to my mind. Two weeks ago I’ve been invited by a Turkish friend of mine to watch an Italian movie with Turkish subtitles, “L’Oriana” (2015).The movie is about the life of Oriana Fallaci. She was an Italian journalist and she had always defined herself as a feminist who fought for women’s rights. In the middle of the movie it is showed when in 1979 Oriana has been received in Iran to interview Sir Ruhullah Humeyni, Iranian imam, great ayatollah, spiritual and political leader of his country from 1979 to 1989. In order to be received by him, Oriana Fallaci has been requested to wear a hijab. She accepts at first, but then, in the middle of the interview she gets nervous and changes her mind, she starts to scream in the face of the imam that she refuses to wear it as the hijab represents a symbol of women’s oppression, a patriarchal tool that denies Muslim’s women the basic rights to control their own bodies and their own way to dress. The imam replies to this polemic statement saying that she is totally free not to wear it, but she misunderstood the real meaning of the hijab and that it’s not up to Europeans and Westerns people to judge Muslim habits that they don’t even understand. Three weeks ago I was in Istanbul to attend the on-arrival training for the EVS. I met many colleagues, young people coming from all over Europe to be EVS volunteers in Turkey. From them I have heard exactly the same kind of comments on hijab as the ones that Oriana Fallaci made to the imam (at least in the movie). But are we sure that is it exactly like that? Is the hijab a patriarchal imposition? What if is it felt instead as a form of protection and to be emancipate in a male-dominated society? What if eventually is it a free conscious choice whether to wear it or not? Otherwise how could we explain the fact that, even within the same family, it happens that some women wear it and some others not?
Merhaba, my name is Jacopo. I come from Italy, I am 29 years old, and I am currently an EVS volunteer in Ankara for “System and Generation Association”.Actually it’s not my first time in Turkey, I have come several times before as I have always felt very good vibes in this country.
Imposition or source of identity? My interpretations on the choice of wearing the hijab