I must say it. I am not sure about what it is written in the Qur’an about it, and I really would like someone to explain me to better understand it, but as I understood it’s not an obligation but a recommendation to wear it. The purpose of the hijab is not to exclude and isolate women from the society, but on the contrary to promote their inclusion. If the hijab is worn as a result of a free conscious choice, to me it seems be part of the identity of the women who decide to wear it. An American feminist anthropologist, Hanna Papanek, who worked in many Arabic countries, especially in Pakistan, speaking about the hijab noted that "Everywhere such veiling signifies belonging to a particular community and participating in a moral way of life."
And another American anthropologist, Lila Abu-Lughod, in her book titled “Do Muslim Women Need Saving?” states:
“I have done fieldwork in Egypt over more than 20 years and I cannot think of a single woman I know, from the poorest rural to the most educated cosmopolitan, who has ever expressed envy of U.S. women, women they tend to perceive as bereft of community, vulnerable to sexual violence and social anomie, driven by individual success rather than morality, or strangely disrespectful of God.(…) As anthropologists know perfectly well, people wear the appropriate form of dress for their social communities and are guided by socially shared standards, religious beliefs, and moral ideas. If we think that U.S. women live in a world of choice regarding clothing, all we need to is remind ourselves of the expression "the tyranny of fashion".”
So, to wrap up, what if we are just stifled by ethnocentrism?