Azizah

This week in my Global Cultures class we read two articles related to Islam in the media and constructing Islamic identities. The first article dealt with a women’s magazine titled, Azizah. Azizah was funded in order to represent Muslim women who may be seen as “uniformly veiled, subordinate, uneducated, and passive” (170). Each cover of the magazine features a beautiful veiled woman, while inside the magazine the editors include women of multiple ethnicities and also display Muslim women without the veil.

One of the questions brought up in class was whether or not Azizah ostracizes other Muslim women who choose not to wear the veil. In a majority of the Muslim world, except Saudi Arabia, women actually have a choice to the wear the veil. Thus, by featuring a veiled Muslim woman on every cover is the magazine solely targeting a specific audience and ostracizing the rest of women who choose not to wear the veil? One could argue that inside the magazine there features of women who are unveiled and who could speak to the population of Muslim women who do not wear the veil.

However, the question is not fully answered by simply talking about the audience of the magazine, but also of the male dominated media who quasi-control the content of Azizah magazine. I would argue that cover of the magazine is “public space”, while the content of the magazine is “private space” for the viewers. The distinction of public/private space follows a larger social ideology of the veil being worn in public and not in private. Thus, the magazine, while it may be for the purpose giving voice to underrepresented women, it’s content still cannot fully reject the collective interests of society.