by photographer Diana Matar
2003 FiftyCrows PhotoFund Winner - North America Region

The Veil as Resistance documents a new generation of Egyptian women who are reclaiming the veil as a symbol of political dissent and resistance. Matar, in her essay, seeks to revise common Western conceptions of veiled women by presenting evolving social and political practices, and the tensions surrounding them.

To the Western imagination, the veil has always signified oppression, sexism, and victimization. In present-day Egypt, however, young middle and upper-middle class women are donning the veil as a gesture of solidarity, social justice, and independence. This recent phenomenon has hatched anxieties within the Egyptian government and sparked class and generational frictions. Matar's essay is an important meditation on gender and Islam in modern Egypt. It is also an effort to redefine how Muslim cultures are perceived in post-September 11 America.