The contestations of citizenship among women in Turkey through the polarized debate on secularism and Islam have been investigated by various researchers, especially since the 1990’s. However, how the contestations unfold when it comes to the conflicts and contradictions among women with headscarves has not attracted as much attention. This study looks into these conflicts and contradictions through the concept of “intimate citizenship”, which highlights a plurality of attempts to answer questions such as how to live a good life, how to gain recognition to choices relating to the “intimate”, and how to keep the dialogue with those opting for different choices. The study relies on analysis of focus group discussions and in-depth interviews conducted with around one hundred women with headscarves in five cities of Turkey. An analysis of the data sheds light on how the headscarf issue relates to the intimate citizenship debate: Women with headscarves are increasingly formulating their choice of head covering with reference to personal life stories and a contingent search for happiness, rather than with reference to an absolute religious conviction that permeates their life to the full extent. This leads to fragmentations, frictions and conflicts as opposed to a collectivity and anonymity formed around “religious woman” identity. The data yields heated points of discussion among women with headscarves that arises from different personal narratives of head covering. Some of these discussions revolve around questions such as: Does the practice of head covering connote continuity or rupture in the identity of “Turkish woman”? Which kind of head covering connotes the “essence” of a “Turkish woman”, and who bears this essence? A traditionally covered, modest “mother”; a young, educated “consciously covered” daughter; a pious woman who keeps her piety to the private, or a politically engaged woman who puts forth Islamic identity and difference? The contestations among women with headscarves add nuance to the dichotomous portrayal of women in Turkey as “Islamist, hence covered” vs. “secularist, hence uncovered”. Moreover, through an analysis of women’s conflicts on highly diversified and personalized narratives about how to be “the good Muslim woman”, this study aims to bring into discussion how the multiple ways of living religion contributes to dialogue among differences.

The critical dichotomy between public and private has been central to almost all feminist writings and its encounter with citizenship debate is critical. The boundaries for citizenship and its exclusions and/or inclusions determine women’s and men’s positioning in a given society. In Turkey, political, social and historical heritages have determined a virile political culture. Men have traditionally been associated with public political domain and it has been nurtured by implications from private spheres of life. Although the term public is gender neutral, public has been associated with a range of highly emotive moral values that were gendered in the masculine. In addition, practices and discourses of personal lives were transformed into public political domain and equipped with a legitimized power entitled to masculine citizen. Especially, the language has reproduced such domination. The interplay between public and private domains forms a strategic discourse that values manhood. In this perspective, this paper questions the role of language in the reproduction of masculine citizen. Gendered idioms that were used with reference to private spheres of lives is critical to discuss to understand (1) how is it legitimized and (2) how does intimate citizenship draw and/or bargain about the boundaries of inclusion and exclusion in a virile political cultural atmosphere.

Citizens of Parallel Publics: Urban Veiled Women in Turkey This study is based on a research conducted among veiled urban women who are employed as sales representatives in retail sector in five different urban centers in Turkey. The main concern of this study is to demonstrate and discuss how veiled women develop an alternative strategy to cope with the conflicting requirements of secular and Islamic publics. My argument is based on a perception of parallel universes in which different ways of life are conducted so that one either belongs to modern secular universe or the modern Islamic. There is not only a segregation of job markets but also there is segregation in terms of lifestyles, values, public spaces such as beaches, bookstores, coffee houses, shops, neighborhoods that segregate Islamic universe from the secular one. It seems that segregation is taken for granted and even voluntary and self-imposed among young women who work in sales jobs. I define voluntary segregation as post-secular strategy through which veiled women come into terms with both conservative and secular gender politics. I aim to understand how veiled women experience their intimate citizenship in the face of voluntary segregation. What kinds of norms and practices does the strategy of voluntary segregation generate and reinforce? This paper explores the consequences of such a strategy first, as a strategy that reinforces an authoritarian political universe in which there is only one authoritative source of truth. Voluntary segregation prevents the emergence of counter-publics which in the western experience promoted the democratization of the public sphere. Unlike a western public this is not open ended or an infinitely contestable public but one with separate language of politics and distinct regimes of truth. Secondly, as a coping strategy for veiled women, it seems to have rendered some benefits for them. I attempt to demonstrate how veiled women describe these benefits ranging from respect, protection, inclusion, comfort and peace of mind and juxtaposed them against alienation, radical difference as in sticking out, harassment and insecurity, anxiety and fear.

How can we evaluate Islamist governments’ records on women? The existing frameworks either conceptualize Islamism as an inevitable extension of Islam and focus on the lack of equal status of women in Islam or emphasize the possibility of different interpretation of Islamic texts. Despite their disagreements, both approaches focus exclusively on Islam as the primary conceptual framework to understand Islamism and women. This focus on Islam, however, wrongly assumes that Islam is the main determining factor behind gender relations. By taking a political economy perspective, instead, this research starts from the premise that improving women’s economic and social conditions is a prerequisite for improving women’s lives. Thus, the study specifically examines the social policy of Islamist governments with the intention of understanding how these policies have affected women’s conditions. This paper uses Turkey’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) as a case study and examines its record specifically on women’s employment and healthcare during the period of 2002-2012. The study is based on field research conducted in Ankara, Turkey, and utilizes documents, archives and interviews. Although the focuses of the paper will be on Turkey, the paper is part of a larger study on Islamist governments and women. Broader implications of the Turkish case for Egypt and Tunisia will also be discussed.