SECULARISM, FEMINISM, AND ISLAMOPHOBIA: A STUDY OF ANTI-VEILING LAWS IN FRANCE AND QUEBEC

Anti-veiling laws require Muslim women to un-cover parts of their bodies in order to work, go to school, or even walk in public space. Since 2004, French-style anti-veiling laws have been debated and enacted globally, including in Quebec, Canada. My research asks: How and why have anti-veiling laws been enacted in both France and Quebec? How have anti-veiling laws circulated transnationally between these two sites? What are the impacts of anti-veiling laws on Muslim women who practice veiling in France and Quebec? Using a qualitative approach, I spent nine-months conducting fieldwork research in Paris and Montreal between 2012 and 2014. I interviewed 47 Muslim women who currently, previously, or periodically wore a headscarf or face-veil, and/or who identified as activists who opposed anti-veiling laws. To analyse my data, I used Saidian citational analysis alongside a transnational feminist and critical race theoretical framework. The dissertation shows that political leaders in both France and Quebec used anti-veiling laws as a legal-political strategy to solidify their national identities around “la nouvelle laïcité,” an identity-based secularism that takes Islam, rather than Catholicism, as its main interlocutor. It also shows how a number of politicians, feminists, and media purveyors facilitated the circulation of anti-veiling laws between France and Quebec by sharing common assumption, lexicons, knowledge, and expertise, and by forming powerful networks through traveling, organizing conferences, and writing books. My findings also demonstrate that anti-veiling laws increased Islamophobia in both France and Quebec, prompting veiled Muslim women to develop survival strategies to mitigate its impacts on their everyday lives. Survival strategies included changing the way they dressed; changing their jobs or studies; starting their own associations or businesses; withdrawing from society; engaging in political/feminist activism; and finally, migration (hijra). My findings suggest that instead of promoting secularism and gender equality, anti-veiling laws negatively impact Muslim women’s education and employment—forcing them to choose between their religion and their daily survival. Their migration away from France/Quebec may also exacerbate labour shortages in sectors that require highly-skilled workers. Finally, I discuss threats to democratic minority rights that anti-veiling laws enable, including ongoing legal challenges to them.