IN her new book, author Nadeine Asbali reveals how her decision to wear the hijab led to an “overnight” shift from blending in to facing “racism and Islamophobia”.
Born in the UK to an English mother and a Libyan father, Asbali looked like the quintessential white British teenager before putting on the hijab.
However, her mixed-race background, with two different cultures, left her “confused” about her racial identity, she said.
“I felt not quite whole because I wasn’t fully English and I wasn’t fully Libyan. I felt English when we were in England and then we’d go to Libya every summer holiday for the whole six weeks, but the two never mixed until I started to get older,” Asbali told Eastern Eye.
“In my teenage years, my friends were doing the things teenagers do, like drinking and hanging out with boys. When I wasn’t doing that, that’s when I suddenly realised, ‘Hang on, I’m not actually English, I’m not actually like these people around me’.’
Her book, Veiled Threat: On being visibly Muslim in Britain, is part memoir, part political essay and delves into the hardships of growing up as a hijab-wearing woman in the UK.
Former prime minister Boris Johnson caused controversy with his comments that veiled Muslim women looked like “letterboxes” and “bank robbers”.
Asbali's new book
A 2019 Nottingham Trent University study reported that attacks against hijab-wearing women in the UK were on the increase, suggesting this was because veiled Muslim women were “represented as ‘agents’ of terrorism”.
Asbali said, “I start each chapter with an anecdote and then move into a political unpacking of that to weave between what I’ve been through and the wider systematic impact Islamophobia has had on visible Muslim women.
“It was a very cathartic journey for me and helped me process a lot of the trauma I went through, over the past decade and a half.”
In the book, Asbali discusses topics such as the online Muslim alt-right (or “akh-right”, as she puts it), white feminism and its “saviour” complex, the representation of Muslim women on screen and why Muslim women deserve control over their voices.
“I wanted to get across how Muslim women are considered a paradox, where we’re seen as these meek victims who are oppressed and need ‘saving’, but, at the same time, we’re seen as a threat. I wanted to get that across in the title.
“That’s why it’s so difficult being a Muslim woman, especially in the west, because half the people want to save you, while the other half want to criminalise you.”
Asbali, 30, admitted she didn’t have a very religious upbringing, but decided that “if I can’t be Libyan and I can’t be English, maybe I can try being Muslim”.
The hijab was her “ticket” to her Muslim side and, aged 15, Asbali wore it on her annual summer holiday to Libya.
On her return, at immigration at Heathrow, she was interrogated by border control officers – a first for her. Asbali’s brother, who looks “very English”, was let through without any questions. (The siblings travelled without their parents).
Asbali said of that experience, “It really hit me hard. But, also, teachers, when they first saw me wearing the hijab, called the names of other Muslim girls in the class because they just got us confused.
Nadeine Asbali
“On the school bus, this group of boys started shouting ‘Taliban’ at me. On other occasions you’d hear typical muttering under the breath about immigrants while you’re standing right there.
“It made me realise how hostile Britain is to visible Muslimness. I grew up in Northampton, which wasn’t and still isn’t very Muslim. After deciding to wear the hijab, overnight, I went from just kind of blending in to suddenly facing racism and Islamophobia.
“It made me quite resentful of Britain as I felt like I was being rejected by the only place I knew of as home.
“The negative reaction and almost being made an outcast made me forget my Britishness and embrace the Muslim, Libyan side of me.”
When Asbali was asked why she wore the hijab and what it meant to her, she realised she knew very little about Islam and set out to learn more.
“After learning and understanding, I believe the hijab to be compulsory in Islam. It’s important to be unapologetic and to show Britain, and the west, that we are part of Britain too, that Britishness is not just this one idea, it’s not just white, not just Christian. Society needs to accept that more than it has been.”
On the impact of toxic masculinity and a far-right version of Islam, Asbali noted the influence of personalities such as Andrew Tate on impressionable young Muslim men and how that can lead to misogyny.
“I tried to start a dialogue that’s often ignored by not only leaders in our community, but also teachers and those in charge of safeguarding young people. Issues such as the ‘akh-right’ and Andrew Tate are shooed away as a ‘Muslim problem’ when it’s so much more complicated than that. It should be more pressing that these young boys online are taking influencers from the akhright as idols and important figures in their developing relationship with Islam.”
In the book, Asbali explores how wearing a hijab impacts her daily life as a secondary school English teacher and journalist.
Asbali is now a columnist at the Metro, and has also written for The Guardian, the Independent and the New Statesman.
Asbali hoped she could inspire her young female Muslim students to feel confident to be themselves. “I hope the book gives the message that they can be unapologetically and visibly Muslim,” she said.
“But I also hope it gives other people an insight into what it’s like to be a Muslim woman and how they play a role in our subjugation by seeing us as victims, or seeing us as threats. The book is a way for us to get our voice out there,” she concluded.
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A seated Jain enlightened teacherAshmolean Museum, University of Oxford
Ganesha from JavaAshmolean Museum, University of Oxford
A Chinese silk painting depicting the BuddhaAshmolean Museum, University of Oxford
ArdhanarishvaraAshmolean Museum, University of Oxford
Head of a grimacing yakshaAshmolean Museum, University of Oxford
NagaAshmolean Museum, University of Oxford
The Bimaran casketAshmolean Museum, University of Oxford
Hunia Chawla
A still from rehearsal
Them performing liveNajmuddin Saifuddin Qawwal Group
The cast of Marriage Material in key moments from the play, including Avita Jay, Kiran Landa, Omar Malik, Irfan Shamji and Anoushka Deshmukh
Sathnam Sanghera’s 'Marriage Material' adapted into bold new play on conformity
The play Marriage Material at the Lyric Hammersmith Theatre is Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti’s adaptation of Sathnam Sanghera’s novel of the same name, which first came out in 2013.
She is lucky to have Iqbal Khan direct Marriage Material. The play, a co-production with the Birmingham Rep, is set in the late 1960s. Mr and Mrs Bains (played by Jaz Singh Deol and Avita Jay) run a corner shop in Wolverhampton. Their younger daughter, Surinder (Anoushka Deshmukh), is 16, her sister Kamaljit (Kiran Landa) is just a bit older.
They have a neighbour, Patwant Dhanda (Irfan Shamji), who, as we shall soon see, is not a very pleasant man. In fact, he comes across just as racist as Enoch Powell, who represented Wolverhampton South West for the Tories from 1950 to 1974.
It will be recalled this was a time when Sikhs working on the buses were told they couldn’t wear a turban. That was a hard-fought battle that had to be won.
The Bains, meanwhile, simply want to get their girls married off.
Nothing new here, I thought.
What makes the tale different is that the plot twists and turns down the generations. Mr Dhanda, who has the makings of a paedophile, makes a pitch for one of the girls when Mr Bains dies early in the play. “A life with no man in the house is no life,” he informs the newly widowed Mrs Bains.
Mr Dhanda has a wife but she has returned to India so he considers himself to be a free man.
Surinder’s English teacher from school, Miss Flanagan (Celeste Dodwell), who is also head of the fifth form, tells Mrs Bains about her daughter: “I don’t want to embarrass you, but she is bright. Ridiculously bright.”
She adds: “Mrs Bains, I think it would be a pity if Surinder didn’t stay on at school.” The initial response from Mrs Bains is not encouraging: “Too much education makes people’s brains get mixed up, they don’t sleep at night…”
But she is finally persuaded that Surinder should be allowed to stay on for a while longer before being married off.
Mr Bains was very old school. When Surinder confides she would one day like to be “a somebody”, he is amused that “my daughter wants to be a somebody”.
“Like you,” she tells her father.
Mr Bains consoles his daughter: “We will find a somebody for you to marry.”
At the point of a possible marriage, however, Surinder is sweet-talked by chocolate salesman Jim Wilson (Tommy Belshaw) into running away with him. They share a love of literature, and he calls her “Sue Bains”. But the relationship does not end well.
Once she has left, Surinder is written off as “dead” by her family. The story that is circulated is that she was only 16 when she was killed in a car crash. That’s better than to let on that she ran off with a white man.
By the time she is reconciled with her sister towards the end of the play, a great deal has changed. Kamaljit married Tanvir Banga (Omar Malik), a young man who helped out in the Bains’ corner shop. When the two sisters meet again, Tanvir has also died. But he and Kamaljit had a son, Arjan Banga (Jaz Singh Deol doubles up for this role after the death of Mr Bains). He has come home after his father’s death to help his mother who is still running the family corner shop.
Meanwhile, Mr Dhanda’s business has prospered. He now has a son, Ranjit Dhanda (the role is taken by Omar Malik after Tanvir’s death), and he is nearly as unpleasant as his father.
Arjan has an English fiancée, Claire (Celeste Dodwell). In London, Arjan worked as a creative director. But after deciding to stay in Wolverhampton to help his mother, he decides he cannot marry Claire because she is white. In other words, Asians are not free of racism, either. Happily, at the end, the couple are reconciled.
As for Surinder, she parted company with Jim Wilson after realising he was all talk, depended on her for money and had failed to earn a penny from his literary pretensions. She had prospered, though, as a hotel owner and had been transformed in time into a well-groomed businesswoman. After being tracked down by Arjan, she decides to return to her roots in Wolverhampton and help Kamaljit run the family corner shop. Perhaps 50 years had passed during the passage of the play.
Being subjected to racism turned some Asians into racists themselves. The word goreh (white person) is repeatedly spat out with venom. Maybe it is worth remembering the play’s audience isn’t exclusively Asian – white folk are watching as well. And maybe some of the toilet humour ridiculing white people, which always makes me cringe, could be cut out.
In Sanghera’s novel, there is a quote from Enoch Powell’s speech in November 1968: “The West Indian or Asian does not, by being born in England, become an Englishman. In law he becomes a United Kingdom citizen by birth; in fact, he is a west Indian or an Asian still... he will by the very nature of things have lost one country without gaining another, lost one nationality without acquiring a new one. Time is running out against us and them. With the lapse of a generation or so we shall at last have succeeded – to the benefit of nobody – in reproducing ‘in England’s green and pleasant land’ the haunting tragedy of the US.”
In Marriage Material, where the acting is marvellous (apart from Mr Dhanda’s Indian mannerisms and accent being overdone) we do travel across a couple of generations.
There is a scene when Tanvir rejects Mr Dhanda’s vision of creating a little Punjab in Wolverhampton.
Mr Dhanda wants to take over the Bains’ corner shop and is putting pressure on Tanvir to sign the papers. He says: “In this country, money is the path to freedom.”
“Sign, please,” he instructs Tanvir. “We must make sure our children learn to behave nicely, according to our rules.”
He insists: “We maintain our identity so we can be ourselves.”
Tanvir disagrees: “We can be us here. With the goreh.”
Dhanda warns him: “Then we will be inviting chaos.”
Tanvir’s comment is telling: “You sound like Enoch.”
Kamaljit, who is expecting a baby with her husband Tanvir, says: “I would like my child to grow up knowing the history of the Gurus and to read the Granth Sahib. And to love their culture.”
Tanvir tells his wife: “I would like my child to go to the finest schools, to cheer for England in the World Cup and eat Yorkshire pudding on a Sunday.”
Kamaljit sets out a dream that has perhaps come to pass with many third and fourth generation British Asians: “Maybe our child can do both.” Much, much later, in a throwback to the past, we learn of Surinder’s O-level results: “Biology A, Chemistry A, English Language A, English Literature A, French A, History B, Latin A, Mathematics A, Physics A…”
Kamaljit tells her younger sister: “Never mind about the B.”
And that is quintessentially Asian. Their acting is outstanding.
Marriage Material is at the Lyric Hammersmith Theatre until June 21, and at the Birmingham Rep from June 25-July 5