Hybrid styles, interstitial spaces, and the digital advocacy of the Salafi feminist

Abstract

This article examines the online advocacy work of Zainab bint Younus, a Canadian Muslim blogger who identifies herself online as the Salafi Feminist. In 2015, bint Younus curated a series of self-portraits from women who wear the niqab, the Islamic face veil. These photos show the women engaging with Western consumerism and popular culture, but they also employ the blended visual styles and the hybridity of digital spaces to deconstruct dominant binaries of Muslim women. While niqabis discuss being treated as sub-human in public spaces because of their covered faces, the digital media provide a creative space to speak back and demonstrate their agency. However, these digital projects go beyond simply creating a space of expression, as these Muslim women engage with tactics of hybridity, mimicry, and disidentification to work within Western cultural spaces, such as selfies, social media posts, and consumer sites, to destabilize Western feminist notions of the liberal, agentive subject. These photos subvert the assumption that self-portraits must show the face, as the women cover their faces with the niqab but illustrate their personalities through other means.