Post-Postmodernity and South Asian Muslim Women's Fashion

117 6 POST-POSTMODERNITY AND SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION Iqra Shagufta Cheema Diverse religious, cultural, global, industrial and colonial factors amalgamate into making South Asian fashion an intriguing subject of study. Despite exponential growth of its fashion market during the last few decades, the arresting nuance of South Asian Muslim female fashion remains neglected. In this chapter, I discuss fashion trends among Muslim South Asian women in the post-postmodern era. I argue that Muslim women have gained more agency in their fashion choices in post-postmodernity. Their choices are more politically charged in visual and global post-postmodern culture because these choices translate into significant statements about their sociocultural and religio-political location. Moreover, the global rise of Islamophobia and the preconceived notion of women’s oppression in Islam also complicate and politicize Muslim women’s fashion more than that of their male counterparts, particularly in patriarchal societies like India and Pakistan. In arguing that, this chapter examines and explores the following questions: what challenges does post-postmodernity pose for Muslim women’s fashion choices in South Asia?1 How do these women represent their religious, cultural, regional, national and global identities through their fashion? How do political and feminist movements like #MeToo affect these choices? How does global or Western fashion affect the South Asian Muslim fashion? I deploy the words ‘dress’ and ‘fashion’ synonymously in this chapter to mean anything that is used to cover or adorn the body (Eicher and Roach, 1965). The reason this chapter solely focuses on Muslim female fashion is because, traditionally, they are held responsible for representation, preservation 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 117 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 118 119 118 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM and transfer of religious identity and cultural traditions across generations. Additionally, considering the chapter limitation, I use South Asia to refer to India and Pakistan only. I choose these countries because centuries-old shared history between both countries makes their fashion, culture and arts similar in more ways than not. Though there has been a wide adoption and appropriation of Hindu cultural and religious rituals and objects, development of Muslim fashion has not gained much attention. Hence, this chapter will enable cross-cultural fashion connections as well as enhance readers’ comprehension of post-postmodern Muslim women’s identity as expressed through fashion choices. Readers might find it ironic that I, in this chapter, deploy Western theories to discuss the ramifications of Muslim women’s fashion and representation of their religio-political and sociocultural identities via fashion. This irony highlights the significance of the discussion of non-Western subjects by a non-Western subject on a global platform in this chapter. It also displays the increasing post-postmodern impossibility of drawing hard lines between different cultural and religious factors. Historical overview of South Asian fashion Geoclimatic and ethnoreligious diversity inspires versatility in fabric, style and cuts in South Asian fashion. Draped and wrapped dresses have always been popular in some form among Muslims and non-Muslims alike to this day. Some examples include sari (five- to nine-yard-long fabric draped on body with a blouse), dhoti (a rectangle garment tied around the waist to cover legs), sarong/lungi (printed un/ sewn fabric worn in a tube shape on lower body), dupatta (head cover), chaadar (broader piece of clothing that coves head and upper half of body) and choli (skirt-like bottoms). In Indian culture, Islamic sartorial traditions blended with the prevalent Hindu religious influence (along with others) – so much so that they gradually became indistinguishable. A Harappan sculpture in the Indus valley (2000–3000 bce) shows a priest draped in an unstitched garment with an embroidered motif, while women wrapped scanty garments around their hips. The Vedas (1200–1000 bce) deploy onomatology like antariya (lower garment), uttariya (upper garment), pesas (skirts) and pratidi (breast covering) to describe glossy garments with gold threaded embroidery. The Ramayana and Mahabharata (500–300 bce) also mention garments in vague form.2 Chandra Gupta Maurya, emperor of Maurya Empire in South Asia (320–297 bce), who married a Greek princess, had ties with Greece and China; these connections strongly influenced South Asian dresses and launched the ancestral form of the sari. Later, the Satavahana Empire (200 bce–200 ce) developed trade with Arabia and the Roman Empire – resulting in traces of tunics and stitched and unstitched garments in that period. When the 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 118 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 119 SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION 119 Kushans (130 bce–185 ce) invaded Punjab in the Indian subcontinent, a blend of Greek, Roman and Kushan trends diversified local sartorial fashion. Sculptures from that era show the amalgamation of these influences in coats, jackets, tunics, blouses, pants, scarves, caps and other pieces. Royalty wore unstitched luxuriously long and flowy fabrics, while the masses wore stitched garments during Gupta’s period (4–8 ce). Lexicon continuity of clothing terminology (7 ce) to contemporary terms is also evidenced in ancient languages like Sanskrit and Prakrit (Dhamija, n.d.). While Islam forbids flamboyance and ostentatiousness, it recommends that dress shows its wearer’s social status. Historically, Muslim rulers wore dresses with intricately calligraphed Quranic ayat (scripture) to ward off evil, rewarded their servants with embroidered silk khalat (gowns) and used dresses and their colours to express or withdraw allegiance to the rulers (Baker, n.d.; Janaki, 2018). South Asian clothing style transformed significantly when Mahmud Ghaznavi invaded India in the eleventh century. Records from that era, along with Ibn-e-Batuta’s travel narratives, mention an advanced stitching style with multiple fabrics for lining, edging and so on. This new clothing style, with its fabric, originally came from the textile workshops in Baghdad. Over time, however, rulers throughout the Muslim Caliphate set up their own textile workshops. In the Muslim Caliphate, sartorial designs, styles and techniques were shared because of strong cross-regional trade between Syria, Egypt and Baghdad – along with South Asia. Consolidation of the Mughal Empire (sixteenth to seventeenth century) also inspired changes in the regional courts and fashion therein. Humayun (sixteenth century) founded textile workshops in Agra and Lahore and introduced a more urbane Mughal style that was inspired by the Persian court. This style was later elevated by Emperor Akbar, who designed some of his own costumes that were more suitable for the geoclimatic conditions. He also replaced foreign sartorial terms with indigenous vocabulary which resulted in wider cultural acceptability and adoption of these dresses by the masses (Dhamija, n.d.) (Sandhu, 2015). The dresses – that included chokdar pajama, coats with pointy corners and head covering – were similar for men and women in Akbar’s reign, but women’s style was altered when Jahangir took over the rule; henceforth women started wearing floating brocade tunics and gossamer veils. More regional, indigenous styles emerged with the Mughal Empire’s decline. The arrival of Europeans (eighteenth to nineteenth century), however, changed these indigenous styles. The colonial government expected people in bureaucracy, military and academia to adopt formal European dress codes. Gradually, the elite adopted Western clothing styles, while the middle class amalgamated European style with their own fashion. Female blouses copied the European neckline, puffed sleeves, and collars (Dhamija, n.d.), (Sandhu, 2015). Men also, more frequently, opted for pantaloons and Western suits. 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 119 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 120 121 120 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM Since the European colonization, Western fashion has maintained its influence on South Asia. In neoliberal cultural imperialism and speculative global economy, South Asia’s geopolitical and ethnoreligious history has problematized these fashion choices. This is visible in post-postmodern sartorial confusion and fusion between Western trends and local traditions. Fashion and its politics particularly affect Muslim female subjects and their identity. Via easy internet access, they have awareness of post-postmodern global fashion and culture, but the same remains politically, economically and geographically inaccessible to them. Muslim female fashion in South Asia is affected and altered by this post-postmodern neoliberal condition. Post-postmodernism and South Asian dress The dominant notion that fashion theorization originated in the West has persisted for centuries. But it is in ‘need of review and revision’ (Niessen, 2018: 105). The above-described concise historical context of the evolution of Muslim fashion in South Asia highlights the complex connection between fashion, politics and power. As South Asian interregional and global politics changed over time, so did culture and fashion – even more so particularly for women under the cultural logic of late capitalism, that is, postmodernism. The following facets of post-postmodernity facilitate and contemporize our comprehension of Muslim women’s fashion. Gilles Lipovetsky contends that we have entered the phase of hyper after that of post – hence hypermodernism instead of postmodernism. Hypermodern society experiences time as a ‘major preoccupation’ where now clashes are not ‘class against class’ but rather ‘time against time’ (2015: 161). Highlighting hypermodernity’s ‘inseparable’ link to ‘traditional and institutional frameworks’ (2015: 163), Lipovetsky argues that ‘globalization occurs along with mobilization of myths, foundation stories, symbolic inheritance, and traditional values’ (2015: 165). Particularly, the older generation frequently reminisce about the cultural traditions and religious celebrations of the past. They search for authenticity, an ideal time, a fixed point in history. South Asian women, due to gender, communal and ethnoreligious issues, have relatively less interregional geographical mobility. Even those who are more geographically and culturally mobile yearn for a revival of past traditions – and they make an active effort in that regard. This yearning is often expressed through fusion of contemporary and traditional fashion. This newer and post-postmodern fashion is a fusion of past and present traditions, as are contemporary South Asian Muslim women. Hypermodernity, argues Lipovetsky, assigns ‘new dignity’ to older traditions by ‘invoking the duties of 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 120 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 121 SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION 121 memory, remobilizing religious traditions’ in a present that constantly ‘exhumes and rediscovers the past’ (2015). Among the younger generation of women, this memory also shows up in vintage fashion trends. Any nostalgic yearning for the past already announces that the past is irretrievable. We can only retrieve or mimic objects from the past. We can blend that past memory and its objects (like traditional accessories and embroidery) via mix, collage, cut and paste with the contemporary tradition (jeans, dress, capris). Vintage made a comeback in South Asian fashion in the form of ghararas (wide legged pants with dramatically exaggerated flare down the knees) and golden frill-laced dupattas in 2018. Gharara was traditionally worn by Muslim women – as an item of clothing it bridges the generation gap between Muslim women that was widened by globalization and multiculturalism. Because of its separate legs, gharara is also feasible for day-to-day physical activities, but it can be easily elevated and accessorized for multiple events and occasions. South Asian women, through this hypermodern mobilization of symbolic inheritance and tradition in the form of gharara, are able to add longevity to this symbol’s life and contemporize the past. Fashion designers, in their vintage collections, render Barthes’s mythic status to fashion articles as a sign of the past. They select gharara as a sign, empty some of the meaning that it carried in the past and assign it a second level of significance (Barthes, 1975). Hence, gharara, which was in the past a casual dress for Muslim women in South Asia, now indicates their appreciation for cultural lineage on a second level of significance. Fashion becomes more prevalent as human beings start experimenting with multiple ways of being and delve into complex modes of existence. Dress is a means to express that multiplicity of being – particularly in South Asia where multiple religious and cultural factors have amalgamated in inseparable ways over centuries. Gilles Lipovetsky argues that Europe started experimenting with individualism, aesthetics and hedonism in the fourteenth century when the rest of the world pursued their traditional clothing style as an expression of their reverence for the past. Hypermodernity is defined by ‘revisionary memory, remobilization of traditional beliefs, and individualist hybridization of past and modernity’ (2015: 169). Hypermodern revivals of centuries-old fashion items such as gharara invalidate claims about Europe as the sole centre for aesthetic activities. Fashion decisions for Muslim women in South Asia are even more charged in the age of neoliberal globalization and social media. Their choices of appearance represent their societal status as well as religious beliefs. Gharara, like most other South Asian clothing items, is modifiable and can be accessorized and accommodated for different levels of price and modesty. These choices of accessories, along with style, also reflect women’s sociocultural and religious preferences. Under the pressure of representing multiple identities, hypermodern fusion of past and 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 121 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 122 123 122 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM present, tradition and invention expands Muslim women’s sartorial options and complicates the politics of these choices and representation. In weaker democracies, like Pakistan, hypermodern fashion provides Muslim women the means of transforming and playing with traditions of institutional patriarchy. Pakistan, with a literally and politically Muslim national identity, complicates the expression of religio-cultural elements of womanhood. In stronger democracies, like India, secularization has resulted in a more subjective and de-institutionalized form of religion. This alternative religious system invokes a reflexive ideology – one’s daily life reflects their politics and their system of belief because they do not perform any ritual under institutional or governmental pressure (2015: 167). I propose, however, that this ideology is reflective as well as reflexive. Despite the absence of governmental interference, sociocultural norms require their subjects to constantly question, rediscover and refigure the foundations of their identity. This reflection enables Muslim women to comprehend, embrace and express diverse political, religious and cultural constituents of their identity and personhood via fashion. This political deployment of fashion goes way back in South Asian history. One example of this is the choice of wearing khaddi as a social equalizer during the freedom struggle from the British; Jinnah cap (named after Pakistani leader Mohammad Ali Jinnah), Gandhi topi (named after Gandhi), Jawahar jacket (named after Jawaharlal Nehru) and Kaptaan’s chappal (named after former Pakistani cricket captain and now Prime Minister Imran Khan) are all examples of explicit expression of politics in sartorial choices. The same can be said for former Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi’s sari and for progressive socialist Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto who wore a particular style of shalwar kamiz and dupatta. Hence, sari and dupatta assumed the significance of a political announcement of patriotic values – where dupatta also indicates Muslim religious affiliation in the Pakistani context. Though shalwar kamiz with dupatta is worn widely as everyday dress by Muslim women in South Asia, the cuts and styles differ widely according to geoclimatic and religio-cultural factors across regions. In urban areas, more Western cuts or more glocal (global + local) style of shalwar kamiz is prevalent. Just like in colonial times, the elite deployed the whole Western dress code while the middle class mixed it with their own indigenous and familial fashion. Modern usually means Westernization of style, which usually means shedding of dupatta, sleeveless kamiz, higher-than-ankles shalwar/bottoms – all of which is considered against the strict religious dictate. Western inspiration and local values are hard to weave together smoothly – that is where the challenge lies for the post-postmodern female subject. Western fashion styles are considered contemporary or modern (in this case post-postmodern), whereas local style is archaic or traditional. This misperception prevails both in local and global contexts. 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 122 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 123 SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION 123 Sandra Niessen speculates that in the sixteenth century, the British admired Indian textiles for their fineness and technological brilliance as a means of creativity and individuality, but in the twentieth century when the South Asian expatriate population grew in Britain, their clothing became a symbol of foreignness and otherness (2018). Jennifer Craik also affirms that non-Westerners’ adoption of their local or indigenous styles is considered ‘traditional’ not fashionable, but adoption/ appropriation of the same by Western designers is deemed fashionable (2018). Globalization and increased immigration have made Muslim women hyper-aware of this cross-cultural adoption/appropriation of their fashion and style. Lipovetsky points to the hyper-ization of everything in hypermodernity: this includes hyper-power, hyper-class and hyper-capitalism that lead to ‘galloping commercialization’ and ‘hyper consumption’ (2015). Mass production and industrial mechanization in a neoliberal speculative global economy have only accelerated the above-described hyper-suffixes. But this hyper-capitalism eventually results in hyperindividualism. Hyper-modernity and hyperindividualism, along with alternative religious practices in countries like Pakistan, lead to a search for ‘hyper-recognition’ (2015: 168). These hypermodern sociocultural changes are more acute for Muslim women in an institutional patriarchy like Pakistan. Clothing is the most convenient way for women to express their individuality and even their political position. Additionally, post-postmodernism has amplified the postmodern focus on micronarratives. In this hyper-recognition and hyperindividualism, South Asian Muslim women want their micro-identities to be acknowledged and accepted. Post-postmodern hyperindividualism, I argue, results in hyper-fashion practices for Muslim women who can express their non-monolithic micro-identities this way. Burqa (also referred to as abaya, hijab, niqab, etc.) is an example to explain the relation of hypermodernity and hyper-fashion. South Asian women wear hijab or cover their faces for cultural reasons more than religious reasons. Growing up, I was encouraged to cover my head while going out of the house or in the presence of elders as a cultural tradition and sign of reverence – never because it was a Quranic dictate or Allah’s command. Undoubtedly, the practice has its roots in a religious narrative of honourable women staying in pardah (cover), but it is mostly practised like a religious ritual under cultural pressure. There are as many styles of burqas as sets of beliefs and religio-cultural contexts: it can range from plain fabric burqas to heavily embellished and embroidered ones; from a tube-shaped dress to multilayered expensive fabric; from just a body covering garment to burqas concealing the entire body with only the eyes exposed or a net over the eyes. They can cost from 500 rupees up to 50,000 rupees. Women from more tribal or rural families wear it to avoid na-mehram men (men who a woman could legally marry) as well as men from other tribes/families; working women opt for a burqa for safer public travel, to 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 123 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 124 125 124 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM avoid street harassment or because of the pressure from a conservative or traditional family. Like gharara and shalwar kamiz, women can still express their personal style in a burqa through unique cuts, design and embroidery. More rigid women might opt for solid coloured and completely plain burqas. Some women choose not to wear burqa as a protest and some women wear a burqa as a protest. The fabric, style and embroidery can also show the social and financial status of a woman. Burka is also tied to women’s financial independence; some women who wear burqa under family pressure shed it when they take up a career and become financially independent – economic pressures in neoliberal globalization have affected this sociocultural shift in South Asia. These are only a few among numerous variations in burqa styles that Muslim women in South Asia use to express their micro-identities. Burqa serves as a good example of the ways in which Muslim women aim for hyper-recognition and hyperindividualism through hyper-fashion. These diverse religio-cultural stylistic choices in South Asian women’s fashion also glimpse Nicolas Bourriaud’s post-postmodern theory, altermodernism. Altermodernism brings cross-cultural collaborations, connections, negotiations and experimentation together for productive compromises. Bourriaud defines altermodernism as the possibility of envisioning ‘human history as constituted of multiple temporalities’ to produce something from an assumed heterochrony from ‘exploring all dimensions of present’ (2015: 257). Any work of art, he argues, combines multiple ‘interrelationships’ that decentralize singular authority to form a ‘collective authorship’ (2015: 258). Through this ‘fragmentation of work of art’, altermodernism not only elevates the work of art but also problematizes it by thinning the line between original creation and copyright infringement. Fashion, as art, reflects the same theory. Cultural appropriation of fashion, sometimes veiled as inspiration, can be understood and analysed using altermodernism as a departure point. In 2017, Forever 21 and Urban Outfitters used Ajrak, a traditional Sindhi print that goes back to the Mohenjo-daro tradition, for bikinis and skirts. Similarly, Paul Smith, an English fashion designer, ‘introduced’ Peshawari Chappal, traditional footwear from the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Gandhara region, to international markets.3 The audacious adoption – which is more akin to cultural appropriation – of this traditional fashion equates to cultural erasure of the previously colonized region. Almost three centuries of British colonization blur the distinction between genuine recognition, cultural appropriation or mere Western capitalization of the South Asian market in neoliberal speculative global economy. Besides that, art and fashion travels across spaces and temporalities. It goes not only across countries but also across histories. Contemporaneous hyper-fashion, according to altermodernism, creates more room for expression of diverse identities through ‘voluntary confusion of eras and genres’ (Bourriaud, 2015: 260), but this 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 124 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 125 SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION 125 confusion does not bode well for under-represented South Asian Muslim fashion. Weak and ambiguous fashion copyright laws further aggravate these issues, leaving expansive room for exploitation of the South Asian market. Additionally, altermodernism results in hyper-capitalism and hyper-commercialization by expanding the reach of global or Western fashion. Neoliberal globalization and mass production have also attracted Western brands to South Asian markets. These brands outsource human labour, which can be exploitative of gender and workplace discrimination. Under the veneer of respect for religio-cultural traditions where women lack safe access to public spaces, they provide South Asian women opportunities to work from home. Hence, they exploit women workforce with meagre financial incentive and without affecting any real sociocultural change – and, sometimes, end up strengthening institutional patriarchy. Working from home hinders women from interacting with other women. Therefore, it keeps them from forming feminist or unionist alliances for access to better work rights, human rights and safety in work and public places. Hence, capitalist interests of foreign investors and international brands blind them to the ways in which they contribute to sociocultural injustice and religio-political misogyny in South Asia. Along with that, South Asia has also witnessed an increase in Western fashion retail stores. High-end European brands that have catered to the oil-rich Arab Muslim women for decades are monetizing the speedily growing South Asian consumer market. Globally, Muslim market is worth US$ 2.1 tn with an annual increase of US$500 bn, according to a 2016 market analysis (Sherwood, 2016). With more women joining the workforce in most globalized Muslim economies, women’s purchasing power has increased. Western brands are capitalizing on that. For example, Dolce & Gabbana launched their hijab collection targeting Middle Eastern and Muslim women in 2016. More than being an appreciable accommodation of religious diversity, this furthers global domination of Western fashion brands. Ignorance or insensitivity of the religious rituals also leads to controversies. For example, MAC stirred quite a controversy and invited ridicule for launching a Ramadan-themed make-up tutorial in 2018. It would be unfair, however, to not talk about the positive impact that these brands make on Muslim women’s fashion. For example, Nike’s hijab sports gear has definitely helped women assert their Muslim identity. It also fights the stereotypical assumption that hijab bars women from living an active and ambitious life (Davids, 2018). Increasingly, it is becoming harder to distinguish whether a fashion designer takes a cultural artefact as a point of initiation and inspiration or as capitalistic exploitation. But now Muslim women entrepreneurs from South Asia are joining the fashion market to resolve these post-postmodern/altermodern issues of representation and collaboration. These entrepreneurs – called ‘Gummies’, acronym for global young urban Muslims – belong to the new glocal South Asian Muslim identity categories. They 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 125 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 126 127 126 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM have more exposure to a global fashion market and have started their initiatives to cater to the Muslim consumers (Sherwood, 2016). They are ‘hyper-diverse’, ‘transnational’, more ‘spiritual rather than religious’ and may originally belong to South Asia but their families are spread in the West too (Sherwood, 2016). Even when located in small communities and producing locally, most of these new start-ups cater to a global Muslim diasporic consumer base in a globalized world. Gummies’ diversity and multiculturalism reflect post-postmodern theory of automodernism. Robert Samuels, in automodernism, announces the end of postmodernism by declaring the contemporary global world a cyberspace (2007). He enumerates four versions of post-postmodernity: multiculturalism, social constructivism, combination of diverse elements and academic critique or deconstruction (2007). The post-postmodern focus on multiculturalism is usually equated with erasure of micro-identities, but Samuels claims that multiculturalism helps us ascertain our identities. When surrounded by a multitude of identities, human subjects tend to question the foundation of their most fundamental beliefs and the formation of their subjectivities. Thus, multiculturalism becomes a socially constructive force for non-monolithic marginalized identities like Muslim women. This might also be one of the reasons for the upsurge in Muslim fashion and its market. In automodernism, women have a wide range of sartorial temporalities, histories and accessories to fuse and collaborate for a better expression of their gender and geographical, religio-political and sociocultural identities. They have multiple styles of head covers, shirts/tops and bottoms along with other accessories. The Gummies are one example as they combine and customize South Asian, Western and Muslim constituents of their subjectivities. They use South Asian accessories as well as introduce new styles in traditional dress. Use of statement jewellery like jhumkas and bangles, khussas (embroidered flat leather footwear) and traditional embroidery are a few of the things that the Gummies use in their daily life to embrace tradition. Hence, Muslim women bridge spatial and ideological boundaries through altermodern collaboration and negotiation of fashion in globalization. Globalization becomes viatorization where the fashion designer turns into a ‘homo viator’ or a nomad by residing in multiple worlds and bringing them together through art and fashion. Bourriaud contends that globalization has far exceeded Jameson’s and Lyotard’s anticipations. Any artist working in this multicultural global sphere is a ‘homo viator’ and/or ‘nomad’, he argues. He describes three types of nomadism: space, time and signs – all mutually inclusive. Fashion designers, as artists, bring multiple signs, spaces and temporalities together. Postmodern and postcolonial schools of thought that started in the 1970s are no longer well equipped to describe the changes wrought by an increasingly global culture. Altermodern fashion creates possibilities of bringing these diverse and insufficient theories together in hopes of something more nuanced and comprehensive. Bourriaud has been accused of recycling ideas such as the 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 126 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 127 SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION 127 Deleuzian nomad, the Lyotardian archipelago, the Derridean archive, postcolonial hybridization and Robert Samuels’s theories of cyberspace (2007: 252). But recycling is historicizing and a creative force in the post-postmodern age of creative exhaustion: vintage fashion, fusion of old and contemporary trends, blending sartorial tradition and innovation are all different forms of recycling. This accusation of recycling these terms from different theorists verifies postpostmodern collaboration, multiple authorship, haphazardness, openness, evanescence and multiculturalism in altermodernity. In post-postmodernity, according to Bourriaud (2015), ‘creolization’ has taken over multiculturalism. Alter-globalization seeks to find and propose singular solutions within models of sustainable development instead of neoliberal, economic globalization. Creolization facilitates that by enabling the blend of new and inherited cultures and blends – the new creole trends contain elements that are dearest to the consumers or wearers. The ‘Gummies’ are identifiable because of the same creolization, viatorization and nomadism. They collage their different glocal identities – the chosen expatriate identity and the inherited old identity – together via fashion in a globalized space. Platforms like Instagram and YouTube have further inspired, accelerated and promoted altermodern fashion elements like collaboration, creolization and online viatorization. This online presence and visibility is particularly critical for South Asian Muslim women who – along with frequent harassment – have restricted access to most public spaces. Religious and sociocultural constraints in institutionalized patriarchies pose challenges. These platforms give ‘the Othered’ Muslim women designers and consumers an increased sense of political and personal agency and expressive freedom in their sartorial designs. These platforms have also made Muslim women more aware of the subtle and impractical misogynistic cuts and styles: the absence of pockets in female clothing, as well as heavy burqas that are unsuitable for South Asian geoclimatic conditions are examples of that. This awareness has inspired some practical changes to traditional style. For example, recently sari-pants emerged as a new trend for women’s fashion in South Asia. Traditional styles of sari – seven feet long silk fabric that is wrapped around the body in multiple layers – have become somewhat impractical for working women. But in sari-pants, women can wear regular bottoms/pants – with the sari pallu (end of the sari) hanging loose over the shoulder as it does in a regular sari. This innovation in style contemporizes a tradition and makes it practical for daily wear. With easy access to fashion trends via TV, film and social media, women can easily reimagine and customize their dresses according to their personal preference. Post-postmodern theories of digimodernism and automodernism also facilitate a discussion of fashion customization and autonomy. Alan Kirby, in Digimodernism (2009), discusses the influence of digital technology on culture and cultural artefacts using examples from film, TV and 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 127 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 128 129 128 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM popular cultural movements. Whereas Robert Samuels, in Automodernism (2007), rejects the oppositional human versus machines binary, Kirby claims that digimodern texts are characterized by ‘haphazardness, evanescence’ and ‘multiple authorship’ (2009: 273), some of which I have explained above as applied to Muslim women’s altermodern fashion. While traits of digimodernism are ‘infantilism, earnestness, and endlessness, and apparent reality’ (2009: 273), Samuels contends that automatization awards humans tameable autonomy. Samuels exemplifies this autonomy through his nephew writing a paper for a school project. His nephew uses interactive chat groups and online guides, simultaneously working on the paper switching between multiple tabs. This forces Samuels, who is observing the nephew, to rethink and reform his own perceptions of plagiarism, multitasking, and human and machine collaboration. In my opinion, the same writing model is applicable to fashion stylists, bloggers and fashion consumers. Samuels’s automodernism is more positive than Kirby’s digimodernism. While postmodernism had only changed traditional perception of autonomy and agency, post-postmodern automodernism and digimodernism further transform these ideas. This necessitates further discussion of the critical role of social media in Muslim women’s agency, visibility and creativity in fashion. Blogs, vlogs, websites and social platforms like Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat –with their built-in templates – have transformed the way we perceive and practice agency, autonomy and creative freedom. Creating any text, be it an essay or a fashion design, involves ‘technical automation’ with ‘human autonomy’ to express the creative freedom via that text (Samuels, 2007: 175). This, ultimately, brings human subjects and their machine expertise together – which can be both liberating and limiting. Since there is already a given template on Instagram, designers have limited choice in Instagram video lengths or the styles of their profiles. In print fashion, Pakistan has some established fashion magazines like She, Good Times, Fashion Central, Pakistan in Vogue; while Indian magazines include GQ India, Femina, Elle, Vogue India, Open and Stardust. But with a disappearing printing industry, social media platforms like Instagram are becoming the only feasible medium for Muslim women to access the latest fashion. They can see show business people’s outfits daily via their ootd (outfit of the day) updates, their style guides and make-up routines. This online engagement inspires these women’s cuts and styles too – they can use that inspiration in accordance with their own micro-identity. For example, I, as a South Asian Muslim woman, scroll through an international or Western fashion blogger’s Instagram post or watch a YouTube tutorial. Let us assume that I like the style of sleeves on her dress in the post. Next time, I would direct my darzi (tailor) to add those sleeves to my traditional shalwar kamiz. My darzi might suggest a different fabric or embroidery thread for that dress – from their personal taste, another client’s dress or may be another online video. Eventually, I would have a kamiz that has unique, non-traditional sleeves 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 128 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 129 SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION 129 but still complies with the religious and cultural sartorial dictates and norms that I prefer or find comfortable. This shalwar kamiz has multiple authorship (designed, perceived, stitched by different people), haphazardness (fusion of local and global styles might appear mismatched or unusual to some) and openness (I could cut the kamiz shorter, wear it with jeans to Westernize it or wear a dupatta with it to make it more traditional). I might comment on that blogger’s post to express my appreciation of that sleeve style. In response, I would receive replies from people located all around the world who might (dis)agree with me. The process of inspiration, imitation and collaboration has substantially accelerated due to accelerated digital access to fashion in post-postmodernity. Women can access top global fashion shows as they are happening, which has increased the fashion transfer rate significantly. It enables cross-religious and cross-cultural connections. This style of sleeves on a traditional kamiz shalwar, which is now a multiauthored text in digimodernism, expresses my willingness to explore and adopt other cultures, while preserving my own. I might accessorize this dress by choosing from numerous options like bangles, khussa, jhumkas. I might add something new when a new fashion trend or accessory emerges and is mass produced by cheaper brands. This is a long, complex process that was initiated via mere scrolling through a screen and staring at a picture for a few seconds. So, in postpostmodernity, my dress becomes the digimodernist multi-authored endless text that expresses the automodern autonomy and agency through this creative freedom – all of which would have been impossible without expeditious postpostmodern digital access to personal gadgets like smart phones, computers and satellite TV. Samuels (2007) equates this experience of personal computer to ‘personal culture’. Personal culture is synonymous with micro-identities. In postpostmodernism, access to gadgets means easy access to other cultures and fashions. The virtual life has diminished temporal and spatial differences and enabled Muslim women to express their micro-identities. Women can just sit at their home and watch the latest fashion trends in ‘autonomous passivity’. Furthermore, personalization and customization of these trends creates the illusion that the wearers have created the fashion object themselves. Massproduced and affordable copies of the high-end clothing items become available in the market within days after the launch of those designs. Hence, along with facilitating nuanced personal/micro-culture and individual expression of microidentities for Muslim women, the digital age also poses challenges for fashion designers and consumers. Due to the inseparable interlinkage of real and online life, the internet is not beyond the influence of economic and political forces. Doris Teske (2003) describes the internet as a space that started beyond any geographical and economic terrain, but gradually economic control caught up with it, with 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 129 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 130 131 130 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM ‘commercialization and state control breaking its earlier “anarcho-libertarian” bubble’ (108). Most fashion designers prioritize instant monetary gratification over human labour or ecological concerns. This makes it hard to ensure the maintenance and accountability of copyright infringement and the protection of humans against exploitation in fashion markets. It is even harder in countries with wide class stratification and weaker sociopolitical and legal infrastructure – like India and Pakistan. In 2017, Khaadi, one of the top Pakistani clothing brands, was accused of not even giving bathroom breaks to their workers, most of whom were women. Fashion, by its very nature, is class specific. In a neoliberal global economy, fashion market complicity often partakes in sociopolitical inequity. But post-postmodern ecological and sociopolitical challenges have also made fashion consumers and producers, particularly women, more aware of the repercussions of their choices. Marginalized consumers, like South Asian Muslim women, tend to engage with fashion more cautiously because fashion is more politically charged for them. Gilles Lipovetsky describes fashion as a ‘form of social change without any particular object’ (1994). Emma Tarlo also highlights the protest potential of sartorial decisions and states that the British ‘acted out’ their domination through imposition of dress but the nationalist leaders ‘contested it’ through their sartorial choices too (n.d.). Though national politics and women’s fashion have historically mutually affected and altered each other in South Asia, this was not as visible when feminist movements were subtler, but contemporary fashion designers and artists are taking a stronger and clearer stance on these issues. For example, in Zia ul Haq’s Islamized Pakistani regime (September 1978–August 1988), female TV anchors and actors could not appear on screen without their dupattas. This was a sudden change from a previously progressive tradition. As a protest against this law, many women refused to perform on screen. Most of these protests did not surface publicly and did not become part of the popular narrative. But in the post-postmodern global village, there is a stronger international accountability. Powerful political bodies or corporations are forced to devise better strategies to stand up for women’s rights and implement the laws. The recent #MeToo movement took the form of #MeinBhi (a literal Urdu translation of #MeToo) in Pakistan. This grants women the expressive freedom via fashion since they can choose what to wear more comfortably. Besides #MeinBhi, this movement also inspired #InkaarKaro (say no) and #KhanaKhudGaramKaro (warm your own food) hashtag movements. Women demanded equity and freedom of choice through these movements. These movements also spurred a plethora of fashion shows where designers recorded their protest and spread awareness through the dresses they wore and catwalks. Sartorial protests came alive in Pakistan Fashion Week 2018, where, for the first time, the runway was walked by real-life plus-sized, elderly, differently abled models, instead of zero-sized youngsters. These models and their clothing aimed to raise awareness about romanticizing 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 130 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 131 SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION 131 women’s ideal age and unreal body and beauty standards for them. Along with that, these fashion shows also highlighted social issues like Jinnah’s Pakistan, child labour, #MeinBhi, net neutrality and the water crises (Pakistan Fashion Design Council, 2006). Maheen Khan’s brand Gulabo stood out with their Fashion for Change and Liberation collections in 2018. The Gulabo collection deployed ramps to shed light on child abuse, women’s rights, street harassment, ecological crisis and national politics. In a fusion of Western and Eastern trends, Khan used graphic statements like #MeinBhi, Save the Earth, Number phenk, tamasha dekh (try sliding me your phone number and watch the shit show) and Naya Pakistan (slogan of Pakistan Party for Justice (PTI) that is popular among the youth). Cheena Chappra also showcased her collection Revivalist on older and plus-sized working women as models (Figure 6.1). Previously in 2016 FPW, designer Rozina Munib chose Mukhtaran Mai – a gang-rape survivor – as her showstopper to raise voice against women’s rape. When accused of using Mai as a gimmick, Munib responded that she, as a woman, has the ‘ethical responsibility’ of portraying these issues in a booming fashion industry (Rehman, Figure 6.1 Photo from Cheena Chappra’s collection Revivalist at Fashion Pakistan Week 2018. 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 131 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 132 133 132 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM Figure 6.2 Women wearing Lahori Ink. 2016). This has also led to some brands capitalizing on the market potential of feminism: for example, a Lahore-based brand Lahori Ink primarily sells clothing items that mix pop culture with feminist and political slogans and graphics (Figure 6.2). The same relationship between fashion and social change is also visible in androgynous clothing. Designers – by adding feminine prints, embroidery and cuts to male clothing and vice versa – tried to make gender boundaries more fluid. Men wearing cholis and heavily embroidered chaadar (previously embroidered chaadar was reserved for women, while men wore plain shawls) are accepted more easily and widely now. Instead of being considered effeminizing, they are perceived as style statements. This fluidity of gender boundaries in fashion gradually seeps into daily life practices and affects real, albeit slow and small, change towards gender equity (Figure 6.3). Younger South Asian Muslim women more flexibly tend to explore and adapt to a more global Muslim identity. In opting for a dominantly cosmopolitan and global Muslim identity, they relegate the regional factors to a secondary status. Emma Tarlo (2013) highlights this intergenerational conflict about religious and cultural adaptation and sartorial choice and observes that Bollywood-esque 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 132 05-Nov-20 12:25:12 PM 133 SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM WOMEN’S FASHION 133 Figure 6.3 Photo from Pakistan Fashion Design Council’s Fashion Week 2018. female objectification contrasts with Islamic modesty or covering of body to evade the male gaze. Younger Muslim women are a cultural blend of global, South Asian, regional and religious influences. That is why a modest mix and match of loud and subtle cuts, colours and trends is more popular among them. This is truer for professional and expatriate South Asian women. This trend is particularly visible in blogs and vlogs run by Muslim South Asian women. One more post-postmodern phenomenon is the emergence of fashion bloggers and vloggers. This is a complex paradox of monetary inequality, more than geopolitical and sociocultural factors. Most female fashion bloggers and vloggers hail either from upper middle class or the film and fashion industry, neither of which are relatable for the majority of South Asia Muslim women. Most middle-class or poor Muslim women can neither afford nor relate to the style or cost of the fashion in these blogs and vlogs. Economically disadvantaged Muslim women face different challenges in fashion. Usually knock-out copies of international, as well as local brands are easily available in bazaars (local markets) both in India and Pakistan. But the variety of machine-produced fashion products in the market help these women choose, modify and 9781350115163_pi-212.indd 133 05-Nov-20 12:25:13 PM 134 135 134 FASHION, DRESS AND POST-POSTMODERNISM customize their style and fashion. There is a rising need for fashion bloggers and vloggers who cater to different socioeconomic classes. This is particularly significant in the Muslim context in institutionalized patriarchies like India and Pakistan where honour killings are still a frequent occurrence. These women’s fashion choices are more significant because they have material consequences for them. Some of these practices like recycling of older styles and trends have been recurrent in fashion but post-postmodernism provides us with the theoretical lens to critically understand different approaches towards customization and personalization of fashion according to micro-identities of Muslim female subjects. Conclusion South Asian Muslim women have wider options to represent their personal, sociopolitical and religio-cultural location in post-postmodernity. Fashion and dress as the most common aspects of everyday life carry radical potential for the expression of Muslim women’s subjectivity. They can use that as a tool to express their personal and socio-political micro-identities. Post-postmodernism also provides women the digital means of access to online spaces. This occupation of online spaces is critical in institutional patriarchies where public spaces are not safe for women. Bourriaud’s viatorization in altermodernity facilitates intercultural collaboration, while Lipovetsky’s hypermodernist revisionary memory reimagines ways of reviving the past and integrating that in current trends. Kirby’s digimodernism expands the online spaces and occupation of those spaces like Instagram and YouTube by women, whereas Samuels explores the ways we create fashion and showcase it on online mediums. Collectively, all of these post-postmodern theories provide newer and nuanced ways to approach and understand Muslim women’s subjectivity and its placement within postpostmodern culture. 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