To Cover the Aurat: Veiling and Sexual Morality among the Muslim Minangkabau

Lyn Parker (University of Western Australia)

This paper is concerned with Islamic veiling in contemporary Minangkabau society. Much of the literature on veiling as a recent practice in Indonesia and Malaysia presents veiling as an expression of an Islamic modernity and a new subjectivity focused on Muslim identity. Brenner, for instance, speaking of Java, sees the growing trend for wearing Islamic clothing as simultaneously articulating membership of an international Islamic community, a new awareness of Islamic authority among a more educated generation of young women and a distancing from local historical traditions and customs (1996). In this paper I explore the wearing of the Islamic veil among Muslim Minangkabau who live in the province of West Sumatra, and argue that a rather different discourse surrounds the practice there.

For West Sumatra, from 2001, there were reports of various initiatives to do with women’s dress, including the wearing of the veil, and mobility (e.g. Cohen 2001; Kompas 18 June 2001; Edriana Noerdin 2002). These were associated with the implementation of decentralization and regional autonomy, locally interpreted as the “kembali ke nagari” (return to the traditional village) movement. This suggested that, rather than the veil working to distance Muslim women from local traditions, veiling was being interpreted as an expression of both Islamic and local Minang identity.

In 2004 I conducted fieldwork in West Sumatra that focused on Minangkabau adolescent girls and schooling. In this paper, I investigate what adolescent girls say about why they wear or do not wear the veil, and the meaning and significance of the veil for them. I also analyse the role of schools in the veiling practices of young women. Adolescent girls emphasize that the function of the veil is “to cover the aurat”, the area of the body that should be covered in public. While this might seem an obvious statement, it seems to have been neglected in the literature. Preliminary analysis suggests that the significance of the veil for older and younger Minang women alike extends from this basis: that veiling has to do with sexuality, gender relations, with sexual morality, propriety and public virtue, and therefore with maintaining a good name.