Taking the veil on campus

At a time when many college students are exploring their identities away from home, two female Princeton students who wear hijab said the traditional dress has led them to examine how their choice fits into the dominant campus culture. Wearing hijab, an Islamic practice intended to reinforce modesty, usually involves a woman covering herself completely in public, save for her face, hands and feet.

Before coming to Princeton, Saud noted that she prepared herself for a change of environment, since wearing hijab was not out of the ordinary for her growing up.

“My question on first coming to campus was ‘[Will] I find it hard?’ ” she said. “There was nobody like me on campus. There was nobody I could relate to.”

Saud said that, growing up, she had already experienced differences in cultural awareness, including an experience in an airport when she was stopped and asked to remove a jacket she was wearing that covered her arms.

“It was kind of awkward,” she said. “Not just in the sense that I was revealing skin, but there was a sense of ignorance that violated my religious beliefs that got to me.”

Unlike Saud, Joy Karugu ’09 didn’t begin to wear hijab until she converted to Islam in the fall of her sophomore year at Princeton. She explained that, though she was raised in a Christian family, she developed an interest in Judaism during high school. It wasn’t until she read the Qur’an while on a trip to Morocco that she decided she wanted to convert to Islam.

“[Islam] just answered all my questions,” she explained. “I guess since I was intellectually convinced by Islam, I was convinced by the rules of Islam. It was all very theoretical, and then I started doing the practical things, and it was like, ‘Oh, this makes sense.’ ”

Though Karugu said she didn’t notice a change in people’s behavior toward her when she started wearing hijab, she is still aware of subtle prejudices some may feel toward her choice of dress.

“Before, I didn’t really care what people thought,” she explained. “But this past semester, I’ve made the effort to be really outgoing to counteract the assumptions ... not that I’m not nice, but that I’m not normal.”

Saud said her experience wearing hijab on campus has been much more positive than she initially expected. “Everyone here is very laid back and accepting,” she explained. “The environment here is that people want to learn more.” Belonging to a diverse campus community, she added, has helped reaffirm her confidence in her own beliefs.

Saud added that because she abstains from alcohol in accordance with her Islamic beliefs, she doesn’t party or go out to the eating clubs, where her difference in dress might be more obvious than it is in other areas of campus.

Karugu, who said she doesn’t drink and only went out occasionally during her freshman year, echoed Saud’s sentiment.

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“The only downside [of wearing hijab], or maybe the upside, is that I feel more uncomfortable in some places, like the Street,” she said.

Despite saying that her biggest challenge has been interacting with fellow students, Saud said her friends at Princeton have been able to understand her for who she really is beneath her hijab.

“They know that there’s somebody behind the veil, that there’s more to me,” she said.