Northrop, Douglas. "The Limits of Liberation: Gender, Revolution, and the Veil in Everyday Life in Soviet Uzbekistan." In Everyday Life in Central Asia: Past and Present, edited by Jeff Sahadeo and Russell Zanca, 89-102. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007.

This chapter appears to be a shorter version of Northrop's book Veiled Empire. It provides a concise picture of the hujum attempt by the Soviets to remove the veil from Muslim women in Uzbekistan. The Appendix contains a letter to the Samarqand City Soviet signed by 20 female school teachers chastising the government for not supporting them in resulting social pressures when they took off the veil.

Sections: A Quotidian Revolution: Veils and Family Life in the Soviet Empire; Appendix

Comments: 2/10/10
This chapter is a great example of the Soviet failure to achieve immediate social change. Such failures by the United States and others continue today in Central Asian and other transition countries like Afghanistan. The chapter also shows many different motivations for wearing (or taking off) the veil. Too many times we fail to consider (and respect) the diverse reasons for veiling.  Northrop shows that some of the motivations for veiling were fueled by, and unintended consequences of, the Soviet efforts to eliminate the veil.  For example, from page 98: "Despite stated goals to the contrary, that is, Soviet efforts played a large role in creating the veil as a national symbol and an emblem of a "tradition" that was in fact quite new." 

It is interesting to compare this work on the veil to Dupree's short description on Tajiks during Soviet times.  In his work, Dupree states that many Tajiks started wearing the veil when they moved to the city because it was a status symbol that they no longer had to work in the fields where they could not wear the veil.  Again, assumptions about the veil should not be lightly made.

Descriptors: 2000s, archival, chapter, history, hujum, N, reform, Soviet, Uzbekistan, women