Expression of Fashion or Subculture ?

The concept of dramaturgy and subcultures are almost intertwined. From previous knowledge and from class discussions, I decided to visit an English speaking school to see if there was any sort of subculture or if I could apply the sociological concepts I learnt in class. I decided to visit a high school, keeping in mind that most youth subcultures are formed when they are separated from their primary socializers, their family, and not under the influence of the dominant culture. Therefore, for this blog post, I wanted to study whether there was a subculture amongst the students from the way most Muslim girls wore their school uniforms and adapted to a westernized environment.

As I was walking through the playgrounds at break time, I noticed how most Muslim girls had their hairs covered with the hijab. The normal school uniform was a polo shirt and a pair of trousers. The girls wore both long skirts and long sleeves, or simply long sleeved shirts with pants. In a sociological perspective, this can be seen as a bricolage. In this case, bricolage is how the young girls adapt to the western style fashion, but at the same time respect their religious beliefs by wearing the hijab.

The theory of commodity was present as Dick Hebdige describes it as “the conversion of subcultural signs into mass-produced objects.” It was tough to determine if the girls were expressing their sense of modesty in Islamic clothing, or conveying their sense of belonging to a certain subculture. Some of the girls had hipster looking glasses, converse shoes and even wore revealing clothing with their hijab on. Some also wore high-rise leggings with their uniform tucked in, which could be another indication of a hipster style.

On the other hand, some girls were holding designer accessories, for example; Chanel, Gucci and Burberry handbags, while others were wearing punk looking bracelets and shoes with spikes on them.  In the end, it is up to us to decide if they belong to a certain subculture, or whether its jut a form of commodity Hebdige refers to.

The world is mediated. In other words, corporations and the media normalize what was once a shock to us. Probably, the way most of the girls were dressed was once considered socially unacceptable, but through media and the fashion industry, these forms of clothing have become acceptable and normalized. Nowadays it is not out of the ordinary for a Qatari girl to wear revealing clothing, where it was contemplated deviant two years ago.

If I were to apply the dramaturgy theory by Erving Goffman, I would say that these girls are all actors on the front stage of a theater. In this case, the stage would be the school. The students, principals, cleaners, security and the teachers are the actors playing set character roles as part of their performances. The students managed their setting, clothing, language, and gestures to correspond the image they tried to project. Nevertheless, this is impression management. For instance, the girls were presented differently on front stage than if they were to be in their comfort zone, the back stage. At one point, the girls took off the hijab and started singing when they were in the classroom alone, and put on their hijab and acted all reserved once they walked out.

The female students could be part of a larger subculture or they could just be consumers of style through the mediated world. 

Taqwacore, the subculture of the Muslim punks

As I was researching about punk rock in the Middle East, I came across the Taqwacore subculture which I had no idea existed. Taqwacore is punk rock movement that has emerged following the publication of Muhammad Michael Knight’s 2003 novel, The Taqwacores, depicting a fictitious Islamic punk rock scene. The word has been derived by combining two words – “taqwa”, an Islamic concept of love and fear for Allah, and “hardcore”, the punk rock subgenre. In other words, Taqwacore can be viewed as a punk music with a Muslim connotation.

According to Hebdige, “spectacular subcultures express forbidden contents in forbidden forms. They are profane articulations and they are often and significantly defined as unnatural…” This can be applied to the Taqwacore subculture where express ion of forbidden content in forbidden forms is regular (e.g. expressing frustration of 9/11 attacks in their lyrics; women-led prayers). The basis of the subculture that is the merging of two seemingly incongruous identities contributes to the spectacular nature of the subculture. Punk rock, as a subculture and musical style actively resists mainstream society and embraces a marginalized identity and role in society. Punk rock blurs traditional boundaries between audience and performer and questions traditional or accepted norms and values. In stark contrast, Islam is a structured religion founded on a deeply personal and individual belief in God and is characterized by selflessness, devotion, and devout sense of social responsibility. From this we can call Taqwacore as a bricolage where the combination of various objects and ideas (in this case punk rock and Islam) appears nonsensical but makes perfect sense to the people involved in the subculture. For the Muslim punks, Taqwacore serves as a platform where they can embrace their own interpretations of Islam via punk rock and use internet to build communities and spread the message.Some of the popular Taqwacore bands are The Kominas, Al - Thawra and Vote Hezbollah.

For this blog article I will be examining the dressing styles and choices by the Muslim punks by viewing it from the two forms of incorporating a subculture – (a) the commodity form & (b) the ideological form. In the Subcultures Reader, Hebdige refers to the commodity form by mentioning that the subculture is communicated through commodities even if the meanings attached to those commodities are purposefully distorted. For the punk rock scene, this commodity form is represented in through the use of spikes, chains, mohawks and dyed hair. Interestingly enough, the Muslim punks combine both the usual punk rock associated styles (use of mohawk and spikes) and Arab traditional wear such as hijabs and the traditional Palestinian checkered scarves which can be seen in the below pictures.

The ideological form occurs when the subcultural style becomes more accepted through the labeling and re-defining of deviant behavior by dominant groups such as the media or the police, through various forms of communication technology. Before the use of pins and spikes on clothing was unheard of and would probably be labeled as fashion disasters. But now, it has become a part of mainstream media and hence has become acceptable. Even in the Qatari society, you can see young females wearing abayas with spikes and pins.

Once Upon A Subculture

Throughout the years the subculture of hipsters has evolved significantly. There has been resistance from society towards hipsters and what they embody and represent. I associate hipsters with being totally against the mainstream and conventional ideas. The phrase “don’t trust the system,” reminds me of the hipster style since it seems that the subculture strongly value nature, originality and freedom beyond the confinements of society. The hipster subculture is a culture within the larger culture. They have their own set of beliefs, values and interests. The subculture discussed is at variance with the larger culture. It seems to me that hipsters are completely against the materialistic way of life and the obsession with consumerism. However, that has drastically changed as the subculture has been accepted and incorporated into the larger culture.

Recently, hipsters have been made apart of the mainstream and larger culture. Websites like Tumblr has helped incorporate the subculture into the larger society. It has become the norm and popular to dress and have similar beliefs which were originally that of hipsters. Is it ironic that a subculture that is built on a belief that is completely against society become incorporated into the mainstream? Are we all hipsters at heart? Has the incorporation of the hipster lifestyle abolish the hipster subculture? All these questions formulated in my head when the hipster incorporation took place. It was confusing seeing a subculture resisted by the masses becoming a trend. However, further reading suggested that the taking on of a subculture by the popular media is a frequent occurrence.

Hebdige brought up two ways in which this occurrence happened. The subcultural styles are incorporated into the mainstream culture by the commodity form and/or the ideological form. The commodity form is “the conversion of subcultures signs into mass-produced objects.” This implies that corporate companies use these subculture styles to create new trends. The ideological form is “the labeling and re-definition of deviant behavior by dominant groups.” The two forms can be applied to the diffusion of the hipster subculture into the popular media. Since culture is not fixed it can take on many different trends and continuously alter.

The Meaning of Style and Subcultures in Qatar

For this blog post, I decided to visit a mall and, using prior knowledge about subcultures in Qatar and building off of what we had discussed in sociology class, see if I could determine if people were part of a subculture from how they were dressing, and to also observe if, and how, mainstream fashion and commercialized commodity play a role in Qatar’s subcultures or the lack of them.

Focusing on Qatari women, it was initially hard to determine if a person was just attempting to express individuality, a shift towards a subculture, or just a slight deviance from the dominant culture. After a lot of slightly creepy staring and observation, I began to determine who might fall where. There were some girls with huge hipster glasses and dip-dyed hair peeking out from their sheila, and some with ombre fishtailed braids and galaxy printed leggings in the changing rooms. Others had on abayas with huge studs, or studded belts around their abayas, and bags with studs, and bracelets with studs, and shoes with studs and even headbands with studs. To me, these all seemed to be women who were pulled into the commodity form of a subculture, most likely that of the reemerging mainstreamed hipster or grunge, and not belonging to it at all and probably not knowing the origins of such stylistic choices. However, there was one woman that I saw who stood out (and I apologize that I have no photos of this as the woman was very conservative). One woman who I saw without her abaya, in the changing room of H&M, had on a pair of creepers, I have never seen them sold here so I doubt they are part of the mainstream culture or fashion in Qatar. She also had a lot of short pink and blue hair and chains, which I had never seen on a Qatari woman before, and, from my knowledge on such things, seemed very punk rock in the way she was talking and carrying herself. When recalling this incident to a friend, she told me “she must have been a boya”.

In such a conservative society, it is hard for many women to express their subcultural interests without being labeled as a boya (a tomboy), or being too weird or different, or bringing shame to the family name. From my time spent observing different people, I noticed that it is very important to look at the dominant culture when discussing or examining youth subcultures. To have a spectacular subculture in Qatar that creates ‘noise’ and interference in the orderly sequence and leads to deviation from the cultural norms would be looked down upon with great distain and would probably be legally impossible. The types of subcultures that we see out in the open in more liberal countries such as punks, goths, emos, cosplayers, and grunge are all represented externally by a specific style that defines them as being part of that subculture. In Qatar, these representations of subcultures still exist, but are harder to determine as if one is not fully submerged in the style of a subculture and only partaking in minimal attempts to symbolize their choice are they part of the subculture at all? There are few groups of people who consider themselves as punks, emos, goths or grunge, and yet their styles do not reflect that of the general subculture, as in Qatar, to dress in full representation would be socially unacceptable. In Qatar, it seems as though those who wish they belonged to a more stylistically expressive subculture and could publicly display this are out of luck.

The concept of the commodity form comes into play in this context, as most people who wish to represent a subculture in Qatar end up buying into the commercialized and mainstream forms of it and missing the entire concept of being a subculture. Very few people often succeed in remaining original, mostly by creating their own original clothing or adapting the mainstream fashions back to representing their subcultures in a way that is not part of the dominant culture. Dick Hebdige refers to this commodity form in “The Meaning of Style”, The Subcultures Reader, stating, “as soon as the original innovations which signify ‘subculture’ are translated into commodities and made generally available, they become ‘frozen’. Once removed from their private contexts… they become codified, made comprehensible, rendered at once public property and profitable merchandise.”

Another way of examining and defining the stylistic choices of many Qatari women can be to look at it from the ideological form. As mentioned by Hebdige, the ideological form is when the subcultural style becomes more accepted through the labeling and re-defining of deviant behavior by dominant groups such as the media or the police, through various forms of communication technology. In Qatar, the wearing of studs and spikes on almost every visible surface of an abaya would, in the past, be unheard of and would probably result in many upset mothers, however, now that it is just part of the new mainstream fashion, it seems to be very acceptable. According to Hebdige, “the media, as Stuart Hall has argued, not only record resistance, they ‘situate it within the dominant framework of meanings’ and those young people who choose to inhabit a spectacular youth culture are simultaneously returned, as they are represented on TV and in the newspapers, to the place where common sense would have them fit.” This alludes to the idea that there probably was a group of Qatari girls who did wear spikes in the beginning - for a purpose other than to be cool and fashionable and were probably trying to express their allegiance to a goth or metal subculture.