Inside and Outside the Hijab

Abstract

The plight of Pakistani women has been normalized under the hegemonic patriarchal rule. As public and urban spaces are gendered, women are normally confined to domestic and private spaces. This chapter explores Samra Habib's autobiographical narrative We Have Always Been Here: A Queer Muslim Memoir (2019) to examine the ways in which the spaces and spatialities in South Asian and Western urban spaces are portrayed. Drawing upon the theoretical perspectives of feminist and queer geography, the chapter argues that the Western urban spaces function as a space of utopia that overcomes the exclusionary practices of Pakistani society. Feminist geography attempts to include women as the primary subjects in the public space, and queer geographies delineate how queer individuals have been ostracized by Pakistani society in public and private spaces. Further, the study reveals that Western urban spaces liberate and provide a normative non-discriminatory environment that empowers women and queer individuals to celebrate femininity and sexuality as it did in the case of Samra.