The keffiyeh, and the power of fashion

Susan Kaiser in her book, The Social Psychology of Clothing:

clothes influences how we represent our identities...interact with others...and are influenced by, and contribute to, the cultures and time in which we live

Is fashion political?

Fashion is political. Politics is inherent in fashion. But it is not simply the clothing itself that are political, but the context behind them, that is political. Much like a piece of artwork, or poem, or any other form of art and media, it is most of the time the intention or message of the creator that turn the product from apolitical to political. 

Context is powerful. A red hand imprint on a t-shirt won't really have any meaning or political connotations until it is known that the red hand on the shirt symbolizes the sexual assaults the wearer experienced. Now, the shirt is not merely a piece of fabric, but a message, a sign of rebellion against the rapist or even the bigger entity that back up and/or limit help for the victims. 

So yes, fashion can be used as a form of rebellion and resistance, and we have seen this way too many times throughout history:

1. "Fur is dead" is a campaign by PETA, a famous organization that is against animal cruelty and the unethical treatment of animals. They often send animal activists to crash runways with cardboard signs that says something along the lines of stop-using-animal-as-fur-for-your-coats. In this sense, fashion does something controversially political, and a political group fight back.
2. In the 70s, 80s and 90s when feminism was making large waves and rage women would protest by throwing away their bras into this big trash can and burn all of it afterward. Bras were seen as a way to constrict the liberation of a woman's body because why does society boos upon women tits and not men?

There are so much more examples of how fashion and politics intertwine, but today the discussion will be focus on an important piece of clothing that is relevant to the occupation of the Israeli government in Palestine, specifically the Gaza strip. The keffiyeh is a symbol that have been and is continuing to get use in the Palestinian liberation movement as the keffiyeh symbolizes social justice, freedom and liberation.

Not only is it important to understand the significance of the keffiyeh as a piece of clothing, it is crucial to dig deeper and learn about how the keffiyeh shape the West perception of Palestinians, the culture and identities built on the foundation of this solidarity symbol.

The example of the keffiyeh

In the recent mass protesting across many American universities demanding these institutions to completely cut ties with Israeli partners and stop funding the genocide. The students that are at the core of these protests and encampment wear the keffiyeh on their head, hang it across their tents. On marches in the streets we see people wear keffiyehs and keffiyeh-pattern clothing.

Bella Hadid wore a keffiyeh inspired red dress during her time at the Cannes, one of the biggest film events of month, which sparked a large discourse online that benefitted tremendously toward the Palestinian liberation movement by bringing more awareness to the genocide occurring in Gaza. We see fashion content creators on TikTok especially making videos discussing the keffiyeh and it's significant, discussing Bella's outfit (some of these creators have never talked about anything Palestine related prior). This allow for a new set of audience to be reach and educated about the important of the keffiyeh and the genocide in Gaza.

According to another design, Hushidar Mortezaie, it was not an easy thing - to design a spaghetti strap dress with asymmetrical hemline out of the keffiyeh fabric - saying he had "nightmares" about it still.

The mini dress itself was made in February of 2001 by Micheal and Hushi, the designer duo who also made the black/white keffiyeh halter top worn by Carrie Bradshaw in an episode of season four of Sex and the City. 

And yes, Carrie probably did not know about the significance of the keffiyeh nor wore it because she support the cause of liberation and justice of Palestine under Israel occupation, as a lot of people probably do. What does this say about the commodification and power (stripping of power) of the keffiyeh?

The keffiyeh as a social identifier

What is so interesting is you can just be going on with your daily life and if you wear a keffiyeh you are subtly resisting the genocide. It also lets other people know your resistance without you having to do much talking. In a way it keeps Palestine alive and remembered. Standing in solidarity you find others who carry the same symbol of liberation, signifying community activism at its finest. Wearing the keffiyeh means you have made a statement.

Erving Goffman work is helpful to understand the function of the keffiyeh as a social identifier of sort. Goffman writes "Individuals, like other objects in this world, affect the surrounding environment in a manner congruent with their actions and properties, their mere presence produces signs and marks. Individuals, in brief, exude expressions". "Individuals, in brief, exude expressions" what does that mean? Well think of individuals in this context that we are discussing, as groups wearing keffiyehs (like occupied Palestinians) who are opposing the US-backed Israeli army with well funded and newest models of weapons. Here, the keffiyeh embodies solidarity for social justice, with similar effect as, say, verbal/protest chants. Therefore the keffiyeh, this piece of clothing not be merely a wearable thing, but a mute communicator, able to send political messages to the audience. Perhaps it may even is more powerful, since it is a graphic, and anyone who understands the language and context of the keffiyeh understand its political statements, unlike chants where one need to know that specific language to comprehend. The keffiyeh stands for the universal language of solidarity for social justice and liberation.

Strip from its meaning, into a piece of accessorizer

Following the dictates of neoliberalism, and as other scholars have noted, the keffiyeh has largely, though by no means entirely, been commodified by western fashionistas and hipsters (Salem, 2008; Schwartz-DuPre and Scott, 2015). In so doing, its political power analyzed above has in many cases been leached from its fabric. But what does this say about how culture works? For one, it tells us about the sort of control that is immanent in global capitalism. Indeed, as Patricia Clough notes in The Affective Turn, this ‘control is linked to the tendency in capitalism toward what Marx referred to as real subsumption, where capital shifts its domain of accumulation to life itself, to preindividual bodily capacities, so that value is produced through modulating affect’ (2007: 20). The monetary value here, the only sort of value recognized by capitalism, depends upon devaluing the politico-cultural aspects that made and make the keffiyeh an important symbol for solidarity. As Theodor Adorno suggests, ‘The mechanism for reproducing life, for dominating and destroying it, is exactly the same, and accordingly industry, state and advertising are amalgamated’ (2005 [1954]: 53). If recognized as political, the value for sales desiccates, as no entity, corporeal or corporate, wishes for any label affiliated with ‘terrorism’. Ngai provides additional theoretical weight on this point with respect to tolerance in the neoliberal project, ‘the object of tolerance in any affluent market-centered democracy is perceived to be harmless or relatively unthreatening. Its ability to be tolerated in this sociopolitical context thus becomes an index of its sociopolitical ineffectuality – in particular, its ineffectuality as a mechanism for dissent and change’ (2005: 341–2; original emphasis).

The Occident perception of the keffiyeh

But there is another side of this portrayal and significant of the keffiyeh. For decades the west has push the narrative that the keffiyeh represents terrorism and criminalization. They have turn the keffiyeh into a piece of propaganda.

Numbers from LexisNexis, an American data analytics company found that the US media portrayal of the keffiyeh is automatically violent and terror-related. Only 10 articles and other form of media from prominent media outlets used the word "keffiyeh" in combination with "social justice" while there were 202 articles and forms of media that incorporated the combo "keffiyeh" and "terrorism.

10 and 202. Sit with it. There is an oblivious, drastic bias that should have not come as a surprise, from US medias on Palestine liberation and Palestinians. How astounding that a, seemingly, piece of cloth, could show

From this it should come at no surprise as to why so many Americans, who are constantly exposed to these pieces of propaganda on a daily basis, believe these lies. All they are fed are supposed "terrorists" wearing keffiyeh and not the farmer with his keffiyeh in occupied Palestine, trying to survive day by day. So when they are fed one thing over and over again, they start to believe and live it. The sole presence of this image dominate the understanding of the keffiyeh cultural seating within the bigger movement and agenda of anti-arab racism and pro-isreal views.

Their narrative is: terrorists wear keffiyehs, Palestinians wear keffiyehs, Palestinians are terrorists

The other perpetrator: fashionistas

Besides masking Palestinians as terrorists, the West has taken the Keffiyeh and stripped away its meaning and turn it into simply a piece of fabric. There's a clear pattern here, as the hijab/niqab were also fetishized and seen as rendering submissiveness, and banned in France. Important clothing pieces (that are not seen as merely clothing pieces but as weapons) that hold weight historically and culturally, became neutralized as fashion, and politicization as threats.