Why Don't You Just Take it Off?

Through collaborative autoethnography, a mother and a daughter with shared and diverging identities examine the hijab as a radical practice of feminist resistance in our lives. Our lived experiences as Indo-Caribbean social workers and university educators at a predominantly white institution offer a unique point of departure from normative narratives of hijabi girls and women. Using a critical feminist analysis, we chronicle our journey through more than 60 years of patriarchal oppression and white supremacy. Our stories reveal a complicated relationship with the hijab as an important faith practice which also functions as a marker of otherness that signals unbelonging in all spheres of our lives including the academy and social work practice.