to be relevant to nationalist formulations in many
Islamic cultures. According to Chatterjee, the
Bengalis structured a cosmology of modernity and
nation intended to sustain the anti-colonial strug-
gle. In this world-view, the Bengalis aspired to
become identical to the British colonizer in an outer
material domain but preserve difference in an inner
spiritual domain as a means of resistance. Middle-
class women had a significant role in this formula-
tion of the national project by being the hallmark of
the internal spiritual domain, untouched by and
protected from the political field within the colo-
nial state. The home was imagined as the realm of
the spiritual and accordingly feminine and tra-
ditional, in which the “‘true identity” existed,
whereas the outside world was imagined as mate-
rial and masculine. Moreover, the idea of the “new
woman” was invented and then indoctrinated as a
means of formulating an authentic modernity. The
new woman was contrasted with modern Western
society but at the same time she was distinguished
from the “old,” namely, traditional woman. Tra-
dition, then, played two conflicting roles in the
Bengali nationalist construct: it was a positive
marker of the cultural essence but it was also the
negative reverse of modernity and thus should be
left behind (Chatterjee 1993).
In spite of diverse trajectories of postcolonial
states, and running the risk of reductionism, simi-
lar imaginations of nationalism are evident in
Islamic countries that experienced colonial encoun-
ters. In Algeria, for one, the family was represented
as a sanctuary of “authentic” values, and the
woman as the guardian of traditional values vis-à-
vis colonial influences. Akin to the Bengali case, an
Algerian convention of the “new woman” emerged
as a direct opposite to the one of the “traditional
woman,” serving as a banner of Algerian anti-colo-
nial nationalism and fueled by the ethos of the
heroine mujàhidàt (female liberation warriors)
(Cherifati-Merabtine 1994). Azerbaijan provides
another illustration for the convention of women
as repositories of tradition and national identity in
the context of confronting colonial domination.
Unable to resist Russian cultural domination, the
private domain was perceived as the ultimate
fortress of identity. In order to avoid the negative
label of “Russified,” women were assigned the role
of bearing “the ethno-nationalist load” (Tohidi
1996). Pakistan may provide an additional case in
point, especially with regard to women’s education
at the turn of the twentieth century, when the con-
finement of women’s education to household
chores and religious teaching was perceived as
Muslim cultural resistance against colonialism and520 nation, women, and gender
Hinduism (Jalal 1991, 81). The idea of the family as
the bastion of the nation was evident also in Central
Asia (Khalid 1998, 226). These illustrations clearly
reflect the ambivalence embodied in the notion of
the “new woman” in the context of nationalism, a
convention symbolizing tradition and its negation
at the same time.
In some of the states that did not experience a
direct colonial confrontation, however, the idea of
modernity as an acute break with the past was pro-
moted by the state more aggressively than in others
and lacked the cultivation of the notion of tradi-
tion-as-authentic. Such was the case of Kemalist
Turkey, which turned its back on the Ottoman past
on the grounds of its “traditional” nature. As illus-
trated by Kandiyoti, the cultural elite, collaborating
with the state, promoted a cultural refashioning of
not only new idealized femininity but also modern-
ized masculinity. Hence, reformers and novelists
represented the Ottoman father and husband as an
authoritarian figure who displayed little feeling for
his family, while expecting the ideal “new man” of
the Turkish nation to be emotionally close to his
family and directly involved with his children (Kan-
diyoti 1998, 281). A comparable project of pro-
moting new wives and mothers for the sake of the
nation in accordance with the new totem of moder-
nity occurred also in Iran of the last decades of
the nineteenth century and the early decades of the
twentieth century, when women were assigned the
role of producing the new citizens of the nation
(Najmabadi 1998b).
The convention of women as the prosopopeia of
the national spirit and honor, associated above all
with their marital role while seeing the nation as an
extended family, is one of the most profound fea-
tures of nationalist discourses around the globe.
Just as universal is the idealization of masculinity as
the foundation of the nation and society, to use
Mosse’s phraseology (Mosse 1985, 16). This role
assigned to the “women of the homeland,” highly
regarded as it has been, has often been in conflict
with interests of women (Yuval-Davis 1997, 67).
Family honor has been employed as a means of for-
tifying patriarchal power by way of controlling
female behavior and sexuality. This social trend
was not eased by the appearance of nationalism
but rather was reinforced and re-presented, now
through nationalist idioms. The latter supported
the male homosocial nature of nationalist dis-
courses in a way that prevented any significant
emancipation after national independence. Egypt at
the turn of the twentieth century provides a typical
case in point. Popular notions about family honor
and female sexual purity were elevated to a national