Veiling in Style: How Does a Stigmatized Practice Become Fashionable?

TLDR

Stigma is widespread, yet consumer research on it is limited and mainly addresses stigma management. The study investigates how veiling moves from stigmatized deviance to a fashionable choice by mapping the processes of stigmatization and destigmatization. Using ethnographic research of urban Turkish covered women, the authors trace veiling’s shift from stigmatized practice to mainstream fashion and discuss its effects on choice, habitus, class, and market‑religion dynamics.

Abstract

Abstract Although stigma is prevalent in everyday life, consumer researchers’ interest on the topic remains scant and focuses mostly on stigma management. We move beyond individual coping strategies and examine the processes of stigmatization and destigmatization. Through an ethnographic study of fashion consumption practices of urban Turkish covered women, we explore how veiling, a deviant practice stigmatized in the secular and urban mind-set, first became an attractive choice for some middle-class women and then transformed into a fashionable and ordinary clothing practice for many. We map out the global multi-actored work that underlies the emergence of veiling as an attractive choice and explicate its gradual routinization and destigmatization. We discuss the findings in terms of their implications for understandings of choice and free will, the formative role of fashion in the evolution of a new habitus and social class, and the relationship between the market and religion.