Female subordination in the Arab-Israeli community: The adolescent perspective of “social veil”

Our research studied the gender-specific perceptions of Arab-Israeli adolescents regarding issues that determine female subordination (e.g., inheritance rights, freedom of movement, and female chastity). The main finding shows that young females oppose the imposition of social constraints upon women significantly more than their male counterparts, while both sexes are in agreement regarding the issues they conceive more or less traditionally; both express the strong conservative attitudes regarding the Islamic code of protecting female honor and chastity. The findings imply that, while females do not oppose the preservation of the cultural code that underlies their subordinate position, they ascribe to it more lenient normative implications.This paper developed out of the masters thesis of Mr. Mohammed Masalha submitted to the Department of Sociology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem under the supervision of the first author and Professor Reuven Kahane. Special thanks are due to Helene Hogri for her indispensable editorial assistance and to Zvi Richter for his statistical aid. We also thank the NCJW Institute for Innovation in Education for funding the technical aspects of this paper.