This is the real face of Iranian women

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/14/real-face-hijab-iranian-women-facebook

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The Facebook page "Stealthy freedoms of Iranian women", where Iranian women are sharing photos of themselves without their hijab, is attracting attention in the world's media. That is no surprise. Iran is a country that has been represented through the garb of its women for the past 30 years. The way Iranian women dress has been a brand used both by the Islamic republic, which wishes to portray the country as uniformly pious, and western onlookers who find the exoticism of the hijab irresistible. What is new here is that the photos are being shared by consenting women in poses that they have chosen; it is re-appropriation by people whose image has often been snatched away or co-opted for varying agendas.

The page name could have been better translated to "freedoms on the quiet", since the word "yavashaki" [furtive in Persian] also incorporates the word "yavash" meaning gently. Iranian women have been pushing against the boundaries of the hijab gently but doggedly for these 30 years. When I returned to Iran from the UK 22 years ago, one of my cousins joked that the only form of resistance to the creed of the new republic has been the persistence of Iranian women to play with the rules of hijab, something that has now created a national style of fashion being applauded as a revolution by the western onlookers, and emulated in neighbouring Muslim countries as cutting edge.

It began in the home, where boundaries had to be negotiated with men of more traditional families to allow their women more space and presence in society. The Islamic republic is not generally credited with women's freedoms, but its laser sharp focus on women's bodies has unwittingly made women more determined and politically informed, and able to find empowerment despite the many obstacles.

Concessions against outmoded patriarchal values have been made in the home among families, to compensate for the harsh restrictions of the public space, therefore changing society from the bottom up. There has always been a gap between what the state prescribes for women and what families will allow here in Iran; it's referred to as the public vs private face of Iran. And the foreign onlooker has only been allowed a glimpse of the public side of our lives. On this Facebook page, a selection of Iranian women have chosen to unveil not just their hair, but their unseen world.

The female journalist Masih Alinejad, who created the page, is herself an embodiment of Iran's complex society. The product of a Chadori family, she made a name for herself as a journalist while in Iran. In exile she has maintained her investigative journalism about Iran from afar. On the Facebook page she says she wishes to give the same space that her mother and sister enjoy in Iranian society as veiled women, to those who wear the hijab because it is a legal requirement and not a personal choice. She is not against the hijab, she is for co-existence – something that happens in her family and many others here.

It will be hugely useful for scholars of social media to monitor this page to see how many women post their photos. To analyse and locate the comments that are being painstakingly translated, according to gender divide and their location. There is still much to be done for women's equality in legal terms in Iran, but the need to be seen as more than the mascot of the political system or the focus of the western gaze is becoming more pressing. The internet and social media are opening a window to an unseen corner of Iranian life. Hopefully one that won't have to remain furtive for long.