Cover Story | Al Jazeera World

Social dynamics are changing in Turkey.

When Turkey was founded in 1923, it was on firm secular principles. Turkish women were banned from headscarf – known as the hijab outside Turkey – in all public sector jobs and universities for most of the 20th century.

During the current AKP party government, a young, confident, female, Muslim middle class has emerged, that is less worried about being socially accepted and more comfortable sharing public spaces with secularists.

Hulya Aslan is the editor of Ala, a monthly fashion magazine in Istanbul that serves a growing Turkish market of Muslim women who think that fashion and Islam are compatible – ‘conservative’ women who want to wear the hijab but also want to dress fashionably, with colour and style.

This film follows Hulya Aslan at Ala and looks at hijabi fashion, social change in Turkey and the ongoing debate about a Muslim woman’s right to choose how she dresses.

2014 Al Jazeera Turk/ 2015 Al Jazeera English (Al Jazeera World strand)

Filmmaker: Ayse Toprak

48 mins