ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on how wearing the cadar (face veil) is part of the subculture of some Indonesian pesantren (Islamic boarding schools) having strong affiliations with the Tablīghī Jamāʿat and Salafi movements. Wearing the cadar for this type of pesantren is an important aspect of ideal Islamic femininity. Nisa analyses the life experiences of cadari (face-veiled wearers) in pesantren by unpacking its disciplined living arrangements that typify Erving Goffman’s total institution (1984). Pesantren is a locus of resocialisation for the students’ changing lifeworld where they learn new norms and values. Nisa discusses Michel Foucault’s earlier work on discipline and punishment, and the panopticon which also give insights into analysing pesantren characteristics in the context of the discipline of the body. The concept of taat (obedience) and face-veiled students’ efforts to discipline their bodies aligns with Foucault’s analysis of the panopticon. The chapter also expands other scholars’ views on how pious subjectivity can be both agentive and docile. In the case of cadari, their obedience in striving to be pious children involves seeing themselves through the eyes of pesantren authority figures and their parents. Therefore, their taat agency, which is embedded in their obedience, is not entirely individuated and self-focused.
