@font-face { font-family: "Times"; }@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } In October 2010 the Constitutional Council of France approved a law banning the burqa and niqab from all public places. Joining the ongoing scholarly discussion on veiling, this study seeks to understand the role the French press played in legitimating the ban, the first of its kind to be implemented in Europe. I argue that discourse in the press made the legislation appear reasonable and necessary because of its association with gender inequality and religious fundamentalism. This media narrative legitimated the legislation by presenting the veil as intolerable and “against public social order.” Made necessary by rapidly shifting demographics in contemporary France, this discourse was couched in a defensive employment of laïcité.

A law proposal was passed by the Danish parliament in 2018 prohibiting the wear of niqab and burqa in all public spaces. This study aims to analyse the discourse of the debate in the parliament leading up to the passing of the law by using Fairclough’s method of critical discourse analysis. The analysis focusses on the construction of Muslim women in the Danish parliament’s debate regarding the ban on niqab/burqa in public spaces, thereby centering the gendered role of islamophobia. Fairclough’s method of critical discourse analysis is used in the analysis in conjunction with perspectives from postcolonial theorists such as Said, Spivak, Yeğenoğlu and Mohanty. The study concludes that the discourse of the debate can be understood as a form of cultural violence. By drawing on orientalist and white feminist discourse it reproduces a cultural hegemonic relation between Western societies and their “Others”. Culture and religion are used as explanations for gender oppression, placing the fault on the “Other”. This not only stigmatizes anyone who is understood as an “Other” but also obscures gender oppression among the majority Danish population making it harder to address.