Story by Marie Sheena
Wearing a brown headscarf, paired with a red dress and gray pants under her black winter coat, she did her best managing nine students who were eager to go home after their Arabic lesson.
“We were learning about Prophet Noah today,” she said, “I told them the story of the ark and they had to either draw a picture or write a poem about it.” Mariam Roncero Moreno, 45, is a teacher at Dar Al Anwar in Granada, an association that offers Arabic classes and Islamic education. For three years, she has been happily instructing children from the age of 6 to 14 how to read and write in the ancient language of the Arab world.
However, before she accepted the job, she had to turn three others down, including an opportunity to teach American exchange students, because she refused to take off her headscarf. A representative of the school informed her she couldn’t wear a hijab because he was afraid “American students will think that we are kind of trying to implement Islam [in] them.”
Her experience is far from rare. In fact, Muslims in Granada have often experienced economic obstacles as a result of religious discrimination. There are those who are denied or even lose their jobs, while others feel pressure to hide their faith in order to earn an income. Moreno acknowledged that her financial situation has allowed her to turn down job offers, but she knows women who reluctantly decided to take off their hijabs because they needed the work.
“According to the Spanish constitution, Muslims have the right to express their religion privately and publicly so it should be accepted and respected everywhere,” Barbara Ruiz, 49, explained. Furthermore, she claimed that laws implemented by the government have not been helpful in combating Islamophobia in Spain.
Ruiz is a member of Junta Islamica and the vice president of Citizen Platform Against Islamophobia in Cordoba, another southern city about an hour and a half away. She acknowledged that if a woman wears a hijab, she is not likely to easily find a job in Spain. Junta Islamica investigates cases of discrimination, aggression, and exclusion on a national level. However, Ruiz said that most cases go unreported because people are afraid to come forward.
She further clarified, “In terms of exclusions for example, we do not have halal food in public centers, schools, or hospitals.” Halal means abiding by Islamic dietary rules, such as only using animals slaughtered by specific practices and food prepared without alcohol or pork.
Ruiz said that many feel particularly affected by the lack of sensitivity to Muslim history in Granada, as evidenced by the city’s annual event called “Fiesta de la Toma de Granada” every Jan. 2. The day celebrates the reconquest of the city by Catholic monarchs, Isabella and Ferdinand, and the removal of Islamic leaders in 1492 — which is also a time when Muslims were forced to convert to Christianity or tortured, stripped of their belongings and sent to prison.
Ouafa Haraja, 31, however, suggested that such blatant insensitivity and even bias is a legacy from more recent history. She connected it to when General Francisco Franco ruled from 1939 to his death in 1975, forcing Catholicism as the state religion and further marginalizing those who practice Islam.
Haraja, too, said she was denied a job because of her hijab. She came to Granada 10 years ago to seek professional opportunities in the tourism industry as a requirement to graduate from the University of Granada. But she couldn’t secure a job. She believes her headscarf was the reason and said two other women she knew suffered the same fate.
“I wouldn’t have been able to finish my career, or I would have had to lose the headscarf and I wasn’t willing to do that.” Fortunately, one of her professors was the director of a tourist company and offered to hire her and the others to help their academic careers.
Muslim women wear their headscarves to cultivate the virtue of modesty, even though it usually becomes the reason for the discrimination they claim to endure.
Moreno once succumbed to this reality and didn’t wear a hijab for five years starting at age 20. However she changed her mind 20 years ago while studying in Syria after she researched why Muslim women should cover themselves using headscarves.
“I don’t think the hijab makes you a better Muslim for sure,” Moreno continued. “But I think God wants us to be modest and to cover ourselves.”
While headscarved or hijabi women are most obviously connected to Islam, Muslim men in Granada have also experienced prejudice because of their faith.
Zacarias Rejon Lopez, 26, secretary of the Great Mosque of Granada, told a story about when he was fired from a restaurant, which he believes was because of his religion. The story revolves around the month of Ramadan, when practicing Muslims fast from sun up to sun down. After incessant pressuring from his colleagues on the job to eat something, he finally explained to them that he was Muslim and couldn’t indulge until the evening. He said he was fired the next day.
Lopez asked not to be quoted directly for fear or trouble in his community, but Moreno said she has seen this scenario play out multiple times. “The message from the media is so against Islam, that as soon as they know that you are Muslim, straight away you get pushed away.”
It’s not just Muslims finding it difficult to secure a job, however. According to EURES, an agency in the European Union established to facilitate employment, joblessness in the Granada province was more than 25 percent in 2017. But tellingly, a population survey done by Barómetro del Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas (CIS) shows that Muslims make up only 2.6 percent of Spain’s population — while the vast majority of the country practices Catholicism — further illustrating how marginalized the Muslim population is.
Nevertheless, while many Muslims associate discrimination in their community with the Islamic religion, Moroccan restaurant owner Mostafa Bougrine, 57, attributes the issue to a broader and more widespread prejudice against immigrants.
“If you are Arab and you are rich, there is no discrimination and no Islamophobia,” said Bougrine, who is a practicing Muslim, through a translator, “But if you are poor and you come from Morocco or Algeria, you are fired.” Although he has never worked for anyone, he has encountered occasional discrimination, which he described as, “Like with a waiter at a bar, or if I went to an office and they notice my accent, their attitude changes a little bit.”
Bougrine has lived in Granada for 30 years and opened Restaurante Arrayanes 10 years ago in the Albayzin, the street adjacent to Calle Calderería Nueva, famous among tourists. He described the atmosphere of his restaurant as an environment that would take visitors back to Moorish times in Granada, with blue Arabic patterns decorating the walls, stairs and tables.
Steps out his front door show a similar appreciation for the country’s connection to its Muslim history. At the shops on Calle Calderería Nueva, colorful scarves and bags line the small storefronts, hung and stacked next to souvenirs with illustrations of the famed Alhambra fortress, where sultans once ruled Granada for 800 years. Between the stores full of plates, hookahs and lamps with Arabian designs, there are cafes offering Moroccan tea.
“In one of those shops, there is one lady wearing her headscarf and there is no problem,” Fauzia Benedetti, 44, said. She used to work in Muslim-owned souvenir shops in the center of town. “And that’s why tourists go there, it reminds them of an Arab country.”
Moreno accepts this reality, but notes that tourist fascination with Moorish history is still a significant departure from cultural acceptance of Muslims. After bearing witness to that for so many years ago, she doesn’t hold out much hope that attitudes by the people of Granada will soon change.
“I think it’s going to get worse,” she said. “Why would it get better?”
A Northeastern University Special Project 