Nike Hijab Pro

On December 1, the Nike Pro Hijab became available in the global shop of the swoosh. The hijab is the most common type of veil used in the Muslim societies, and its sporty version is the first ever produced by a big brand, that has normally avoid to get into the religious dress code of the Muslim religion. The launch of the product raised a lot of talks about it: on one hand, it allows to Nike to enter in the Islamic market, on the other, it affects the effort of the American brand in the struggle for inclusiveness of Islamic woman in sports. Of course, it raised critics and compliments.

The hijab is made in a single layer of the mesh, and it has an elastic binding that lets the wearer adjust the hijab to her head and her sport. An ice skater, for example, needs a tighter fit for twirling. Nike also made the back of the hijab long so that it won’t come untucked during activity. Nike developed the hijab with Haddad and other Muslim athletes, such as figure skater Zahra Lari, and got feedback from advocates and local communities to ensure the design met cultural requirements. Nike will likely become the largest player in the market for performance hijabs, which has only just started to emerge in recent years, as smaller, independent brands have looked to technical fabrics to meet the needs of female Muslim athletes. 

The Hijab pro reaffirms Nike’s inclusive values, which the company has put front and center since the election of US president Donald Trump. “The Nike Pro Hijab has been a year in the making,” the company said in its announcement, “but its impetus can be traced much further back to Nike’s founding mission, to serve athletes, with the signature addendum: If you have a body, you’re an athlete.” The product was announced during the travel Ban posed by the new President against the citizens of 9 Muslim countries.  On social media, the response to Nike’s hijab has been mixed. On Twitter many users criticised TIME's magazine the decision to insert it into the list of 25 Best Inventions of 2017, claiming that Hijab was always there and this is a cultural appropriation by Nike. Even the first adv for the product was highly criticized for the misrepresentation of the woman's life in the Muslim countries.

Vice Sports collected some opinions Muslim women and activist about the Hijab. Shenila Khoja-Moolji, a visiting scholar at the University of Pennsylvania, wrote in Al Jazeera that Nike, among other companies marketing these kinds of products, is selling “an imagined feeling of inclusivity to Muslim girls who often do not experience it in their daily lives.” She warned that this type of “tokenistic inclusion” could distract from serious conversations about social reform and reduce Muslims to a target market. Iranian journalist and human rights activist Masih Alinejad was born in Iran and now lives in the United States. She’s the creator of the #MyStealthyFreedom and #WhiteWednesday campaigns in which Iranian women dare to upload images of themselves, sans hijab. Alinejad applauds Lari and Nike for helping the Muslim minority in America—but she also believes it could normalize oppressive behavior by regimes such as the one in Iran.