Winner - Australian Book Industry Awards 2006 - Australian Book of the Year for Older Children
Notable Book - Selected as a Notable Book by the Children's Book Council 2006
Long listed for the UK Galaxy Book Awards 2006
Short listed for the Grampian Children’s Book Awards UK 2006
Notable Book - Selected as a Notable Book by the Children's Book Council 2006
Long listed for the UK Galaxy Book Awards 2006
Short listed for the Grampian Children’s Book Awards UK 2006
Summary
This is the story of Amal, an Australian-Palestinian girl living in the suburb of Melbourne, Australia. She makes a big decision to war the hijab full time, which is the Muslim head scarf. Her parents make warnings that ridicule and mocking is to come since she goes to a prep school, home of snobby kids. She makes this decision from within and on her own, based off her faith, and wants to take this next step. Can she take the taunts, deal with crushes, friends and still stay true to herself?
My Thoughts
First off, I found it interesting that Amal decided to wear the hijab full time, she was first inspired from Rachel from Friends. Could this be that they idolize American culture? Through the book there are many components of Middle East included, like vocabulary. For example Yallah mean comes on or hurry up, Assalamu Alaykom- Peace be upon you. She introduces a culture and practices we wouldn't otherwise now unless we were them or had personal connections with people from the Middle East. For example the hijab, the afternoon prayers and morning prayers, there is a good look into the culture. This book is written by Randa Abdel-Fattah who she herself lives in Australia, so she knows that culture and is a Muslim-Palestinian-Egyptian, who decided to wear the hijab full time from 13 to 17, so she has personal experience with the journey. So not only do you get to learn about Middle Eastern culture, some Jewish, Christian, Japanese, British, but about Australian too. It is one big set of cultural learning.
There is the idea of ridicule and not acceptance. Her friend Yasmeen says, "What are you trying to do to yourself? Isn't it hard enough with a last name the length of the alphabet Now you want people to wonder if you're batting for Osama's team? Stick with the anonymity girl!" (20). Her reaction to her friend wanting to go deeper in her faith and wear the hijab full time is not supporting her freedom to chose as she pleases. Luckily Amal realizes she is just kidding, but what if she didn't? Her parents reaction is different, "Since when do people see it as a mere piece of material? You and I both know that's being a tad optimistic, ya Amal" (24). They are also depicted as a them, not an us. As Amal talks about, once the veil goes on they become an UCO's (Unidentified Covered Objects). People stereotype them into a 'muslim appearance' and are surprised when they are not as they imagined. Readers could learn from this not to judge a book by it't cover and instead look inside of them and get their deeper meaning.You can't judge a culture or people, you can look at an individual and see that they can be different or the same, but everyone is different. Tia is the one girl who can get under Amal's skin, because she knows nothing but the negatives and stereotypes and doesn't bother to learn about the individual. Amal is one of the strongest characters in the book.
"You know what? Who cares what normal is, Simone? Let's protest. From now on we're the anti-normal, anti-average, anti-standard" (83). This quote from Amal says it all. She is becoming more comfortable in her own skin and is encouraging her friends to do so too. By telling Simone that she is gorgeous and doesn't need to lose weight. She is a supportive friend and cares about their well being. Even Amal's mother tells her to be respective of elders, and that everyone has a different perspective and was raised differently I find this to be an important message that the readers could learn from. Her parents are also vastly different than I had expected from reading other Middle Eastern literature. So it shows that even though she is Middle Eastern, and her parents are not the stereotypical ones. There is the other side though, her Uncle, Aunt and Cousins who are Middle Eastern try to erase that identity and live as Aussies. They chose to assimilate to the culture, and change names, not live by Islamic rules and dye their hair. Her Uncle Joe believe that Muslims are better off retreating and concealing their identity, not only because they need to assimilate but also to get ahead in society (107). Islamics and Middle Eastern's are lumped into one category, so whenever tragedy strikes they are all blamed as a group and Amal can feel their watchful eyes; why can't they show respect, and that not every one of them is bad? Peace does come when everyone is mourning over the tragedy in Bali, where they can all be together and not think of their labels or identity. Amal puts it best when she says she is a colorful adjective (359). All of her hyphens put together.
But there is respect shown for Amal, from her friends and even the boy she likes. They understand that it is her decision and respect her for being bold and standing up for what she believes in, especially Tia the mean girl. She believes in what her hijab and religion stand for and she doesn't allow exceptions, like when Adam wants to kiss her. She stands firm in her beliefs and doesn't submit to the peer pressure. She is an example of how hard growing up being more than one culture is and the struggles that it entails, but also the triumphs she can achieve. God says,"We have created man and know what his soul is whispering within him. We are closer to him than his jugular vein" (336).
There is the idea of ridicule and not acceptance. Her friend Yasmeen says, "What are you trying to do to yourself? Isn't it hard enough with a last name the length of the alphabet Now you want people to wonder if you're batting for Osama's team? Stick with the anonymity girl!" (20). Her reaction to her friend wanting to go deeper in her faith and wear the hijab full time is not supporting her freedom to chose as she pleases. Luckily Amal realizes she is just kidding, but what if she didn't? Her parents reaction is different, "Since when do people see it as a mere piece of material? You and I both know that's being a tad optimistic, ya Amal" (24). They are also depicted as a them, not an us. As Amal talks about, once the veil goes on they become an UCO's (Unidentified Covered Objects). People stereotype them into a 'muslim appearance' and are surprised when they are not as they imagined. Readers could learn from this not to judge a book by it't cover and instead look inside of them and get their deeper meaning.You can't judge a culture or people, you can look at an individual and see that they can be different or the same, but everyone is different. Tia is the one girl who can get under Amal's skin, because she knows nothing but the negatives and stereotypes and doesn't bother to learn about the individual. Amal is one of the strongest characters in the book.
"You know what? Who cares what normal is, Simone? Let's protest. From now on we're the anti-normal, anti-average, anti-standard" (83). This quote from Amal says it all. She is becoming more comfortable in her own skin and is encouraging her friends to do so too. By telling Simone that she is gorgeous and doesn't need to lose weight. She is a supportive friend and cares about their well being. Even Amal's mother tells her to be respective of elders, and that everyone has a different perspective and was raised differently I find this to be an important message that the readers could learn from. Her parents are also vastly different than I had expected from reading other Middle Eastern literature. So it shows that even though she is Middle Eastern, and her parents are not the stereotypical ones. There is the other side though, her Uncle, Aunt and Cousins who are Middle Eastern try to erase that identity and live as Aussies. They chose to assimilate to the culture, and change names, not live by Islamic rules and dye their hair. Her Uncle Joe believe that Muslims are better off retreating and concealing their identity, not only because they need to assimilate but also to get ahead in society (107). Islamics and Middle Eastern's are lumped into one category, so whenever tragedy strikes they are all blamed as a group and Amal can feel their watchful eyes; why can't they show respect, and that not every one of them is bad? Peace does come when everyone is mourning over the tragedy in Bali, where they can all be together and not think of their labels or identity. Amal puts it best when she says she is a colorful adjective (359). All of her hyphens put together.
But there is respect shown for Amal, from her friends and even the boy she likes. They understand that it is her decision and respect her for being bold and standing up for what she believes in, especially Tia the mean girl. She believes in what her hijab and religion stand for and she doesn't allow exceptions, like when Adam wants to kiss her. She stands firm in her beliefs and doesn't submit to the peer pressure. She is an example of how hard growing up being more than one culture is and the struggles that it entails, but also the triumphs she can achieve. God says,"We have created man and know what his soul is whispering within him. We are closer to him than his jugular vein" (336).
Review From the New York Times
The teenage-girl-as-outsider novel has a venerable tradition, one that predates even the very notion of teenager -- think Jo in ''Little Women.'' The exploration of what it means to come of age as an individual in the sometimes stiflingly conformist world of the young has produced beautiful literature, like Katherine Paterson's ''Bridge to Terabithia,'' and diverting, insightful storytelling, as in ''All-American Girl'' by Meg Cabot and ''Looking for Alibrandi'' by Melina Marchetta.
''Does My Head Look Big In This?,'' by Randa Abdel-Fattah, gives us a new kind of outsider. The narrator, Amal Mohamed Nasrullah Abdel-Hakim, is the only Muslim student in her class at an elite prep school in an upscale suburb of Melbourne, Australia. Already an oddity (''the teachers labeled me slow in preschool because I was the last child to learn how to spell her name''), Amal raises the bar several notches when she decides to adopt the hijab, the women's head covering that many Muslims believe to be a requirement of their faith. That she makes this decision while watching a ''Friends'' episode in which Jennifer Aniston endures the horror of having to appear at her ex's wedding in a hideous bridesmaid's outfit signals Amal's bifurcated worldview, divided between the orthodoxies of pop culture and the traditions of her faith.
There aren't a lot of modern Muslim women's voices in contemporary fiction, so it's refreshing to hear this one. At school, from the principal's office to the playground, Amal has to battle the common assumption that the only reason she's wearing a scarf is because her oppressive parents forced her. In fact, her broadminded parents, though devout, worry about her decision and its implications for her happiness in a sometimes prejudiced culture. There are many reasons a Muslim woman might wear the veil: religious conviction (because the Koran requires modest dress), political radicalism (a symbol of rejection of the West), feminism (de-commodifying female beauty), sisterhood (hijab-wearing women tend to help one another), or even to attract an eligible man (the type that doesn't consider an unveiled woman a suitable marriage prospect).
Amal, sassy and spirited, knows a mere piece of fabric isn't a barrier to ambition -- like the real-life Aussie who designed the first ''burkini'' for Muslim women to wear at the beach. But Amal also knows it puts her in the path of all the anger and incomprehension generated by 9/11 and the 2005 Bali bombings.
In asmuch as Abdel-Fattah uses Amal to defeat stereotyping of Islam, this is a valuable book, occasionally an entertaining one. But it would have been more valuable and entertaining if it weren't so very clear that Abdel-Fattah is using Amal. The book too often veers into an eat-your-peas preachiness that makes it less of a novel and more of a tract. The author also lacks a genuine ear for high school nuance: those delicious, evanescent, almost anthropological details that so enrich works by Cabot and Marchetta (who teaches at an all-boys school in Sydney and has said she never sends off a book until a trusted crew of pupils has scoured it for inauthentic details). I also found it highly implausible that in Australia, where elite private schools are overwhelmingly single-sex institutions, an observant Muslim family would choose to send their daughter to a coed high school.
Abdel-Fattah, a lawyer, attended a Catholic primary school and an Islamic college; at 13, she decided to wear the hijab full time. She says she stopped wearing it outside of school at 17, anxious about prejudicing her job prospects. A novel based more closely on her own difficult choices might have had an authenticity -- of voice and of emotion -- that this one, sadly, too often does not.
By GERALDINE BROOKS
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=980CE4DA103AF935A2575AC0A9619C8B63&ref=bookreviews
''Does My Head Look Big In This?,'' by Randa Abdel-Fattah, gives us a new kind of outsider. The narrator, Amal Mohamed Nasrullah Abdel-Hakim, is the only Muslim student in her class at an elite prep school in an upscale suburb of Melbourne, Australia. Already an oddity (''the teachers labeled me slow in preschool because I was the last child to learn how to spell her name''), Amal raises the bar several notches when she decides to adopt the hijab, the women's head covering that many Muslims believe to be a requirement of their faith. That she makes this decision while watching a ''Friends'' episode in which Jennifer Aniston endures the horror of having to appear at her ex's wedding in a hideous bridesmaid's outfit signals Amal's bifurcated worldview, divided between the orthodoxies of pop culture and the traditions of her faith.
There aren't a lot of modern Muslim women's voices in contemporary fiction, so it's refreshing to hear this one. At school, from the principal's office to the playground, Amal has to battle the common assumption that the only reason she's wearing a scarf is because her oppressive parents forced her. In fact, her broadminded parents, though devout, worry about her decision and its implications for her happiness in a sometimes prejudiced culture. There are many reasons a Muslim woman might wear the veil: religious conviction (because the Koran requires modest dress), political radicalism (a symbol of rejection of the West), feminism (de-commodifying female beauty), sisterhood (hijab-wearing women tend to help one another), or even to attract an eligible man (the type that doesn't consider an unveiled woman a suitable marriage prospect).
Amal, sassy and spirited, knows a mere piece of fabric isn't a barrier to ambition -- like the real-life Aussie who designed the first ''burkini'' for Muslim women to wear at the beach. But Amal also knows it puts her in the path of all the anger and incomprehension generated by 9/11 and the 2005 Bali bombings.
In asmuch as Abdel-Fattah uses Amal to defeat stereotyping of Islam, this is a valuable book, occasionally an entertaining one. But it would have been more valuable and entertaining if it weren't so very clear that Abdel-Fattah is using Amal. The book too often veers into an eat-your-peas preachiness that makes it less of a novel and more of a tract. The author also lacks a genuine ear for high school nuance: those delicious, evanescent, almost anthropological details that so enrich works by Cabot and Marchetta (who teaches at an all-boys school in Sydney and has said she never sends off a book until a trusted crew of pupils has scoured it for inauthentic details). I also found it highly implausible that in Australia, where elite private schools are overwhelmingly single-sex institutions, an observant Muslim family would choose to send their daughter to a coed high school.
Abdel-Fattah, a lawyer, attended a Catholic primary school and an Islamic college; at 13, she decided to wear the hijab full time. She says she stopped wearing it outside of school at 17, anxious about prejudicing her job prospects. A novel based more closely on her own difficult choices might have had an authenticity -- of voice and of emotion -- that this one, sadly, too often does not.
By GERALDINE BROOKS
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=980CE4DA103AF935A2575AC0A9619C8B63&ref=bookreviews
Review of the review
I agree that the coming of age story in a conformist world make for a good story. It is inspiring because we all go through it. She has been labeled since she was young. Like the review says, ''the teachers labeled me slow in preschool because I was the last child to learn how to spell her name." From a young age she had to deal with the labels and assumptions about who she is and going to be. I think that she does a have a divided world view, between her religion and pop culture. She is always referencing her magazines and what pop stars say and do. Like when she talks about boys she references the tips she has read and their advice on when they like you. I also agree that there are not many strong modern Muslim women voices in literature. It took me awhile to find the books for this project. She is strong willed, driven and ambitious and she doesn't want the hijab to stop her. She has moments when she contemplates if it was the right idea to go through with, but she goes back on her word and faith, affirming that this is what she feels is right. Unfortunately she is lumped with every negative news article about Muslims or Islamics who have caused terror, bombings or other crimes. She doesn't let that bother her, she usually has a comeback for them, showing she is gutsy. I do agree that the author uses Amal to defeat the stereotype of Islam. I don't get the feeling that she is deliberately using Amal as a tool, but instead another character breaking out against her struggles of her identity being a minority. The reviewer questions if it is actually realistic that a Muslim family would send their daughter to a co-ed private high school. I think why not. She deserves to get whatever education she wants, no discrimination on that. I also disagree when Time says that this doesn't have the voice of authenticity and emotion. I felt with Amal the whole time I was reading. Since the author went through a similar experience I think that makes this an even more genuine
Abdel-Fattah, R. (2005). Does my head look big in this?. New York: Orchard Books.