CAIRO – American Muslim students donning hijab in the University of California have shared their experiences of stigmas they usually face during a special performance in the campus.

“I’m already a woman, and I’m already black,” Damali Stennette, a fourth-year anthropology student, told Daily Bruin.

“I could take off my hijab, but I’ll feel vulnerable regardless.”

Stennette said she chooses to continue wearing the hijab despite occasional harassment because Islam is an integral part of her identity.

The young woman recalled how a Christian preacher singled her out from the Bruin Walk crowd.

The preacher said, “You are evil, and everything that will come out of your womb is evil because you are Muslim.”

Stennete shared her account with other six Muslim UCLA students who recalled their account of struggles for wearing a hijab.

“(My hijab) allows people to get to know me and see me for who I am rather than my body,” Stennette said.

“There are a lot of women who feel a sense of freedom from being covered.”

The show, Hijab Monologues, explored their personal relationships with the Muslim custom of wearing the hijab, said the show’s founder and director Merima Tričić.

Tričić said she came up with the idea for the show at the start of her college career, when she began wearing the hijab.

Countering stereotypes, she wanted to set up a creative platform on her campus to educate non-Muslims about Islam and the traditional headdress.

“If you go on Google and type in ‘Muslim women,’ I guarantee you the first three or four pages is all these sad women in black with jail bars on their face,” Tričić said.

The show comes in light of recent events on campus, such as a chalk writing in South Campus saying “Stop the Jihad”.

“I’ve had a student on campus yell ‘Allahu Akbar’ at me and make explosion noises,” Tričić said.

Tričić said several non-Muslim audience members have approached her after past Hijab Monologues to tell her they enjoyed the event because they learned things from their Muslim peers that they would have been too afraid to ask about directly.

“I want to show people I’m human,” Stennette said.

“I hope UCLA students learn that Muslim women are regular people who cover a little bit more of our bodies.”