Excerpt:
The vast majority of women surveyed who wear the niqab in Canada are not only willing to remove their veils to be identified, but feel it is part of their responsibility to do so, according to the most extensive research of its kind.
The niqab has become a polarizing issue in the federal election — with the Conservatives vowing to limit its use in certain circumstances — but interviews with niqabists themselves suggest some political assumptions about them are incorrect.
In fact many of the women interviewed for the study Women in Niqab, by Concordia religion and Islam professor Lynda Clarke, were "irritated" by the widely held belief that they were being forced to wear the veiled garment.