The Authority and Symbolism of the Turban in Yemeni Society: Signifier and Signified

Abstract This study examines the turban (al-‘imāma) in Yemeni society as a semiotic object whose meanings have shifted from a utilitarian head covering to a marker of status and, ultimately, to a religious and political emblem. Through a semiotic framework, it investigates the signifier–signified relationship as it appears in texts, images, and social practices, situating the turban within a broader symbolic system that organizes social differentiation, belonging, and legitimacy across tribal, religious, and political fields. Historically, the Zaydi Imamate integrated the turban into a stratified—at times racialized—order of distinction. The 26 September Revolution reduced its official display without erasing its symbolic power. In the present, particularly within Houthi discourse, the turban is redeployed to evoke ancestry, sacral authority, and political entitlement, functioning as a visible medium for symbolic power in Bourdieu’s sense. The study draws on classical Arab sources, ethnographic and historical accounts, and cultural-semiotic theory (Saussure, Eco, Barthes, Hall, Goffman) to trace how the turban’s meanings are produced, circulated, and stabilized. It concludes that the turban remains a living sign: a regulatory device within tribal performance registers, a resource for symbolic capital, and a vehicle for redefining social boundaries and claims to legitimacy in contemporary Yemen.