This volume counters the prevailing Western views and stereotypes of Muslim women - usually projected through male interpretations - by presenting a cross-cultural perspective of their experiences and choices in contemporary Muslim communities. The main theme running through these papers is the manner in which Muslim women consciously as well as unconsciously manipulate religious belief to negotiate their gender roles within the context of their lives.
Do Muslim Women Need Saving? is an indictment of a mindset that has justified all manner of foreign interference, including military invasion, in the name of rescuing women from Islam. It offers a detailed, moving portrait of the actual experiences of ordinary Muslim women, and of the contingencies with which they live.
Until now the bulk of the literature about the veil has been written by outsiders who do not themselves veil. This literature often assumes a condescending tone about veiled women, assuming that they are making uninformed decisions choices about veiling makes them subservient to a patriarchal culture and religion. “Rethinking Muslim Women and the Veil” offers an alternative viewpoint, based on the thoughts and experiences of Muslim women themselves. This is the first time a clear and concise book-length argument has been made for the compatibility between veiling and modernity. Katherine Bullock uncovers positive aspects of the veil that are frequently not perceived by outsiders. “Rethinking Muslim Women and the Veil” looks at the colonial roots of the negative Western stereotype of the veil. It presents interviews with Muslim women to discover their thoughts and experiences with the veil in Canada. The book also offers a positive theory of veiling. The author argues that in consumer capitalist cultures, women can find wearing the veil a liberation from the stifling beauty game that promotes unsafe and unhealthy ideal body images for women. This book also includes an extensive bibliography on topics related to Muslim women and the veil.
This authoritative “go-to” publication aims to educate women on how to express their rights within Islam. Perfect for enabling activists to integrate an egalitarian Islamic belief system into their movements. The most effective means of improving Muslim women's lives is connecting them to their deeply held beliefs that affirm human dignity and gender equality at the core of the Islamic faith. But Muslim women lack this information that enlightens and vouches for their sacred rights, and they have no accessible tools that encourage faith-based activism consistent with the Islamic faith. To protect them from being misrepresented by or outside their communities, there is a need to provide pre-packaged, easy-to-understand literacy tools to women so they can lead lives of choice, dignity, and opportunity. 30 Rights of Muslim Women aims to fill this gap.
An increasing number of American women are embracing Islam, already over one million converts. These are modern American women born and brought up in America to non-Muslim parents. They have journeyed down the path of Islam without giving up their American heritage and found liberation and self-actualization by becoming Muslims. "This book presents the personal accounts of six American Muslim women who have been kind enough to share their first-person stories of the winding roads they traveled en-route to embracing Islam. In giving their personal portrayals of their individual journeys to Islam, some of these sisters-in-Islam have publicly proclaimed far more about their personal lives than they normally would be willing to share. In essence, they have sacrificed some of their personal privacy, as well as some of their normal reticence and modesty about their personal and private lives.Being American sisters-in-Islam does not mean that we are any less zealous than other Americans in cherishing our rights as Americans, and it does not mean that we are any less patriotic... What the authors... share with other modern women in America is immense, and cannot be easily overstated... However, despite all the things that we share with our fellow Americans who are non-Muslims, what we have come to share with our worldwide sisters-in-Islam is especially sweet and appealing. While each of us remains an American, we are Americans who have joined a very special and caring sisterhood that transcends biological inheritance, personal genetics, ethnicity, race, and socioeconomic status. We have come to understand and to love the fact that what is important is individual righteousness, notsuperfluous consid
A classic, pioneering account of the lives of women in Islamic history, republished for a new generation This pioneering study of the social and political lives of Muslim women has shaped a whole generation of scholarship. In it, Leila Ahmed explores the historical roots of contemporary debates, ambitiously surveying Islamic discourse on women from Arabia during the period in which Islam was founded to Iraq during the classical age to Egypt during the modern era. The book is now reissued as a Veritas paperback, with a new foreword by Kecia Ali situating the text in its scholarly context and explaining its enduring influence. “Ahmed’s book is a serious and independent-minded analysis of its subject, the best-informed, most sympathetic and reliable one that exists today.”—Edward W. Said “Destined to become a classic. . . . It gives [Muslim women] back our rightful place, at the center of our histories.”—Rana Kabbani, The Guardian
Who says you can’t be pious and fashionable? Throughout the Muslim world, women have found creative ways of expressing their personality through the way they dress. Headscarves can be modest or bold, while brand-name clothing and accessories are part of a multimillion-dollar ready-to-wear industry that caters to pious fashion from head to toe. In this lively snapshot, Liz Bucar takes us to Iran, Turkey, and Indonesia and finds a dynamic world of fashion, faith, and style. “Brings out both the sensuality and pleasure of sartorial experimentation.” —Times Literary Supplement “I defy anyone not to be beguiled by [Bucar’s] generous-hearted yet penetrating observation of pious fashion in Indonesia, Turkey and Iran... Bucar uses interviews with consumers, designers, retailers and journalists...to examine the presumptions that modest dressing can’t be fashionable, and fashion can’t be faithful.” —Times Higher Education “Bucar disabuses readers of any preconceived ideas that women who adhere to an aesthetic of modesty are unfashionable or frumpy.” —Robin Givhan, Washington Post “A smart, eye-opening guide to the creative sartorial practices of young Muslim women... Bucar’s lively narrative illuminates fashion choices, moral aspirations, and social struggles that will unsettle those who prefer to stereotype than inform themselves about women’s everyday lives in the fast-changing, diverse societies that constitute the Muslim world.” —Lila Abu-Lughod, author of Do Muslim Women Need Saving?
A pioneering work on controversial issues within the Muslim world Islamic Ethics of Life considers three of the most contentious ethical issues of our time--abortion, war, and euthanasia--from the Muslim perspective. Distinguished scholars of Islamic studies have collaborated to produce a volume that both integrates Muslim thinking into the field of applied ethics and introduces readers to an aspect of the religion long overlooked in the West. This collective effort sets forth the relationship between Islamic ethics and law, clearly revealing the complexity and richness of the Islamic tradition as well as its responsiveness to these controversial modern issues. The contributors analyze classical sources and survey the modern ethical landscape to identify guiding principles within Islamic ethical thought. Clarifying the importance of pragmatism in Islamic decision making, the contributors also offer case studies related to specialized topics, including "wrongful birth" claims, terrorist attacks, and brain death. The case studies elicit possible variations on common Muslim perspectives. The contributors situate Muslim ethics relative to Christian and secular accounts of the value of human life, exposing surprising similarities and differences. In an introductory overview of the volume, Jonathan E. Brockopp underscores the steady focus on God as the one who determines the value of human life, and hence as the final arbiter of Islamic ethics. A foreword by Gene Outka places the volume in the context of general ethical studies, and an afterword by A. Kevin Reinhart suggests some significant ramifications for comparative religious ethics.
