The latest article on Asra Nomani and her struggle for the recognition that women are God’s creation, not man’s slave. Both Muslim Wakeup! and altmuslim are cited in the article and they have had great coverage on the issue. I’ve posted some of my thoughts on MWU in the comments section.
Related Posts
The New Orientalists
An upcoming article talks about lenses used to describe the lives of Muslim women (via Law and Humanities Blog): "Popular narratives produced from the west, particularly since 9/11, perpetuate negative stereotypes about Middle Eastern Muslim women. Native writers settled in the west also dish out heart-rending tales of women's oppression in fundamentalist Islamic societies, targeting a western audience long fed on tales of Islam's intolerance towards women. These 'New Orientalist' narratives, portraying Muslim women as hapless victims of Islamic fundamentalism, only serve to reinforce the stereotypes entrenched in popular western imagination. With Azar Nafisi's Reading Lolita in Tehran as a…
More on Women and the Veil
This one is an interesting take on a non-Muslim woman who has to wear the veil in Saudi Arabia. I’m curious about somethings. Towards the end, she is on the sidewalk unattended by a male. Is that not a problem? She can’t be in the bank with her male escort, so she’s left unescorted outside? Also, isn’t the abaya supposed to be the thing that hides women? Are they be veiled and separated in a different room? I know all these things intellectually, but to read her story helps to highlight the contradictions. Technorati Tags: veil, Saudi Arabia, women in…
Muslim Chic
Here is a nice piece from HuffPo that tries to understand why Muslim women wear the hijab. I think it is still a bit essentializing, but overall is very good.
One thought on “Women in Mosques”
Comments are closed.
I am convinced that much of the trouble in the Muslim world is related to the treatment of women in Muslim societies. From an educational and economic point of view, the stagnation is obvious. I am, however, speaking about a loss at the spiritual level. We are created in God’s image. For me, this is not a literal reference to our physical bodies, but rather, a very important aspect of the masculine and feminine nature of creation and the Creator. When we subjegate one half of that spirit, our world will indeed be out of balance.
Bloody hell: school children held hostage in Russia; suicide bombings in Israel and Moscow; mosque burning in Nepal, give the women their rights, education, and their dignity. Then and only then can the Muslim world address its other problems. How can we even begin to speak about cultural and religious pluralism when we are not even allowed to speak openly with one half the segment of society.