[Bok]

Is there space for feminism in Islam?
Journal no.8 1996. pp4-5.

Saba Risaluddin

If by 'feminism' is meant the demands of certain women for the right to behave as badly as men, the question is easily answered with a simple negative. But I hope that even in the context of a title composed of words so loaded with association as 'women, religion, feminism and fundamentalism', there is the possibility of a more nuanced argument.

By 'fundamentalism', I presume is meant the exclusivism of those - of whatever faith - who claim that they are following the precepts of their faith when they behave in ways that are distasteful or offensive to the people who consider themselves to be I against fundamentalism'. Many Muslims find this use of the word baffling when applied to Islam, especially in the context of human rights and women's rights. The fundamentals of Islam - its holy scripture, the Quran and the words and deeds of the Prophet - affirm for all, women and men, rights that were in the Prophet's day, and remain to this day, more genuinely egalitarian and just than any modem, western concept of human rights. The most exciting work being done today by Muslim theologians, many of them women, in this field is precisely that which seeks to reclaim the founding values of Islam, to strip away the accretions of culture, the ingrained patriarchal traditions, which have over the centuries distorted those founding values.

If this can be accepted by western feminists as meriting the label 'feminism', then undoubtedly there is space in Islam for feminism. Some Muslims might prefer not to use the word 'feminism' at all, fearing a tendency for western feminists to dismiss the work of Muslim theologians and Muslim activists whose concern is women's rights, because their endeavours are sometimes seen to lead to conclusions that they, the western feminists, may find hardly less distasteful than what they call 'fundamentalism'.

It is an almost instinctive reaction among Muslims to appeal to the Quran and to the traditions of the Prophet Mohammed when challenged to justify their actions. But what different Muslims make of text and tradition is another matter. A literalist interpretation, taking verses in isolation, may find justification for beliefs or behaviour that those who appeal to the ethos, the spirit of the Quran would find entirely indefensible. Many verses of the Quran refer to the innate spiritual and moral equality of men and women, starting from the creation itself, when "your Lord ... created you from a single soul and created its mate (zawj -one of a pair, with no connotations of gender) of like nature, and from them both scattered countless men and women". The constant Quranic concern for justice extends to its "particular solicitude toward women ... It provides particular safeguards for protecting women's special sexuallbiological functions such as carrying, delivering, suckling and rearing offspring".(1) Only later, under Jewish and Christian influence, did the ordinary Muslim come to believe that Adam was first created and that Eve was made from Adarn's rib, and thereby to assign to women an ontologically inferior status.

Notwithstanding these Quranic and Prophetic warrants for treating women and men with equality to the point of what would now be called positive discrimination in favour of women, in many Muslim societies the survival of pre-Islamic mores or the influence of other cultures has led to girls and women being devalued, with all the consequences thereby entailed. Some Muslims - those who are commonly tagged 'fundamentalist' among them - seek to justify the abuses that result from this bias in Islamic terms; but it is not hard to find Muslim theologians, sociologists, historians, human rights lawyers and others who challenge such distortions.

Valuable as are the endeavours of activists in the field of women's rights in Muslim societies, enduring change is perhaps most likely to result from the work of Muslim theologians such as Riffat Hassan, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Louisville, Kentucky. On the creation of humankind and the myth of Adarn's rib, Professor Hassan writes: "While this myth is obviously rooted in the Yahwist's account of creation in Genesis 2:I8~24, it has no basis whatever in the Quran which describes the creation of humanity in completely egalitarian terms. In the thirty or so passages pertaining to the subject of human creation, the Quran uses generic terms for humanity (an-nas, al-insan, bashar) and there is no mention in it of Hawwa' or Eve. The word Adam occurs twenty five times in the Quran but it is used in twenty one cases as a symbol for self-conscious humanity. Here, it is pertinent to point out that the word Adam is a Hebrew word (from adamah meaning the soil) and it functions generally as a collective noun referring to the human rather than to a male person. In the Quran, the word Adarn (which Arabic borrowed from Hebrew) mostly does not refer to a particular human being. Rather it refers to human being in a particular way. ... An analysis of the Quran descriptions of human creation shows how the Quran evenhandedly uses both feminine and masculine terms and imagery to describe the creation of humanity from a single source.... It is difficult to imagine that Muslims got this idea (that Hawwa'/Eve was created from Adarn's rib) directly form Genesis 2 since very few Muslims read the Bible. It is much more likely that the rib story entered the Islamic tradition through being incorporated in the Hadith literature during the early centuries of Islarn."

Professor Hassan has demonstrated that hadith relating the rib story are weak with regard to their isnad, while "as far as their content (matn) is concerned, it is obviously in opposition to the Quranic accounts about human creation. Since all Muslim scholars agree on the principle that any hadith which is in contradiction to the Quran cannot be accepted as authentic, (these) ahadith ought to be rejected on material grounds. However, they still continue to be a part of Islamic tradition." This is in part because they are included in the hadith collections of Bukhari and Muslim, which are widely regarded as almost as unassailable an authority as the Quran itself. Professor Hassan continues: "The continuing popularity of these ahadith amongst Muslims in general also indicates that they articulate something deeply embedded in Muslim culture, namely, the belief that women are derivative and secondary in the context of human creation."(2)

Riffat Hassan's analysis demonstrates in intellectual terms what is all too evident from a sociological perspective - that there is a real need to rethink the way in which women are perceived in some Muslim societies and by some Muslim individuals. The fact that she and others are able to develop a specifically Muslim feminist theology, underpinning the work of activists in the field, shows clearly that feminism of a distinctively Islamic nature exists and is carving out a space for itself.

NOTES I Sura 4, al-Nisaa (Women), v. I.
2 "The development of feminist theology as a means of combating injustice toward women in Muslim communities and culture", paper delivered to the 22nd International Student Conference of Jews, Christians and Muslims, 6-I3 March I995.
http://waf.gn.apc.org/journal8p4.htm

[Bok]

Some different definitions and quotes on feminisms: from feminists:

"We are putting a new face on feminism, taking it beyond the women's movement that our mothers participated in, bringing it back to the lives of real women who juggle jobs, kids, money, and personal freedom in a frenzied world. Women may have been granted grudging access to the job market, but we still bear much more of the burden than men: it costs more money to be a woman, we have to work harder just to be considered competent, we do all the emotional maintenance work in relationships, and all the old stereotypes that keep us from being respected unless we act like men remain firmly in place."
http://www.io.com/~wwwave/

"We strive to combat inequalities that we face as a result of our age, gender, race, sexual orientation, economic status or level of education. By empowering young women, Third Wave is building a lasting foundation for social activism around the country."
http://www.thirdwavefoundation.org/

"While feminists in the second wave were more focused on fighting for gender equality in the workplace, abortion rights and economic parity, today's activists say they are looking at a wider range of topics through the feminist lens.

Rather than seeing this as evidence of a dissipated movement ... younger women now have the liberty to offer their unique perspectives on everything from arts and culture to prison reform.

"I think that the impact of the feminist movement was in helping women to achieve a voice," said Krishnamurthy, 25. "Now, we are articulating that voice in a multiplicity of ways."
http://www.womensene...0/context/cover

"... a particular brand of Muslim feminism has developed in recent years which is neither westernised and secular nor Islamist and ultra-traditional, but instead is trying to dismantle the things which enforce women's subjugation within the Islamic framework."
http://www.guardian....comment/story/0,...,796213,00.html

[Bok]

"Some consider 'Islamic' and 'feminist' perspectives as mutually exclusive or deny the need for an Islamic feminism with the argument that Islam as it is has already given women all their rights. An investigation of women's activism in Muslim societies through the prism of 'Islamic feminism' takes a different point of departure. Rather than contrasting these terms, it points to the possibility of connecting perspectives grounded in feminism and Islam. Yet, simultaneously, it also brings to the fore that such a linkage does not come about automatically. Being involved in politics, Islamist women need to take a position vis-à-vis state policy and oppositional movements. Arguing in terms of Islamic concepts, they engage in debates with those claiming positions of religious authority. Debating gender, Islamist women activists relate to women's daily-lived realities."
http://www.isim.nl/i...m_feminism.html

"Today Muslim women are striving for greater inclusiveness in many diverse ways, not all of them in agreement with each other. ...

As the term ‘Islamic feminism’ gained currency in the 1990s through scholars and activists, it would clarify the perspective of a large number of women somewhere between Islamists and secular feminists. While they would not give up their allegiance to Islam as an essential part of self-determination and identity they did critique patriarchal control over the basic Islamic world-view.

By going back to primary sources and interpreting them afresh, women scholars are endeavoring to remove the fetters imposed by centuries of patriarchal interpretation and practice. By questioning underlying presumptions and conclusions they are creating a space in which to think about gender. Drawing upon enduring principles of human rights, enshrined in the text, they extract meanings that can interact with the changing moral and intellectual circumstances of the reader. And women scholars and activists are also busy constructing a system of legal reforms that can be implemented today for the full status of women as moral agents at all levels of human society."
http://www.newint.or...e345/legacy.htm


"People (like myself) who have only recently become acquainted with feminist thought, can rarely escape the feeling of being completely overwhelmed by the amazing scope and variety of ideas and approaches that are being discussed in feminist literature. There is Marxist Feminism, Socialist Feminism, Existential Feminism, Post-modernist Feminism, Psychoanalytic Feminism, Liberal Feminism, Radical Feminism, "Western" Feminism, "Third-World" Feminism, Feminism in Literature, Feminism in Anthropology , etc, etc. ... But what I want to do here is to draw attention to the possibility of something that is "home-grown": a feminism that bases itself on Islam, and tries to defend women’s rights on the basis of an enlightened understanding of religion.
http://www.birzeit.e...ov/bah1198.html

[Bok]

And if ya'll not sick of my feminist links yet try:

http://www-stu.calvi...04.12/ess2.html
http://www.arches.ug...Islamwomen.html
http://www.shobak.org/islam/women.html

For starters

[Mowlana Vector]

Muslim Sisterhood Eclipses Feminism, Says Brit Convert

Muslim women's sense of sisterhood makes "Western feminism pale into insignificance", says Yvonne Ridley, the tabloid journalist who converted to Islam after her experiences in a Taleban jail.

"I know I shouldn't generalise, but Western women are always bad-mouthing each other, pinching each other's husbands and boyfriends and trying to pull each other down," says Ms Ridley, a dryly witty Brit in her mid-40s who is speaking in New Zealand this week.

"Muslim women pull each other up and are encouraging of each other. They pull together."

That, coupled with her discovery that Islam was not the oppressor of women as she had believed, persuaded her to trade her Protestant faith for Islam in 2003.

Thrice-married and solo mum to 12-year-old Daisy, Ms Ridley exchanged a hedonistic life full of overwork and late-night boozing ("I used to be like a tightly coiled spring and I hated my own company") for alcohol-free piousness, full-time hijab (hair coverings) and five prayer sessions daily.

"I'm much calmer now," she admits. "Life is simpler. I'm happier and healthier."

Ms Ridley, now political editor of Islam Channel, a London-based satellite service, enjoys the respectful behaviour that her conversion prompts in others. It's a while since she has heard a really filthy joke and doesn't miss them. Her hijab has provoked hostile glares in public. She is not disturbed, but wonders what stokes such aggression.

With a foot in both Western and Muslim worlds, Ridley is a frank and often amusing commentator on the gulf between. She hit the headlines in 2001 after the September 11 attacks. Then a Sunday Express journalist, she sneaked into Afghanistan, at the time ruled by the fundamentalist Taleban.

According to her darkly funny book In the Hands of the Taliban, she was burqa-clad and posing as a deaf mute when the donkey she was mounting moved. Ridley yelled "Flaming Nora!" and as she reached for the reins, her camera - a banned item - swung into the view of a passing Taleban soldier.

During her 10 days in captivity, Ms Ridley was treated respectfully. Although terrified, she decided to behave as badly as possible, spitting and swearing. There was, she says wryly, no chance of getting Stockholm Syndrome - a condition in which hostages begin to side with their kidnappers.

Once home, she started reading up on Islam and got a shock: "The Koran makes it clear that women are the equal of men. The image I had ... was that they were shackled to the kitchen sink."

The Muslim women she met were welcoming. Still, it took her 2 1/2 years to convert.

Some friends "ran away, but they're creeping back". Her mum, a regular church-goer, was accepting; her father died two months ago still "in denial".

In New Zealand for the first time, Ms Ridley has been impressed by the cohesiveness of New Zealand's 40,000-strong Muslim community. Followers of different backgrounds mingle easily, something she says does not happen in Britain.

The openness reinforced what she had heard: that New Zealand "has a fantastic reputation for its humanitarian approach and welcoming refugees with open arms - and for refusing to get involved in an illegal war".

She is now an fervent anti-war campaigner - "bombs don't discriminate" - and admires New Zealand having the "guts to plough its own furrow".
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FURTHER READING
Muslim Women With Attitude

Mood Swings: Who's Afraid of Islamic Feminism?

Muslim Women Are Not Idiots!

Re-Orienting Western Feminisms: Women's Diversity in a Postcolonial World