Gender in Islam: Negotiating Advocacy

When Islam is discussed in contemporary discourse, lurking in the background of every discussion is the question of gender. In discussions of gender, the interplay of religion, and specifically Muslim women, is often kept in the margins. This presentation examines the implications of gender in Islam with a specific focus on domestic violence, veiling, and education. Understanding gender as both a lens through which to evaluate the world and as a means of structuring power, the research explores the context and history, the modern manifestation of these concerns, and current resistance and advocacy for change from within Islam. This is a critical inquiry of a variety of sources, including historical analyses, memoirs of Muslim women and girls, spoken testimony of religious leaders, and film. The presentation seeks to identify methods of alleviating the problems from the interaction of religion and gender within a Muslim, non-Western framework.