More handpicked essays just for you.
Essay on role of women in islam
The role of women in Islam. Christianity, Islam, and the West
The role of women in Muslim society
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
“I could tell Rashida was smiling, because her eyes crinkled up. She pressed her cheek to mine. We are Shia girls.” (p.97) This is a defining line, which closes out the section “Shia Girls” from Kathleen Jamie’s 2002 book Among Muslims: Every Day Life on the Frontiers of Pakistan. To dive into why this line is so defining right away, would be overwhelming. First, some background information. Jamie (b.1962) is a writer from Edinburgh, Scotland. She attended Edinburgh University where she studied philosophy and began writing. Jamie traveled to the northern areas of Pakistan for the purpose of experience and to be able to write a piece of travel writing -------- which she titled The Golden Peak (1993). Ten years after her first visit, the writer returned to Pakistan as she had always hoped to do, but upon her return found a drastically different Pakistan. She summarizes her newfound experiences that she has, in her book Among Muslims: Every Day Life on the Frontiers of Pakistan. Here she reproduces the people and situations she’s encountered while evaluating all of the things around her. …show more content…
She begins with the text from a letter she received from Rashida, a Shi’ite woman she met and became quite close with the last time she went to northern Pakistan. In the letter, Rashida was asking Jamie to come live with her in Gilgit, her small town in Pakistan, for the rest of their lives. Although Rashida made sure to explain to Jamie that she would have to give up her Western lifestyle and begin living the life of a Shia girl. The term “Shia girl” is a very important idea in Jamie’s writing. For Jamie it does not only mean a girl who is Shi’ite, but rather an all inclusive term of the lifestyle of a Shi’ite girl living in
I’ve been reading Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly. For our first book meeting I was absent, but our group decided on reading through Chapter 4, which was about 64 pages. The book follows three main characters; Herta, a German doctor; Caroline, an ex-Broadway actress; and Kasia, a Catholic teenager living in Poland. Each chapter switches the perspective to one of these characters and tells part of their story. The structure of this book really helps me keep reading because every chapter is different. If you are bored with the chapter you are on, you know the next chapter will be breath of fresh air. It’s hard to fully capture the personality from only one or two chapters, but I’m not in love with all of the characters. Caroline, who works as
Major newspapers around the world wrote about Masih’s story, even though it was often demoted towards the end of the newspaper. It was not long before both the media and the public disregarded it. A little less than seven thousand miles away from Pakistan, however, another 12-year-old boy in Thornhill, Canada devoted Masih’s story to memory, an undertaking that signified the beginning ...
Laura Deeb’s An Enchanted Modern: Gender and Public Piety in Shi’i Lebanon seeks to rectify post-9/11 notions of political Islam as anti-modern and incongruous with Western formulations of secular modernity. Specifically, Deeb is writing in opposition to a Weberian characterization of modern secular Western societies as the development of bureaucracies through social rationalization and disenchantment. Within this Weberian framework Deeb asserts that Shia communities are in-part modern because of the development of beuorocratic institutions to govern and regulate religious practice. However, Deeb makes a stronger argument oriented towards dislodging the assumptions "that Islamism is static and monolithic, and that
Tucker, Judith E., and University Georgetown. Arab Women: Old Boundaries, New Frontiers .Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993. eBook Academic Collection (EBSCOhost). Web. 4 Nov. 2013.
Joseph Campbell describes the hero’s journey as a quest where the “hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man” (Campbell 7). The heroine’s quest, according to Valerie Estelle Frankel includes “battling through pain and intolerance, through the thorns of adversity, through death and beyond to rescue loved ones” (Frankel 11). Contrary to the hero’s journey, the heroine’s journey focuses on the “culture on the idealization of the masculine” while the hero’s journey focuses on the adventures. In the inspiring autobiography, I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban, Malala Yousafzai represents a heroine because she goes through the stages of the heroine’s journey as she refuses to be silenced and risks death to confront the Taliban on behalf of the young Pakistani girls that are deprived of education. The stages of the journey include the ordinary world, the call to adventure, the supernatural aid, the crossing of the first threshold, the road of trials, the ordeal, death and rebirth, and the return with the elixir.
The autobiography I am Malala by Malala Yousafzai begins with the scene of young pakistani education and women’s rights activist Malala being shot in the head. Her school bus had been stopped by the Taliban who, after asking which of the girls was Malala, put a bullet into her head. Malala ends the powerful prologue with the words “Who is Malala? I am Malala and this is my story” (9). Malala then rewinds to the story of her birth and how in Pakistan, no one congratulated her parents when she was born because she was a girl. Pakistani culture pushes for the birth of a boy as an islamic majority country. However, her father saw the potential in his daughter as a great leaser and named her after one of the great female leaders in Pakistan- Malalai of Maiwand who inspired the Afghan people, who were losing hope, to spur the army to victory against the British/Indian forces. Malala describes life in Mingora, Swat Valley, Pakistan. She outlines the Indian- Pakistan revolution and the shift of the Pashtun people into the Swat Valley. Malala’s father grew up in Shahpur but struggled to get his education in the town where he met Malala’s mother. They married and his dream of building a school, Khushal Public School, became reality when they moved into Mingora.
Lila Abu-Lughod’s article titled, “Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving?” takes a closer look at the problematic ethnocentric approach many have when trying to gain an understanding of another culture that may be foreign to that individual. In this analytical paper, Lughod looks at women in Islam, specifically the treatment of women and how it might be utilized as a justification for invading into a country and liberating its people. The country Lughod refers to in her article is Afghanistan, and Lughod points out the misunderstanding from the people to the Bush administration like First Lady Laura Bush who believed that intervention was necessary to free women from the captivity of their own homes. It is important to consider the role that different lenses play into all of this, especially when one’s lenses are being shaped by the media. Depictions of covered women secluded from society leave a permanent image in the minds of many, who would then later support the idea of liberation. This paper will discuss that the practice of using propaganda when referring to the lifestyle in the Middle East is not exclusive to the U.S; rather it has been utilized throughout history. Additionally, we will take a closer look on the importance of symbols, such as veils in this case; help to further emphasize the cause to liberate. Finally, we will analyze Lughod’s plea towards cultural relativism and away from liberal imperialism.
The religion of Islam was imposed upon Iranians, whether they liked it or not. Marjane and her classmates “...didn’t like to wear the veil, especially since we didn’t understand why we had to”(Satrapi 3). The young girls were against wearing the veil because they were not practicing
In the book, Women in the Middle East, a Saudi Arabian proverb states, "A girl possesses nothing but a veil and a tomb" (Harik and Marston 83). The key words, "veil" and "tomb" lend evidence to the fact that many Middle Eastern women lack identity symbolized by the “veil” and lack the right of ownership except for their veil and the tomb. This statement further enforces the notion that many women in the Middle East are expected to serve and tolerate the oppression of the men in their lives throughout their lives on this earth. Moreover, it confirms that many of these women do not get the opportunity to obtain education, join the work force, and even participate in the political affairs of the country. This arrangement further helps the Middle Eastern men to view women as their properties, servants, or even as slaves. Ultimately, there are three main reasons why Middle Eastern men engage in the act of oppressing their women.
Brooks, G. (1995). Islamic marriage. Nine parts of desire: The hidden world of Islamic women. London: Hamish Hamilton.
In a culture where stereotypes are so common and thrown left and right, it’s not uncommon to hear someone say “That guy looks suspicious” or “You’re such a FOB.” However, we must be careful when it comes to these remarks or stereotypes because we must remember that what we are doing is simply feeding more into a closed minded society and contributing to the derogating of a mixed society. In all three novels, Throne of the Crescent Moon, Anatomy of a Disappearance, and Lebanese Blonde, all three male Arab characters have shown that they go against this grain of the stereotypical Arab male gender/ culture. Whether it’s Doctor Adoulla Makhslood, the ghul hunter in the city of Dhamsawaat, who’s simply trying to rewind after a hard days of work and enjoy his tea; Or Nuri el-Alfi, the young boy with an odd fascination for a woman who becomes his step-mom with a father who can only be described as mysterious; Or Samir Tammouz, the reluctant individual who never quite seemed to fully grasp what he was getting himself into till it was too late. These three Arab male characters in all three novels are distinct in their own way and that’s what separates them from the mainstream stereotypes of the Arab male gender/ culture.
Hamid’s fiction deals with varied issues: from infidelity to drug trade in the subcontinent and, in the light of contemporary developments, about Islamic identity in a globalised world. His first novel, Moth Smoke (2000) won a Betty Trask Award and was shortlisted for the PEN/Hemingway Award in 2000. His other novel, The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007) was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, the Decibel Award and the South Bank Award for Literature. This book serves as a testament to his elegant style as he deftly captures the straining relationship between America and Pakistan.
The purpose of this discourse is to first, examine and delineate the manner in which Arab women novelists portray or ‘write’ men; and second, to discuss the most relevant reasons why the women write them as they do. This will be accomplished by focusing mainly on three novels written by women from Jordan and Palestine with settings form Beirut to London.
Salman Ahmed Rushdie is an eminent postcolonial diasporic writer of Indian origin. He was born in a Muslim family in 1947, the year India became free from the clutches of the colonial rule. The novelist and essayist of international repute, Rushdie, started his writing with the fictional work Grimus (1975). His second novel Midnights’ Children (1981) won the Booker’s Prize. The text focuses on the simultaneous independence and partition of the two nations. He came into thick of controversies because of his novel, The Satanic Verses. (1988). The Muslims considered the novel to be blasphemous. The publication of the novel led to a wide range of demonstrations and protests worldwide. The publication of the text became dearer for him as the Muslim religious leader of Iran issued a fatwa. The fatwa meant that the man who takes away the life of Rushdie would get one billion dollars as a reward. As such, he continues to live under threat to his life till today. Rushdie’s fame as a novelist is immense. More than seven hundred journal articles and numerous book chapters have been published on it. In the text Shame, Rushdie gives his account of societal and political life in Pakistan. He is satirical of the social conditions in the country which are the resultant of undemocratic, dictatorial and unlawful political practices of the leaders of Pakistan. The present paper attempts to analyze the issue of marginalization of women in the patriarchal society of Pakistan. Rushdie tries to highlight the denial of rights to the Pakistani masses, especially the women, by the rulers. Rushdie portrays the gloomy picture of the Pakistani society in which the women have to face acute sufferings and oppression and suppression has become the talk of the...
According to Kessler and McKenna, gender is a socially constructed phenomenon that exists in society because of commonly shared characteristics and beliefs found amongst members of society. My paper aims to analyze and assess the hijras in Pakistan as a role and gender identity using Nanda and Jami as portrayed in the movie Bol.