Women and gender in Islam : historical roots of a modern debate

by Leila Ahmed

Paperback, 1992

Publication

Imprint: New Haven : Yale University Press, c1992. Responsibility: Leila Ahmed. Physical: Text : 1 volume : viii, 296 pages : 25 cm. Features: Includes index, notes.

Call number

Women / Ahmed

Barcode

BK-03643

ISBN

9780300055832

Collections

Your library, Adult Materials, Religious Studies

CSS Library Notes

Description: Are Islamic societies inherently oppressive to women? Is the trend among Islamic women to appear once again in veils and other traditional clothing a symbol of regression or an effort to return to a "pure" Islam that was just and fair to both sexes? In this book Leila Ahmed adds a new perspective to the current debate about women and Islam by exploring its historical roots, tracing the developments in Islamic discourses on women and gender from the ancient world to the present. -- from back cover

Table of Contents: Part 1: The pre-Islamic Middle East: Mesopotamia ;
The Mediterranean Middle East
Part 2: Founding Discourses: Women and the rise of Islam ;
The transitional age ;
Elaboration of the founding discourses ;
Medieval Islam
Part 3: New Discourses: Social and intellectual change ;
The discourse of the veil ;
The first feminists ;
Divergent voices ;
The struggle for the future

FY1994 / FY2015 /

Physical description

viii, 296 p.; 25 cm

Description

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… (more)