Feminists, Islam, and Nation : Gender and the Making of Modern Egypt

Unknown to most Westerners, Mohammed's sayings and teachings are collected in literature called Hadith (or Ahadith). The most famous and most reliable according to Islamic "scholars" is the Bukhari collection. Every Muslim knows the quote from Mohammed, who when asked why the Koran gives the testimony of two women the weight of the testimony of one man, answers "Women are deficient in intellect." Mohammed created a world in which man can marry up to four "wives," and sexually exploit any slave women the Muslim man has on hand. Muslim men, under classical Sharia law can divorce a wife for any reason that pleases him at any time and he is authorized by God to beat his wife if necessary to obtain obedience from her. A Muslim wife does not hold the same position as a Christian wife who Christ taught may not be abandoned by divorce except for adultery. Islam does NOT make sacred the pairing of one man with one woman as does Christianity. This is all part of the bedrock of Islam and anyone who tells you different is not being honest. Muslims could in theory change their practice, even their theology, but they will have to invalidate writings that they themselves have held sacred for 1400 years. "The emergence and evolution of Egyptian feminism is an integral, but previously untold, part of the history of modern Egypt. Drawing upon a wide range of women's sources - memoirs, letters, essays, journalistic articles, fiction, treatises, and extensive oral histories - Feminists, Islam, and Nation tells this story. Margot Badran shows how Egyptian women assumed agency and in so doing subverted and refigured the conventional patriarchal order. Unsettling a common claim that "feminism is Western" and dismantling the alleged opposition between feminism and Islam, the book demonstrates how the Egyptian feminist movement in the first half of this century both advanced the nationalist cause and worked within the parameters of Islam. Badran offers an innovative reinterpretation of modern Egyptian history by demonstrating the gendered nature of nationalist, Islamic, and imperialist discourses." "The book shows how Egyptian women, attentive to the implications of gender, played vital roles, both as movement activists and everyday pioneers, in the construction of citizenship and the institutions of a modern state and civil society. Badran argues further that, of all the forces that shaped and reshaped modern Egypt, feminism constituted the most sustained critique - from within - of state and society. Feminists, Islam, and Nation not only expands our understanding of modern Egypt and our historical knowledge of feminist movements, but also contributes toward theorizing and further defining feminism."--Jacket Drawing upon a wide range of women's sources - memoirs, letters, essays, journalistic articles, fiction, treatises, and extensive oral histories - this title shows how Egyptian women assumed agency and in so doing subverted and refigured the conventional patriarchal order. Margot Badran. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [317]-337) And Index. Also Available Online.