In the most simplistic
terms, Islamic feminism is distinguished from other feminist movements by its
conjunction with Islam. As Margot Badran says, “the distinction between
(secular) feminist discourse and Islamic feminism is that the latter is a
feminism that is articulated within a more exclusively Islamic paradigm” (in Bahi
2012 p 5.) However, the combination of Islam and feminism is a subject of
contention. As we shall see, many non-Muslim feminists and some feminists who
are believing Muslims claim that Islam is too inherently patriarchal ever to be
feminist. Equally, some Muslim women’s rights’ activists have claimed that ‘feminism’
is too western, too capitalist, too secular and too focused upon cultural
sources of difference to be Islamic. Riham Bahi explores these perceived oppositions,
“The literature on women in Islam has become so polarized with oppositional
binaries: theology versus social issues, Islam versus democracy and Qur’an
versus universal standards.” She goes
on: “The polarization of the discourse is further reinforced by the so-called
confrontation with the West coupled with the growing demand for cultural
self-determination in terms of an Islamic collective identity” (2012 p3.) This
essay will look at these two oppositions; Islamic feminism distinguished from
secular feminisms in strongly Islamic countries and Islamic feminism
distinguished from Western feminisms.
It should be
stressed that there are considerably more similarities that could be discussed between
Islamic feminism and other movements. We could consider Bahi’s analysis of feminist
responses to Islam which groups them into ‘rejection and dismissal’ and
‘revision and reconstruction’ and compare this to Heather Walton’s study of
feminist responses to Christianity which she argues to take three forms -“
reconstruction, rejection, revisionism” (1999 p339.) We would see a similar
focus by Islamic feminists and Christian feminists on the reinterpretation of
religious texts and the foregrounding of powerful women in those texts and in religious
history. A different essay could compare
essentialist gender roles and the emphasis on the importance of motherhood often
found in some forms of Islamic feminism and in French feminism. A strong similarity is clearly discernible
between the Sufi construct of the ‘Divine Feminine’ in the work of such
influential figures as Sheikh Muyiddin
ibn al-‘Arabî (N. 1165,) and the ‘Goddess, Nature and Earth’
feminism associated with Susan Griffin’s Woman
and Nature (1978) and Mary Daly’s Pure
Lust (1984.)
In many ways,
exploring such similarities would be preferable to seeking distinctions. The
Iranian feminist scholar, Valentine Moghadam, who promotes the idea of a global
feminism which incorporates myriad diverse feminisms, maintains that “it is not
particularly useful to create absolute boundaries between Islamic feminism,
Western feminism, Latin American feminism, African feminism, Jewish feminism,
and so on” (2002 p1165.) I, an active, Western, liberal, secular feminist
wholeheartedly share Moghadam’s views and her aim for a global feminism but, also like her, see, too, the value of
understanding the distinguishing features of the individual feminisms which constitute
it.
My examination of Islamic feminism in
relation to secular feminism within predominantly Muslim countries will
consider the debate between the groups on the usefulness of an Islamic
framework to feminist activism. Islamic feminists’ reinterpretation of the Qur’an
and their arguments drawing upon powerful women in Islamic history will be
discussed. The concerns of secular feminists about the subjectivity of this
process and its long-term effectiveness for change will be considered. Having
looked at some primary methodologies and ideological underpinnings of Islamic
feminism in the first part of the essay, I will then consider the distinctions
between Islamic feminism and Western feminism more in terms of conflicting
feminist identities and feminist values.
Some differences between the two in their perceptions of gender roles
and different social issues requiring feminist intervention will be considered.
It would, of course, be a mistake to assume that
there is a cohesive school of thought known as ‘Islamic feminism’ any more than
that there is one known as ‘secular feminism’ or ‘Western feminism.’ In the introduction to the book, Feminism and Islam, Mai Yamani says that
the “category of
‘Islamic feminism’ may stand its ground by the sheer diversity it includes” (1996
p1.) Acknowledging the differences and even contradictions in the arguments of
her contributors, Yamani says, “a strong theme that runs through the book is
the suggestion that women should be taking a much more prominent role in the
interpretation of the basic sources of Islam” (p24.) Elizabeth Segran defines
Islamic feminism in a similar way: “Throughout the Muslim world, a groundswell of feminist sentiment
is growing among women who are
seeking to reclaim Islam and the Koran
for themselves” ( 2013 pg 12.) ‘Secular feminism’
can refer to any feminism which does not draw on religion, and only becomes a
definition in itself when related to a feminism that does. In the first part of
this essay, the secular feminism I will be discussing will be that within
countries where Islam is the dominant faith.
Many
secular feminists who are Muslim have argued that Islamic feminism is
oxymoronic. Mahnaz Afkhami,
the liberal Iranian, secular feminist argues “Our difference with Islamic
feminists is that we don’t try to fit feminism in the Qur’an. We say that women
have certain inalienable rights. The epistemology of Islam is contrary to women’s
rights…I call myself a Muslim and a feminist. I’m not an Islamic feminist—that’s
a contradiction in terms”(in Moghadam 2002 p1152.) Haideh Moghissi too sees
feminism and Islam as incompatible arguing that feminism is a secular ideology
and Islam rests on “fundamentalist foundations” (in Bahi 2012 p5)
Islamic
feminists strongly dispute this and argue that, on the contrary, Islam is
inherently egalitarian but has been skewed falsely towards patriarchalism. In
support of this argument, they return to the sources of Islam, drawing on the
Quran and the history of powerful women in Islam. The Iranian women’s magazine, Zanan, frequently takes this approach. Ziba
Mir-Hosseini looks at its legal section and shows a process in which issues in
the shari ‘a that are problematic for
women’s rights are examined in relation to the Qur’an, hadith and cultural practices of the time. She shows scholars
drawing a distinction between ‘the divine Law Giver’ (Shar ‘-i Islam) and the mundane law maker (in this case, the
Iranian Islamic Republic), and says “primary sources are subjected to
innovative interpretations [and] the secondary sources are debated and at times
refuted by the aid of the former” (1996 p315.)
Islamic
feminists, Moghadam tells us, “engage in theological reinterpretation to support
the view that genuine Islam, as opposed to patriarchal interpretations, holds
women in esteem and calls for an egalitarian status for them within the family
and in the society” (2002 p1156.) We see an example of this in the Iranian,
feminist translator and psychologist, Laleh Bakhtiar’s, translation of verse
4:34 of the Qur’an, traditionally read as
“Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath
made the one of them to excel the other …As for those from whom ye fear rebellion,
admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them” (M.M Pickthall’s translation in
Cervantes-Altamirano p5.)
Bakhtiar’s translation, however,
reads
“Men are supporters of wives because God has given
some of them an advantage over others…
Those (women) whose resistance you fear then admonish them and abandon them in
their sleeping place and go away from
them” ( my emphasis. in Cervantes-Altamirano
pg 5.)
This is clearly a radical change in
which men are neither inherently superior to women nor entitled to corporally
punish them.
Many Islamic
feminists maintain that the Qur’an also needs to be read in its historical
context. Ghada Karmi argues that it should be seen as two documents, “one
eternal and unchanging and one conditional and adjusted to social circumstance”
(1996 p83.) “It is clear” she argues “that Islam has been exploited by
patriarchal society to legitimise its discrimination against women” (p82.) Amina Wadud makes a similar argument. Her aim
is to show “how to transform Islam through its own egalitarian tendencies …by
first admitting that concepts of Islam and concepts of justice have always been
relative to actual historical and cultural situations (2006 p2).
In support of
their argument that true Islam supports women’s rights to education and
careers, many Islamic feminists draw on the example of the Prophet Muhammad’s
wives, Khadija and ‘A ‘isha. Khadija was
a successful business woman who employed many men including the prophet himself. Muhammad always expressed great respect for
his wife’s acumen and judgement and she was his first convert. As Halef Afshar
asserts, “no religion which she accepted could discriminate against women”
(1996 p199.) ‘A ‘isha was a great scholar, a politician and warrior. Most
significantly perhaps for Islamic feminism seeking legal reformation was her
standing in legal matters. Raga El-Nimr says “On Islamic jurisprudence, she was
and is still regarded as a great authority” (1996 p92.)
However,
secular feminists are largely dubious about the long-term merits of feminist
reinterpretation of sacred texts and historical figures. Elizabeth Segran says “secular feminists … say that
pursuing justice within Islam is a losing battle because the process of interpreting
Islamic sources is inherently subjective. They warn that building a movement on
such shaky ground is unwise” (2013 p15.) To this objection, Islamic feminists
have argued that working within Islam is not only effective but necessary to be
meaningful to Muslim women. Zainah Anwar, one of the founders of the global
Islamic women’s movement, Musawah
(equality), argues that “Religion matters to the lives of the women we claim we
want to help… We needed to engage with religion and provide answers to these
questions in ways that were relevant to their lives” (in Segran p13.) A main
aim of the organisation is to provide women with the information and arguments
they need not only for legal advancements but in their everyday
relationships. Anwar maintains that, “When
their husbands beat them, have affairs or neglect to provide for them, they
assert their agency by arguing that this behavior goes against Islam. They say
their husbands are much more likely to respond to religious appeals than if
they simply point out that their actions are hurtful” (in Segran p13.)
Moghadam
acknowledges this utilitarian argument saying “I am sympathetic to the
discursive strategy of these Islamic feminists, but …a reasonable concern is
that, so long as Islamic feminists remain focused on theological arguments
rather than socioeconomic and political questions, and so long as their point
of reference is the Qur’an rather than universal standards, their impact will
be limited at best” (p1158.)
Although
secular and Islamic feminists share many goals, there are clearly significant
differences in their ideological or theological bases of argument and their
methodologies. The distinctions between Islamic feminism and secular Western
feminism are perceived more in terms of female identity and essential values
and in the different issues they address.
Kent Blore traces the history of Western feminist
thought regarding Islam through first and second wave feminism and shows a consistent tendency of Western
feminists to have “espoused the universality
of patriarchal oppression, but in so doing imposed generalised Western
experience on, and othered, the non-Western world” (2010 p5.) Consequently, Blore argues, “Islamic feminism in particular sought
to refute two aspects of Western feminism; firstly its claims of universal
application to the experience of Muslim women, and secondly the Orientalisation
of the experiences of Muslim women as a reassurance of Western moral
superiority” (p5.)
Of course, there are many feminisms to be found in
the West but the ‘Western feminism’ from which we will see many Islamic
feminists distinguishing themselves in this essay, is specifically a white,
liberal, middle class, scholarly feminism. More accurately, it is some key
principles within an Anglo-American feminism which, in addition to striving for
identical rights for women, also espouses the view that all gender roles are
culturally constructed and regards Muslim women as the epitomised victims of
patriarchal oppression. This feminism is
often seen as imperialist, hegemonic and full of misconceptions about and misdirected
empathy for Muslim women.
Fatima Seedat correction of this perception is
worth quoting in full.
“Contrary to the
European history of Islam where Islamic feminism is the express wish that
Muslim society may someday hopefully emerge into a secular and equality-focused
future, these scholars work with the idea of a non-secular present which is not
waiting to become secular, modern, or democratic. It is faith-oriented, both
presently and in the future, already modern, exists in the now, and is already
feminist” ( 2013 pg 16)
In short, Islamic feminism is not an embryonic form of
Western feminism but a fully formed, current movement situated firmly within
Islamic faith, culture and history.
Some Muslim women’s rights activists have rejected
the term ‘feminist’ considering it, in the words of Omaima Abou-Bakr, the
“hegemonic naming of the ‘other’ (in Bahi p7.) Bahi says “some Muslim women
activists see the term feminism attached to Islam as “redundant and offensive.
So while some Muslim feminists openly use the term, others evade it opting for
“Believing women” or “Muslim women scholar-activists” (Bahi pg 7.) Haleh Afshar
uses the example of the veil to illustrate fundamentally different perceptions.
Often seen by Western liberal feminists as a symbol of oppression, Islamic
feminists have argued that it actually serves a feminist purpose. Afshar says,
“They maintain that the veil enables them to become the observers and not the observed;
that it liberates them from the dictates of the fashion industry and the
demands of the beauty myth” (1996 p201.)
In fact, Afshar explains, “many highly
educated and articulate Muslim women regard Western feminism as a poor example
and have no wish to follow it” (p200.) They argue that “Western feminists have
only liberated women to the extent that they are prepared to become sex objects
and market their sexuality …to benefit patriarchal capitalism” (p200.)
Interestingly, Moghadam too criticises Western feminists for supporting
capitalism by failing to demand political and economic transformation but she
regards this flaw as a similarity with
Islamic feminists whom she criticises for failing to address issues around
homosexuality and personal autonomy. “Both groups of feminists,” she maintains,
“work within and maintain the legitimacy of their respective political systems
“(p1159.)
Clearly,
feminist identity differs culturally between Islamic and Western feminism. An essential difference in relation to gender
roles is also perceived by many Islamic feminists. Whilst dominant Western
feminisms seek identical rights and espouse a view that gender roles are the
result of cultural conditioning, many Islamic feminists see a complementary
equality between men and women as essentially Islamic. This is certainly the
view taken by El-Nimr when she says, “According to Islam there is a specific
sex individuality in man and woman which they must preserve and cherish. It is
this individuality which gives them honour and dignity and enables them to
fulfil their specific roles inn society in an effective way”(1996 pp88-
89.) Afshar shows that many Islamic feminists feel
that in seeking identical rights for men and women, Western feminists have
‘sought and failed to make women into quasi men’ (p200.) In contrast, she says,
many Islamic women argue that ‘Islamic dicta bestow complementarity on women…providing
an honoured space for them to become mothers, wives and home-makers’ (p200.) Both El-Nimr and Maha Azzam are activists who argue
that education and spiritual equality and authority are part of this role and a
right often wrongly denied Muslim women. Azzam says “Islam is not a religion or
way of life for those who believe men and women should have identical rights”
(1996 p228.) Instead it offers women an “enhanced position that demands they be
honoured as wives and mothers” and that “by turning to Islam for legitimisation
and the legacy of learned women throughout Islamic history for inspiration, Muslim
women today are attempting to authoritatively extend their roles beyond the
home” (Azzam p228.)
In
addition to holding frequently different views regarding gender roles, Western
feminists and Islamic feminists have different problems to address in relation
to different cultural norms. One significant difference is in relation to
female sexuality. Whilst Western feminists frequently raise the issue of
women’s worth being related to their sexual attractiveness and the effect this
has on women’s self-perceptions, Islamic feminists have expressed concerns
about Muslim women’s worth being perceived as entirely bound up in her chastity
and ‘modesty’ and the social restrictions this places on women. In both cases,
the feminist issue is that the woman is not being recognised as a full human
being but reduced to her sexual appeal.
Lama Abu-Odeh
addresses the most serious consequence of this in her study into ‘crimes of
honour’ against (usually poor) Arabian Muslim women. She argues that, “A
heterosexuality that is honour/shame-based such as the Arab one, demands, under
sanctions of social penalty, that the performance of femaleness be “in
conjunction with”, “inseparable from”, “part of” the performance of virginity”
(1996 p149.) Masculinity, Abu-Odeh argues, is also dependent on the virginity
of his female family members. “The man who kills his sister to defend his
honour, epitomises in a dramatic way, through his act, the performance of his
gender” (p151.) Lama Abu-Odeh fears that a reluctance to seem to be espousing permissive
values may be preventing Islamic feminists from being as active as they could
on this issue. She maintains that Arab
feminists shy away from tackling the leniency of sentences on men who commit
violence against women for reasons of ‘honour’ because their feminism already
makes them feel marginalised and they fear losing the respectability they have.
Activists are placed in the ‘impossible
position of having to avoid discussing issues that give the impression they are
advocating sex before marriage” (p186.)
Whilst
feminists are often satirised in Western societies as sexless kill-joys who
regard all heterosexual intercourse as an act of violence against women,
Islamic feminists risk being perceived as sexually promiscuous advocates of
free love. This is made very clear in the publication by the Palestinian
feminist group al-Fanar, “The deliberate misrepresentations of feminism…such as
accusing it of being in favour of immorality or permissiveness, is nothing
other than an attempt at malicious deceit, the purpose of which is to
perpetuate the oppression of women and the suppression of women’s liberation
movement” (in Abu-Odeh p186-7.) However, as Abu-Odeh points out, this view of
feminism is much more worrying if it is, as she suspects, sincerely believed to
be true.
Clearly feminism
comes in many forms and within diverse cultures, expresses itself in myriad
ways and addresses substantially different issues faced by women. I have only
been able to compare Islamic feminism with secular feminism within
predominantly Muslim countries and with some dominant features of a scholarly
form of Western feminism. We have seen that in strongly Muslim countries
secular feminists and Islamic feminists disagree about how useful feminist
activism is when it works within an Islamic framework. Secular feminists have
expressed concerns that theological interpretations are subjective and argued
that a feminism based on equality of human rights is more useful for long term
change. Islamic feminists have disputed this, arguing that the Qur’an and
Islamic history support egalitarian arguments for gender equality and that
Islamic approaches to feminism are more persuasive amongst people to whom their
Muslim faith is very important.
In my
consideration of the distinctions between Islamic feminism and Western
feminism, I discussed arguments that Western feminist attitudes towards Muslim
women have tended to erroneously universalise Western feminism and that Islamic
feminist have resisted this and been critical of some aspects of Western
feminism. We have seen that Islamic feminists are more likely to consider
gender roles to be complementary and to reject ideas that all differences are
culturally constructed. Above all, Islamic feminism and Western feminism are
distinguished from each other in that they address different problems using different
sources and different methodologies and they face different barriers and
hostilities in doing so.
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