Häftets samlingstitel: Unveiling the feminism of Islam. AnA society for Feminist Analyses.

Basic characteristic of Islamic heritage law, principally it has accepted the two-to-one ratio between the male and the female children/siblings in division of heritage. In Islamic inheritance law, the main/basic reason why the share of the male is twice the share of the female is no “value” judgments given to female/women in creation and gender in Islam, on the contrary, are real realities related with the roles and financial obligations that man and woman have undertaken, in other words, related (...) with “socio-economic structure/fact” in the family and society structure foreseen by Islam. As a matter of fact, “need principle” is based on in division and succession of heritageand a fair arrangement has been made in accordance with the rights and responsibilities of the husband and wife in Islamic Law. In some classical tafsīr books, the concept of “degree” in the verse “... Men have a degree (right) over women” (Al-Baqara 2/228) mentioning the mutual rights and responsibilities of women and men; and the expression of “lil al-dhakari mithlu haẓẓ al-unthayain” in the verse –the inheritance of man is the share of two women– (Al-Nisā 4/11) mentioning the inheritance shares of boys and girls is interpreted against the woman by disregarding the intended purpose and socio-economic contexts of these verses. As a result of this interpretation, the share of men in inheritance is twice the share of women in Islamic law is ontologically (existential/creation) based on a justification that “man is superior to woman”. In this article/study, an analyticallook atthe interpretations in some classical tafsīr books on the axis of “daraja/degree” and “lil al-dhakari mithlu haẓẓ al-unthayain” that today sheds light on the sociological-historical background of depriving the daughter from the heritage will be made. Summary: Just as there is no way to determine a person’s sex, it is not either possible by reason to have such an opportunity. - With the possibility of medical intervention nowadays - sex is determined by the discretion of the Supreme Creator rather than will. Indeed, it is mentioned in the Qur’ān: To Allah belongs the dominion of the heavens and the earth; He creates what he wills. He gives to whom He wills female [children], and He gives to whom He wills males (Al-Shūrā 42/49.)In addition to human biological sex, there is also social gender. Indeed, the term “sex” refers to being biologically female or male, while the term "gender" refers to the social and cultural identity of a woman or man, or the social roles that occur in the historical process.Accordingly, while it is not possible to determine biological sex (in normal circumstances in advance), determining gender is shaped by the cultural will of individuals and societies. As a matter of fact, gender is shaped according to the religions, customs and cultures of the societies and it shows differences according to time, culture and family structure. In this context, in the pre-Islamic Arab society, the gender of the girl or the woman was shaped by the custom of the ritual and customs. Indeed, it is a known fact that during the period of Jahiliyyah, in terms of social gender, the girl/woman has been deprived of many social and economic rights, especially heritage. The Qur’ān has brought the girls who, in the period of Jahiliyyah, were oppressed in terms of gender, deprived of many social and economical rights, treated as second class human, embarrassed of themselves and buried alive, to the same position as man. In this context, as it is in every field in the direction of social structure and social conditions of that day, also in the field of inheritance law, a number of regulations were made in the Qur’ān and the Sunnah being the main sources of Islam. The divisions of the inheritance were connected with religious and legal rules and the shares of the inheritance of the sons and daughters were determined by naṣṣ (verses and hadiths).However, in Islamic inheritance law, as a requirement of the structure of family and society accepted by Islam, in principle, “two-to-one” measures have been adopted between male and female children. As a matter of fact, in this aspect, it is mentioned in the Qur’ān: Allah instructs you concerning your children: for the male, what is equal to the share of two females (Al-Nisā 4/11.)On one hand, the principle that Islamic law brings between boys and girls; Seems to be an inequality in terms of the arrangement in which "the inheritance share of the male child is twice the share of the female child", while on the other hand, within the border of in the family foreseen by Islam, this regulation has not been seen as an injustice and inequity by Muslim societies, because in Islamic family law, a man is obliged to ensure the livelihood of the family after marriage. He is also obliged to give his wife her mahr when marrying.In Islamic inheritance law, “necessity principle” is taken as the basis of responsibility that women and man have undertaken in family and society. Therefore, even though giving nothing at all to those who are not in need and giving less to those who are in less need, giving too much to those who are in much need might seem contrary to the principle of equality, it is a necessity of the principle of justice and fairness. As a matter of fact, while "law equality, necessity in sharing" principle, law is arranged according to people's qualifications, goods and wealth sharing is divided according to the needs of people. In this context, there has been a fair division in Islamic heritage law based on the necessity, (distributive) justice and fairness principle. Indeed, the French philosopher Roger Garaudy (1913-2012), who chose /converted to Islam, evaluates the following about the proportion of male child in the Qur'an to that of female child: “When we consider that in the Arab society all the obligations of the family and of the care of the parents and of all the things that we call ‘social security’ today are put on the shoulders of the husband, the hereditary male child's share must be twice as high as the female child’s is”.As Garaudy argues, the difference in the inheritance of women and men in Islamic inheritance law is not a legal discrimination/inequality, but a form of divisiveness stemming from a need based on the role and responsibility that women and men have undertaken in the family and society. Therefore, giving nothing to those who need nothing, giving little to those who need little, and giving a lot to those who need a lot,even though may seem contradictious to the principle of equality, it becomes a necessity of equity and (distributive) justice principle. In this case, in Islamic inheritance law, the basic reason why the share of the male child is twice the share of the female child, is social and economic reasons and it is possible to rank them as follows:1) According to Islamic law, women are not obliged to make their own economic livelihoods. The woman’s economic responsibility belongs to her father or brothers before marriage, and then to her husband after marriage. 2) When a woman is married she is not responsible for herself or other family members’ livelihood. The male is obliged to make a living for himself, his wife and his children.3) While married, the male is obliged to give the wife mahr. The woman has no such responsibility.As it is understood from the above explanations, in Islamic inheritance law, the basic reason why the share of the male child is twice the share of the female child is not about the ontologically “value” based on creation and sex given to the woman (girl child) in Islam. On the contrary, it is the real facts concerning the family and society structure that Islam predicts, the roles and financial obligations that man and woman have undertaken, namely “socio-economic structure/fact”.In some commentaries in classical commentary books, the rights and responsibilities of women and men are referred to, like: the word “degree” mentioned in: …but the men have a degree over them [in responsibility and authority (Al-Baqara 2/228), and the talk about the inheritance shares of boys and girls in: for the male, what is equal to the share of two females (Al-Nisā 4/11). Eventually, the concepts “lil al-dhakari mithlu haẓẓ al-unthayain” have been associated with the gender of the woman/girl child ontologically (based on social fact) by ignoring the referent purpose and socio-economic contexts of these verses. As a result of these interpretations, it was desired that the Islamic law principle of inheritance share of male child being twice the share of female child, ontologically, should be based on a justification that “man is superior to woman”.In this study, some of the era’s dominant culture classical interpretations grounding women's inheritances share on her gender and based on the axis of the concepts of "degree" and “lil al-dhakari mithlu haẓẓ al-unthayain” in the related verses of the Qur'ān will be elaborated. (shrink)

Since the Moroccan invasion in 1975, official reports on visits to Sahrawi refugee camps by international aid agencies and faith-based groups consistently reflect an overwhelming impression of gender equality in Sahrawi society. As a result, the space of the Sahrawi refugee camps in Algeria and, by external association, Sahrawi society and Western Sahara as a nation-in-exile is constructed as ‘ideal’ (Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, 2010, p. 67). I suggest that the ‘feminist nationalism’ of the Sahrawi nation-in-exile is one that is employed strategically (...) by internal representatives of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia el-Hamra and Río de Oro (POLISARIO), the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) and the National Union of Sahrawi Women (NUSW), and by external actors from international aid agencies and also the colonial Moroccan state. The international attention paid to the active role of certain women in Sahrawi refugee camps makes ‘Other’ Sahrawi invisible, such as children, young women, mothers, men, people of lower socio-economic statuses, (‘liberated’) slave classes and refugees who are not of Sahrawi background. According to Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh (ibid.), it also creates a discourse of ‘good’, ‘ideal’ refugees who are reluctant to complain, in contrast to ‘Other refugees’. This feminisation allows the international community not to take the Sahrawi call for independence seriously and reproduces the myth of Sahrawi refugees as naturally non-violent (read feminine) and therefore ‘ideal’. The myth of non-violence accompanied by claims of Sahrawi secularity is also used to distance Western Sahara from ‘African’, ‘Arab’ and ‘Islamic’, to reaffirm racialised and gendered discourses that associate Islam with terrorism and situate both in the Arab/muslim East. These binaries make invisible the violence that Sahrawis experience as a result of the gendered constructions of both internal and external actors, and silence voices of dissent and frustration with the more than forty years of waiting to return home. (shrink)

This article foregrounds the intersection between queer Islamic masculinity and Islamic female identity in Rayda Jacobs’s Confessions of a Gambler, and shows how these two identity categories are subjugated in light of dominant expressions of Islamic masculinity. The novel’s action takes place within a traditional Cape Muslim community and employs, among other literary strategies, the main protagonist’s vice of gambling and her son’s sexuality as tools to illuminate the interstitial and perilous social space occupied by women and gay (...) men in South African Muslim society. The research dissects the poignant picture that Jacobs paints of marginal identities as they exist at the intersection of religion, gender identity and sexual identity, and ultimately exhibits that homophobia and gender inequalities are not necessarily intrinsic to Islam. The article adopts a cultural studies style literary analysis. In light of this theoretical approach, this article evaluates Jacobs’s novel in a manner that goes beyond its literariness and shows how it also acts as a form of social commentary. This article also shows how the novel problematises hegemonic representations of gender and sexuality within Islam by giving voice to women and gay men: identity categories which remain largely voiceless in the dominant representations of Islam. (shrink)

This book is an ethnographic study of the Sufi ritual practices and embodied experiences among the female members of the Naqshbandi community in Cape Town, South Africa. The specific Sufi ritual in question is hadra, often called the “Sacred Dance,” a religious gathering that combines bodily movement, the recitation of sacred texts, and music to achieve closeness to God. The book’s main argument is that hadra serves as a somatic platform for Sufi women to express their identity and piety, (...) made visible through their bodies and bodily movements during the ritual. (shrink)

The Islamic Republic of Iran punishes homosexuality with death but it actively recognizes transsexuality, and partially funds sex change operations. This article aims to examine how this seemingly progressive stance on transsexuality is connected to the IRI's larger oppressive apparatus of gender. It will first provide an overview of the cultural politics of gender and sexuality under the Islamic Republic's rule, and will then discuss the confluence of religious and medical literatures that led the Islamic Republic to adopt (...) its new discourse on transsexuality despite – or perhaps rather because of – its sex/gender politics. The article does not deny that this emerging discourse has been somewhat empowering for those transsexuals who genuinely desire surgical transformation. But empowering as it might have been for such transsexuals, the emerging discourse is still deeply troubling since it systematically regards homosexuality and more generally any sexual or gender non-conformity as unintelligible, perverse, and punishable by law, except for those willing to transform their "wrong bodies." The article will, therefore, demonstrate that the IRI's permission of transsexuality and sex change operations is motivated by a goal that is more about assimilating gender atypical individuals into the heteronormative order than about broadening horizons for sex/gender possibilities. The article ends by discussing how this discourse is making non-surgical trans/multi-gendered identity illegible and illegitimate not only as a publicly recognized possibility, but also with regard to transpersons' own self-perception and self-constitution of their gender and sexual subjectivity. (shrink)

Feminist scholarship on women in religious and right-wing social and political movements has moved from a reductive focus on causal or motivational factors to more sophisticated analyses explicating processes of agency and subject formation. With the aim of expanding and deepening this conceptual space, I will discuss some of my interactions with a group of women in the Jamaat-e-Islami in Pakistan, as we attempted to explore the complex meanings of ‘the modern’ that informed the self-understanding of my interviewees. My work (...) corroborates some of the contemporary scholarship on what is referred to as Political Islam in arguing that Islamist movements in Muslim societies are also the catalysts of modernization, rather than simply its interlocutors. This article argues that these processes of social and political organizing entail particular interrogations and the reconstituting of identities in ways that blur the line between ‘the religious’ and ‘the secular’. On the one hand, we need to understand Jamaat women's self-construction as religious or pious women; on the other hand, we must grasp the specificity of their claims to act as modern subjects situated in the time of political and cultural modernity. (shrink)

In recent years, Islamic feminism has become a prevalent and controversial topic among scholars from Muslim countries and Western feminists. While respecting the efforts of Muslim activists, this paper argues that because Islamic perspective is inherently anti-pluralist, it is not conducive to feminism and even at odds with it. Since it is impossible to make any generalizations about Muslim countries, this paper focuses on the debate of Islam and feminism as it relates to Iran. Islamic laws that are the ground (...) for constitutions in many Muslim countries treat men and women unequally. In countries with a theocracy, Islam becomes a political system where the power of the ruling elite, which are the clerics, becomes an important obstacle on the way of reforms. As a worldview, Islam provides a fixed identity of women and men that is irreconcilable with any liberating theory. The significance of this discussion lies in the potential of celebration of “Islamic feminism” for reinforcing the fusion of religion and politics in a country such as Iran, which has a religious state. (shrink)

As physicians encounter an increasingly diverse patient population, socioeconomic circumstances, religious values and cultural practices may present barriers to the delivery of quality care. Increasing cultural competence is often cited as a way to reduce healthcare disparities arising from value and cultural differences between patients and providers. Cultural competence entails not only a knowledge base of cultural practices of disparate patient populations, but also an attitude of adapting one's practice style to meet patient needs and values. Gender roles, relationship (...) dynamics and boundaries are culture specific, and are frequently shaped by religious teachings. Consequently, religion may be conceptualised as a cultural repertoire, or dynamic tool-kit, by which members of a faith adapt and negotiate their identity in multicultural societies. The manner in which Islamic beliefs and values inform Muslim healthcare behaviours is relatively under-investigated. In an effort to explore the impact of Islam on the relationship between patients and providers, we present an Islamic bioethical perspective on cross-gender relations in the patient-doctor relationship. We will begin with a clinical scenario highlighting three areas of gender interaction that bear clinical relevance: dress code, seclusion of members of the opposite sex and physical contact. Next, we provide a brief overview of the foundations of Islamic law and ethical deliberation and then proceed to develop ethicolegal guidelines pertaining to gender relations within the medical context. At the end of this reflection, we offer some practice recommendations that are attuned to the cultural sensitivities of Muslim patient populations. (shrink)

Building upon an ethnographic exploration of the pedagogy and alternative dispute resolution activities of an Islamic feminist movement in India called the Indian Muslim Women’s Movement, this article speaks to the tension between Saba Mahmood’s influential account of religion and gendered agency, and a liberal feminist conception of gender equality. Anthropological explorations of Muslim women’s pious commitments as well as liberal feminist engagements with religion and culture are premised upon a presumed dichotomy between ethical engagements with religion, and a (...) commitment to gender equality. Yet there is little analysis in existing scholarship of how gender equality is constituted by social movements premised on a religious identity, such as Islamic feminist movements. This article moves beyond thinking about gender equality merely as an abstract liberal normative good to explore how the discourse of gender equality is constituted in a movement that brings together everyday ethical commitments inspired by notions of piety and concerted everyday struggles against social and legal inequality. The ethnographic vignettes show how gender equality connotes social and legal equality between men and women premised on their equal spiritual status as God’s creations, their equal pious obligations irrespective of gender and the equal imperative of ethical conduct on both men and women based on Quranic values of compassion and justice. The pursuit of gender equality also entails reinterpretation of social norms in the light of ethical conduct, and an ethical commitment to collective struggle against gender discrimination in state and non-state forums. (shrink)

In the past few years, the growing presence of veiled women in Azerbaijan, particularly in the capital city, Baku, has been striking. This article traces the background to Islamism in Azerbaijan under the state dogma of atheism, and the post-Soviet changes that have facilitated a resurgence of religion in the country. It examines the motivations and the generational divide among women who have recently adopted veiling. Notions of `traditional' and `modern' are questioned here, pointing out the impact of identity (...) politics and foreign Islamic forces on Azerbaijani society in today's increasingly globalized world. Furthermore, the article reveals the tensions and insecurities in the independent era that have reinforced the rise of Islamic ideology in the country and the contradictions involved in new veiling for Azeri women. (shrink)

As physicians encounter an increasingly diverse patient population, socioeconomic circumstances, religious values and cultural practices may present barriers to the delivery of quality care. Increasing cultural competence is often cited as a way to reduce healthcare disparities arising from value and cultural differences between patients and providers. Cultural competence entails not only a knowledge base of cultural practices of disparate patient populations, but also an attitude of adapting one's practice style to meet patient needs and values. Gender roles, relationship (...) dynamics and boundaries are culture specific, and are frequently shaped by religious teachings. Consequently, religion may be conceptualised as a cultural repertoire, or dynamic tool-kit, by which members of a faith adapt and negotiate their identity in multicultural societies. The manner in which Islamic beliefs and values inform Muslim healthcare behaviours is relatively under-investigated. In an effort to explore the impact of Islam on the relationship between patients and providers, we present an Islamic bioethical perspective on cross-gender relations in the patient-doctor relationship. We will begin with a clinical scenario highlighting three areas of gender interaction that bear clinical relevance: dress code, seclusion of members of the opposite sex and physical contact. Next, we provide a brief overview of the foundations of Islamic law and ethical deliberation and then proceed to develop ethicolegal guidelines pertaining to gender relations within the medical context. At the end of this reflection, we offer some practice recommendations that are attuned to the cultural sensitivities of Muslim patient populations. (shrink)

Women in Islam in the light of Qurʼan dipicting feminist ethics, gender identity etc. from Islamic viewpoints.

The main aim of this paper is to investigate how Moroccan women prisoners interpret and practice their religion in prison and the consequences of this in their lives, on an individual level and on a group level, in short the role religion plays for them in prison. Based on the qualitative method, and by using in-depth interviews as the investigative technique, the results show that, in general, religion brings important benefits such as psychological well being, helping the women prisoners to (...) adapt to prison life, alleviating the pain of separation from their children and giving them hope for the future. However, the Islamic religion is the principal point of difference among the Moroccan women prisoners, according to the degree of influence that they exercise over each other which is influenced by various factors: where they come from, their socialization process and for the time that they have spent in prison. Based on these factors three distinct profiles for Moroccan women prisoners have been identified which differentiate them as women and as prisoners. In short, our results show that religion is key to understanding the identity of these women in prison. Our work opens a new line of investigation that encompasses religion, gender, nationality and prison not addressed until now. (shrink)

The aim of this study is to investigate the necessity of revising the Ethics Code of the Psychology and Counseling Organization of the Islamic Republic of Iran with respect to people’s rights and dignity and to avoid unfair discriminations toward sexual orientation and gender identity. It is said that confused diagnoses; wrong decision making; unethical practice; and the subsequent harm caused to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender clients result from the lack of a clear code and relevant guidelines. (...) In addition, certain conditions in Iran lead professional psychologists and researchers to avoid researching sexual minorities and gender identity, which negatively impacts the Ethics Code of the PCOIRI. Iranian and Western researchers have identified four primary sources to which psychologists and counselors can refer when faced with ethical dilemmas: developmental psychology, professional ethics codes, philosophy of psychology literature, and available researches and compilations on professional ethics. Finally it is suggested that, when dealing with homosexual clients and the related ethical dilemmas, Iranian psychologists and counselors need clear and specific guidelines and a professional ethics code developed from more appropriate reference points than legal and religious sources. (shrink)

Much research on women’s religious participation centers on their abilities to act within constricted institutional spaces. Drawing on five years of ethnographic fieldwork, this study analyzes how African American Muslim women use the mosque as a physical space to enact public performances of religious identity. By occupying, protecting, and appropriating spaces in the mosque for meaningfully gender-specific ways of engaging Islam, the women further a project of religious self-making that bonds African American Muslim women together. In their maneuverings (...) of different forms of physical space as a sisterhood, the women enable themselves to resist gender, economic, and racial oppression. This study reveals that even within men-dominated religious organizations with limited symbolic and material spaces for women, women participants successfully exert agency over their own religious experiences. (shrink)

This essay is an autobiographical journey through my intellectual career. It is a reflection on how my mother tongue Berber and my identity as a woman have impacted my career to the extent that they are interlocked in my research agenda. My Berber identity inspired my graduate theses and subsequent linguistics work, and my identity as a woman inspired my endeavors to help create the first Studies and Research on Women Center and the first graduate Gender (...) Studies Program in my university. These two academic structures spearheaded the creation of similar centers and programs in Morocco and North Africa. The combination of my two identities is behind my introduction of the Language and Gender discipline in Morocco and North Africa and made of me a Berber feminist linguist. (shrink)

The increasingly pervasive practice of veiling among Muslim women has stimulated a great deal of scholarly investigation and debate. This study brings empirical evidence to bear on current debates about the meaning of the veil in Islam. This article first examines the conflicting meanings of the veil among Muslim religious elites and Islamic feminists. Although the dominant gender discourse among Muslim elites strongly favors this cultural practice, an antiveiling discourse promulgated by Islamic feminists has gained ground within recent years. (...) This study then examines how these discursive disputes affect gender identity negotiation among veiled and unveiled Muslim women living in Austin, Texas. Interviews with these women highlight how their gender identities reproduce and reformulate existing Muslim gender discourses. Special attention is paid to the subjective disparities and points of congruence between both groups of respondents. This study concludes by suggesting avenues for future research on the intersection of gender, religion, and cultural difference. (shrink)

The article focuses on the politics of representation in Kosova since the United Nations took over ‘peace management’ in 1999. It uses UN propaganda posters (political pedagogy) and local nationalist political advertising as a way to read the multiple gendered discourses of representation. It shows how gender is used relationally between competing forces – the ‘international community’ and nationalists – as a tool to ensure UN's imposition of Western policies and norms and as a mechanism for local politicians to (...) consolidate their domination of the domestic/private sphere. Moreover, it discusses the price paid to mimic the West: how Kosovar politicians have sought to ‘undo’ national identity in favour of a Western self-representation through a gendered abnegation of Islam. Thus, as an intrinsic part of the discourse of ‘peace-building’, these images represent the site of power production, domination, negotiation, and rejection, involving the collaboration of different actors, institutions, and individuals. Three specific points will be made: first, the article seeks to show that a Western political modernization discourse has, paradoxically, reinforced patriarchal relations of power and traditional gender roles in Kosova through the subjugation of women. Second, it explains the inability to resolve competing Albanian narratives – one relying on the legacy of peaceful resistance and the other on the armed struggle against Serbian domination during the 1990s. Third, through the intermeshing of international peace-keepers and local nationalist patriarchs, it will show how the militarization of culture is perpetuated through, and in relationship to, gender. (shrink)

Freedom of religious expression is to many a fundamental element of their identity. Yet the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights on the Islamic headscarf issue does not refer to autonomy and identity rights of the individual women claimants. The case law focuses on Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which provides a legal human right to freedom of religious expression. The way that provision is interpreted is critically contrasted here with the right (...) to personal autonomy and identity now developed by that court in interpreting Article 8 which contains a right to respect one’s private life. (shrink)

Greater numbers of women are entering workplaces in Saudi Arabia and other Middle Eastern countries. Structural features of patriarchy are changing in Middle Eastern societies and workplaces, but women’s experiences of gendered segregation, under-representation and exclusion raise questions around the feminist politics and ethics mobilized to respond to them. Building on and extending emerging research on feminism, gender, resistance, feminist ethics and the Middle East, we use data from an interview study with 58 Saudi Arabian women to explore their (...) attitudes toward gender-segregated and mixed workplaces. We develop a novel conceptualization of how gender is experienced through patternings of resistance and conformity shaped by the ethicopolitical, religiopolitical and sociocultural webs of meaning in Saudi society that permeate workplaces. Saudi women’s attitudes and actions in the workplace are neither entirely individual and private nor entirely collective and public, but made up of nuanced commitments and resistances to context-relevant identity issues. We discuss implications of our findings for the feminist ethics and politics of gendered resistance and conformity to working practices and norms in Islamic and Middle Eastern settings. (shrink)

In March 2004 the French parliament controversially adopted legislation regulating the wearing of symbols indicating religious affiliation in public educational establishments. This note discusses several features of the new law indicating its origins, its rationale and its position within French constitutional discourse on religious freedom and secularity. It is based on a panel discussion held in April 2004 within the Gender Studies Programme at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, European University Institute, Florence. Placing the French legislative initiative (...) in the context of recent developments in national and European case law (suggesting clear limitations to freedom of religion), the note explores the complexity of issues of gender, identity and difference in the present debate, especially when considered in the light of reactions to the law in Islamic countries. (shrink)

This study is an exploration of the Hagar narrative from the perspective of African Womanist Theology. The article focuses on the spirituality of Hagar before and after her captivity (Gn 16). The research takes an Afrocentric perspective and uses a postcolonial lens to comment on the preceding text as well as consider how this story is captured in Judaism, Christianity and Islam. At the core of the article is an attempt at reclaiming the African in Hagar who is largely portrayed (...) in the stories of Sarah and Abraham within a Hebrew perspective which itself is arguably imperial. The aim is to inspire modern African women (and in the diaspora) to reclaim their African spirituality within their stories and experiences. Summarily, the article is a critique of the colonial project, slavery and its legacies in dehumanising and disenfranchising people and African knowledge systems. The article is structured as follows: firstly, it introduces the Hagar and/or Hajar traditions from the perspectives of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Secondly, it takes a step back to consider Hagar’s identity as an Egyptian princess before she encountered Sarah and Abraham. The article also discusses how Hagar’s past in Egypt had a bearing on her spiritual encounters when she and her son Ishmael and/or Ismail were exiled. Finally, the article concludes with a recommendation for continued reflection on an African spirituality narrative of the Hagar traditions alongside the predominant narratives from Abrahamic religions.Contribution: This article demonstrates that the religious scriptures must be read from liberation perspectives such as the postcolonial paradigm to inspire the recovery of authentic experiences of the oppressed and displaced, and it is an inspiration to African women to reclaim their true identity and spirituality. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to develop and illustrate an approach for making the commonplace visible in a natural, as opposed to manipulated, social setting. The key research task was to find a way of capturing the ongoing production or enactment of the self that provides some insight into the way in which it is produced in a routine, matter of fact way. The article takes a number of steps to develop a research approach to the task. First, (...) class='Hi'>gender-identity was selected as a more specific aspect of self-production. Second, the concept of "flashpoints" was used to refer to a particular moment in the routine which achieves some significance or salience as a result of the participants seizing upon some otherwise unremarkable action or statement and twisting it to their purpose. In this study, the purpose was gender-identity creation. Primary school children in the classroom and their teachers were the participants of the study. Through the use of flashpoints, the article demonstrates how gender-identity production of these children can be caught in flight. The article concludes that this approach can be added to the researcher's toolkit. (shrink)

Intersex being a birth impairment in human babies is a fact of humanprecreation. Opposed to normal birth of humans as males and females incidentsof babies with vague gender identity have perturbed people and families asto how to socially place them within the binary system of men and womenin the community. In Islam, it is more important in view of the genderedorientation of some Islamic laws and its system of social ethics. Accordingly,jurists formulated an Islamic blueprint to manage this (...) segment. However,their main criteria to align such individuals to one of the normal genders wereinadequate to assign a specific sex to all intersex. Medical science, on the otherhand, proposes not only to achieve precise diagnoses of intersex conditionsbut also to manage them medically. Accordingly, Muslim jurists and muftisby and large celebrated this medical solution as a better remedy to resolve thisjuridical perplexing question. This study, however, argues that juristic stamp ofapproval needs to be more ethically grounded so as to avoid pitfalls inherent inthis medical innovation. (shrink)

Within the Judeo-Christian tradition, Sodom and Gomorrah represent locales in which threats to national formation are couched in sexual terms. The biblical narrative insists on a particular social invisibility for those sexual activities not blessed by the bonds of matrimony. Reclaiming Sodom surveys a number of institutions that have had an interest in perpetuating these views: the police, the state, the church and the law. The collection ranges through biblical scholarship, an investigation of the Founding Fathers' beliefs, the legal mobilization (...) towards the category of sodomy in 18th and 19th century England, and the US Supreme Court's 1986 Bowers vs. Hardwick decision. Analysis is provided of the ways in which the Judeo-Christian tradition has shaped anthropological accounts of the same-sex practices of non-Western people, as well as essays on how colonial gestures have marked lesbian identity in the Carribean, and derformed narratives about the racial geography of AIDS. Reclaiming Sodom explores alternatives to the force of the Sodomitic biblical narrative in Islamic, non-western, and western traditions, and discusses the ways in which sodomy calls into question normative definitions of sexuality and gender. The collection pursues the "pleasures and dangers" of these alternatives, and takes on Proust's refusal to imagine a social movement founded on the "stigma" of Sodom. The collection examines the relations between sex/gender identities and sexual acts in important and provocative ways, and argues for the political use and usefulness of both Sodom and sodomy. Reclaiming Sodom makes an important and controversial contribution to the literature on sexuality and gender, as well as the nature of sex in our culture. Contributors: Dorothy Allison, Robert Alter, Neil Bartlett, Leo Bersani, Gerald Creed, Marc Daniel, Lee Edelman, Janet E. Halley, Jonathan Ned Katz, Pierre Klossowski, Rocky O'Donovan, Guy Hocquenghem, Cindy Patton, Marquis de Sade, David Shannon, Makeda Silver, Jonathan Goldberg. (shrink)

A theory of gender ought to be compatible with trans-inclusive definitions of gender identity terms, such as ‘woman’ and ‘man’. Appealing to this principle of trans-inclusion, Katharine Jenkins argues that we ought to endorse a dual social position and identity theory of gender. Here, I argue that Jenkins’s dual theory of gender fails to be trans-inclusive for the following reasons: it cannot generate a definition of ‘woman’ that extends to include all trans women, and (...) it understands transgender gender identity through a cisgender frame. (shrink)

Our gender identity is our sense of ourselves as a woman, a man, as genderqueer, or as another gender. Our gender is the property we have of being a woman, being a man, being non-binary, or being another gender. What is the relationship between our gender identity and our gender? Recently, much work has been done on ameliorative accounts of the gender concepts that we should accept and on the metaphysics of (...) gender properties. From this work 4 views of the relationship between having gender identity G (e.g. having a female gender identity) and being a gender G (e.g. being a woman) have emerged. A first, the no connection view, says that gender identity and gender are entirely distinct; Sally Haslanger’s ameliorative account of gender, as well as Theodore Bach’s account of gender properties, are instances of this view. A second, the gender-identity-first view, says that all there is to our gender is our gender identity; this view is at least similar to views that Talia Bettcher and R.A. Briggs and B.R. George have argued for. A third, contextualist view, says that in some contexts and relative to certain standards, our gender identity determines our gender, and that in others it does not; Ásta and Robin Dembroff have proposed and defended views along these lines. A fourth view, the two gender properties view, says that there are two properties that can make it the case that one is gender G (in any context), one’s having gender identity G and one’s being socially classed as a G; Katharine Jenkins and Elizabeth Barnes have proposed views along these lines. This article explains these 4 different views and spells out their prospects, and the problems they face, as both ameliorative and as metaphysical views. (shrink)

This book is designed for use in courses in law schools and university departments of philosophy. It can serve as a text for basic and advanced courses and seminars. Readings include excerpts of classic works of Aristotle, Aquinas, Locke, Hobbes, Kant, Bentham, and Austin. Provided also are excerpts from standard works of twentieth century philosophers. The book explores current legal discourse with readings on topics such as sociobiology, Islamic law, the legal process school, legal feminism, critical legal studies, intersectionality and (...) gender identity theories, law and economics, and new private law theories. It reprints leading cases on natural rights/human rights and readings from online blogs, op-ed essays, news stories and internet publications, as well as drawing on literary treatment of topics relevant to legal philosophy. (shrink)

Sex change surgery has been practised in Iran under Ayatollah Khomeini’s fatwa in 1982. Therefore, a medical and judicial process of transition has been regulated accordingly. However, this has not resulted in either the legalization of sex change surgery, nor in the recognition of transsexual identity within Iranian substantive law. Sex change surgery is allowed through Islamic law, rather than substantive law, in response to the existing social facts and norms, on the one hand, and structural cooperation with medical (...) system, on the other. In this article, I argue that the Iranian heteronormative law’s understanding of transsexuality has amounted to the misrecognition of trans persons’ status within law and society. Using semi structured interviews, intersectional content analysis, and feminist methodologies, the findings indicate that transsexual bodies have gained meaning through religious and medical discourses within a framework of power relations, and that Iranian transsexual persons have reconstructed and redefined gender and gender relations in a way that informs their understanding of gender and sexuality beyond the existing Islamic legal and social norms. Moreover, intersectional analysis of the interviews demonstrates how the legal misrecognition of transsexuality creates space for a discourse which in itself leads to the misrecognition of other gendered identities, such as homosexuals and transwomen. (shrink)

Feminist approaches within the social sciences have expanded enormously since the 1960s. In addition, in recent years, geographic perspectives have become increasingly significant as feminist recognition of the differences between women, their diverse experiences in different parts of the world and the importance of location in the social construction of knowledge has placed varied geographies at the centre of contemporary feminist and postmodern debates. Gender, Identity and Place is an accessible and clearly written introduction to the wide field (...) of issues that have been addressed by geographers and feminist scholars. It combines the careful definition and discussion of key concepts and theoretical approaches with a wealth of empirical detail from a wide-ranging selection of case studies and other empirical research. It is organized on the basis of spatial scale, examining the relationships between gender and place from the body to the nation, although the links between different spatial scales are also emphasized. The conceptual division and spatial separation between the public and private spheres and their association with men and women respectively has been a crucial part of the social construction of gendered differences and its establishment, maintenance and reshaping from industrial urbanization to the end of the millennium is a central linking theme in the eight substantive chapters. The book concludes with an assessment of the possibilities of doing feminist research. It will be essential reading for students in geography, feminist theory, women's studies, anthropology and sociology. (shrink)

Talk of gender identity is at the core of heated current philosophical and political debates. Yet, it is unclear what it means to have one. I examine several ways of understanding this concept in light of core aims of trans writers and activists. Most importantly, the concept should make good trans people’s understanding of their own gender identities and help understand why misgendering is a serious harm and why it is permissible to require information about people’s (...) class='Hi'>gender identities in public life. I conclude that none of the available accounts meets these essential criteria, on the assumption that the gender norms of femininity and masculinity are unjustified. But we can, and should, pursue the feminist project without “gender identity”. Such feminism can include trans people because it is possible to account for the specific harm of misgendering without assuming a claim to the recognition of our gender identities. I conclude that we should eliminate the concept of “gender identity.” To understand the phenomena that are putatively captured by “gender identity,” we are better off employing other concepts, such as “sexual dysphoria,” (assigned or aspirational) “gender roles,” and (internalised or endorsed) “gender norms”. These concepts can usefully replace “gender identity” in an individual evaluation of each of the trans people’s claims to inclusion into particular spaces. (shrink)

In this article, I argue that the medical conceptualization of gender identity in the United States has entered a “new regime of truth.” Drawing from a mixed-methods analysis of medical journals, I illuminate a shift in the locus of gender identity from external genitalia and pathologization of families to genes and brain structure and individualized self-conception. The sexed body itself has also undergone a transformation: Sex no longer resides solely in genitalia but has traveled to more (...) visible parts of the body, implicating racialized aesthetic ideals in its new formulation. The re-imagining of gender identity as genetically and neurologically inscribed and the expanding locus of sex correspond to an inversion of the relationship between gender identity and the sexed body as well as shifts in medical jurisdiction. Whereas psychiatrists in the 1960s, ’70s, and ’80s understood gender as stemming from genital sex, the less popular idea that gender identity precedes the sexed body has gained traction in recent decades. If gender identity once derived from the sexed body, the sexed body must now be brought into alignment with gender identity. The increasing legitimacy of self-defined gender identity, the expanding definition of racialized sex, and the inversion of the sex–gender identity relationship elevates the role of surgeons in producing racialized and sexed bodies. (shrink)

The often poorly explained notion of gender identity, and the attendant cisgender/transgender distinction, are critically examined.

The first-person authority view (FPA) is the current dominant view about what someone’s gender is. According to FPA the person has authority over her own gender identity; her sincere self-identification trumps the opinions of others. There are two versions of FPA: epistemic and ethical. Both versions try to explain why a person has authority over her own gender identity. But both have problems. Epistemic FPA attributes to the self-identifier an unrealistic degree of doxastic reliability. Ethical (...) FPA implies the existence of an unreasonably strong and unqualified obligation on the part of others not to reject the person’s identification. This essay offers an alternative: the negotiative theory of identity. Unlike epistemic FPA, the negotiative theory doesn’t presume the reliability of self-directed beliefs. Unlike ethical FPA, the negotiative theory doesn’t imply an obligation not to reject. Instead, it contends that an act of rejection is morally permissible if and only if it respects three ethical and epistemic constraints. In doing so, the negotiative theory combines the strengths and avoids the weaknesses of both versions of FPA, and gives us substantive insight into how far first-person authority reaches in terms of grounding rights and obligating others. (shrink)

The general mission of feminist philosophy is to correct whatever male biases may exist in the mainstream philosophical traditions. Thus western feminist philosophers investigate and challenge the ways in which western traditions have so long been participating in subordinating women or in rationalizing their subordination. By questioning the gender insensitivity of ethics and philosophy, feminism attempts to reveal various forms of subjugation of women operating through laws, institutions, customs, social theories, and cultural values. Feminism aims at coming up with (...) a better design for society, based on a thorough review and rethinking of gendered positioning of human beings. (shrink)

According to the DSM IV, a person with GID is a male or female that feels a strong identification with the opposite sex and experiences considerable stress because of their actual sex (Task Force on DSM-IV and American Psychiatric Association, 2000). The way GID is characterized by health professionals, patients, and lay people belies certain assumptions about gender that are strongly held, yet nevertheless questionable. The phenomena of transsexuality and sex-reassignment surgery puts into stark relief the following question: “What (...) does it mean to be male or female?” But while the answer to that question may be informed by contemplation of GID, we should also be aware that the answer to the question “what does it mean to have GID?” is shaped by our concepts of male and female. First, I consider the concept of transsexuality, and explain how it forces us to clarify our concepts of sex and gender, and leads to the development of what I will call the “standard view.” I then explain GID from a mental-health standpoint, question the concept of gender identity, and try to uncover some fundamental assumptions of the standard view. I argue that these assumptions are at odds with the plausible view that gender supervenes on physical, psychological, and/or social properties. I go on to argue, contra the standard view, that gender has no essence. I suggest an anti-essentialist account of gender according to which “man” and “woman” are cluster concepts. This undermines the dualistic conception of gender that grounds the standard view. An anti-essentialist view of gender cannot make sense of the concept of “gender identity” and hence sees so-called “GID” as primarily conflict between the individual and her society, and only derivatively a conflict between the individual and her body. (shrink)

‘Gender identity’ was clearly defined sixty years ago, but the dominant conceptions of gender identity today are deeply obscure. Florence Ashley’s 2023 theory of gender identity is one of the latest attempts at demystification. Although Ashley’s paper is not fully coherent, a coherent theory of gender identity can be extracted from it. That theory, we argue, is clearly false. It is psychologically very implausible, and does not support ‘first­person authority over gender’, (...) as Ashley claims. We also discuss other errors and confusions in Ashley’s paper. (shrink)

A Letter to the Editor about the origin of "gender identity" and deficiencies in its current definition.

Transgender people and issues have come to the forefront of public consciousness over the last year. Caitlyn Jenner' very public transition, heightened media coverage of the murders of transgender women of color, and the panicked passage of North Carolina's “bathroom bill”, mean that conversations about transgender health and well-being are no longer happening only within small communities. The idea that transgender issues are bioethical issues is not new, but I think that increased public awareness of transgender people and the ways (...) that their health is affected by systems that bioethics already engages with offers an opportunity for scholarship that works to improve transgender health in meaningful ways. (shrink)

In African philosophical literature, and especially in Afro-communitarianism, there are discussions about the value of the relationship an individual has with her respective community. By community, reference is made to the metaphysical holistic view of community which includes all beings in nature. But since the article deals with gender, which is a social construction, most of the arguments appeal to a narrower version of community, that of human beings. Therefore, discussions about “value” refer to the value that is given (...) to the relationship that surpasses any individual value, and it applies or appeals to human beings. One implication of this understanding and the prioritisation of the relationship is that identity is something that is conferred by this sort of relationship. In this article, we argue that this way of understanding “identity” from an Afro-communitarian world view has something to offer in understanding or conceptualising gender(ed) identity(ies). The assumption is that gender identity will be understood as socially conferred and most importantly, one that takes community as essential. (shrink)

Our gender identity is our sense of ourselves as a woman, a man, as genderqueer, or as another gender. Our gender is the property we have of being a woman, being a man, being non-binary, or being another gender. What is the relationship between our gender identity and our gender? Recently, much work has been done on ameliorative accounts of the gender concepts that we should accept and on the metaphysics of (...) gender properties. From this work 4 views of the relationship between having gender identity G (e.g. having a female gender identity) and being a gender G (e.g. being a woman) have emerged. A first, the no connection view, says that gender identity and gender are entirely distinct; Sally Haslanger’s ameliorative account of gender, as well as Theodore Bach’s account of gender properties, are instances of this view. A second, the gender-identity-first view, says that all there is to our gender is our gender identity; this view is at least similar to views that Talia Bettcher and R.A. Briggs and B.R. George have argued for. A third, contextualist view, says that in some contexts and relative to certain standards, our gender identity determines our gender, and that in others it does not; Ásta and Robin Dembroff have proposed and defended views along these lines. A fourth view, the two gender properties view, says that there are two properties that can make it the case that one is gender G (in any context), one’s having gender identity G and one’s being socially classed as a G; Katharine Jenkins and Elizabeth Barnes have proposed views along these lines. This article explains these 4 different views and spells out their prospects, and the problems they face, as both ameliorative and as metaphysical views. (shrink)

This essay considers the creation of a gender identity clinic at Rikshospitalet, the National Hospital of Norway, in the early 2000s and its implications for the production of medical knowledge during that era. In the preceding decades, medical transition was overseen by an informal, self-organized, multidisciplinary team of medical experts, but this situation changed when a centralized gender identity clinic was established under psychiatric control. The essay argues that shifting institutional, societal, economic, legal, and bureaucratic circumstances (...) redistributed expertise and authority on trans medicine. Economic framing, institutional frictions, patient activism, and media attention restricted the doctors’ room for maneuver and created a scientific crisis of legitimacy in trans medicine. These processes changed medical knowledge regarding medical transition; eventually, “sex change” and, therefore, all that is denoted by “sex” became intertwined with and inseparable from the politico-bureaucratic processes of reforming a modern public health-care system and welfare state. By anchoring the analysis in the history of science and expertise, this inquiry offers a new focus on the role of bureaucratic practices in the production, structuring, and circulation of medical knowledge in the welfare state. (shrink)

This paper proposes a new account of gender identity on which for A to have gender G as part of their gender identity is for A to not take G not to fit them (or to positively take G to fit them). It argues that this subjective fit account of gender identity fits well with trans people’s testimony and both trans and cis people’s experiences of their genders. The subjective fit account also avoids (...) the problems that existing accounts of gender identity face. Existing accounts face broadly two types of problems. First, they seem to imply that trans people have gender identities different from those that they in fact have. For instance, they seem to imply that some trans women do not have a female gender identity or have not always had that gender identity, contrary to their testimony and experiences. I argue that the subjective fit account avoids this problem. Second, many existing accounts of gender identity seem to conflict with the idea that our gender identities merit respect. I argue that the subjective fit account avoids this problem because it understands gender identities to consist in normative experiences and judgments and normative experiences and judgments merit respect. (shrink)