A Quiet Revolution (56 page)

1. Quotations in the following seven paragraphs are all from this text (
   79
   –
   87
   ).
   

   1. Quotations in this and the following three paragraphs are from Shereen Khan, “Transcending Immediate Comfort Zones: The Making of an Interfaith Movement and Need for Religious Literacy in a Post
      9
      /
      11
      World,”
      Illume,
      no.
      9
      (n.d.):
      116
      –
      17
      .
      

   2. Nimat Hafez Barazangi, “Silent Revolution of a Muslim Arab American
      

      Scholar-Activist,” in Bullock,
      Muslim Women Activists,
      1
      –
      2
      ,
      10
      ,
      13
      –
      14
      .
      

   3. Ekram Beshir, “Allah Doesn’t Change the Condition of People Until They Change Themselves,” in Bullock,
      Muslim Women Activists,
      25
      –
      26
      ,
      204
      .
      ‌
      

   4. Beshir, “Allah Doesn’t Change,”
      23
      .
      

Chapter
11
. American Muslim Women’s Activism in the Twenty-First Century

1. Quotations in this and the following paragraph are from Tayyibah Taylor, “Un- doing Internalized Inferiority,” in
   Muslim Women Activists in North America Speaking for Ourselves,
   ed. Katherine Bullock (Austin: University of Texas Press,
   2005
   ),
   193
   –
   95
   .
   

2. Taylor, “Undoing Internalized Inferiority,”
   196
   ; Tayyibah Taylor, “Lost in
   

   Translation,”
   Azizah
   4
   , no.
   4
   (June
   2007
   ):
   39
   .
   

3. Laleh Bakhtiar,
   The Sublime Quran
   (Islamicworld.com; Chicago: Kazi,
   2007
   ),
   

   xliii.
   

4. Bakhtiar,
   Sublime Quran,
   xliii.
   

5. Material in this and the following two paragraphs is from Bakhtiar,
   Sublime
   

   Quran,
   lii–lv.
   

6. Leslie Scrivener, “Furor over a Five-Letter Word,”
   Toronto Star,
   October
   21
   ,
   

   2007
   .
   

7. Ingrid Mattson, “Re: Statements Made by ISNA Canada Secretary General
   

   Regarding Laleh Bakhtiar’s Quran Translation,” October
   24
   ,
   2007
   . http://www.isna.net
   

   /a
   rticles/Press-Releases/PUBLIC-STATEMENT.aspx. Accessed April
   28
   ,
   2010
   .
   

8. Mohammed Ayoob,
   The Many Faces of Political Islam: Religion and Politics in the Muslim World
   (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press,
   2008
   ).
   

9. Nadia Yassine, the prominent spokesperson for the Justice and Spirituality Party of Morocco, officially holds the position only of leader of the women’s division. Rox- anne L. Euben and Muhammad Qasim Zaman, eds.,
   Princeton Readings in Islamist Thought: Texts and Contexts from al-Banna to Bin Laden
   (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Uni- versity Press,
   2009
   ),
   303
   .
   

10. Andrea Useem, “Does the Quran Tolerate Domestic Abuse?” Beliefnet.com (n.d.). http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/Islam/
    2007
    /
    07
    /Does-The-Quran-Tolerate
    

    -
    Domestic-Abuse.aspx. Accessed June
    2
    ,
    2008
    .
    

11. Useem, “Does the Quran Tolerate Domestic Abuse?”
    

12. Mubarak openly acknowledges in her article that she deliberately chose to write her paper while remaining within an “Islamic framework.” Academics, she explains, “have a moral responsibility to engage the society in which they live in a purposeful and meaningful way,” and she goes on to quote another Muslim interpreter, Asma Barlas, to reinforce her point: “It is safe to say that no meaningful change can occur in those soci- eties that does not derive its legitimacy from the Quran’s teachings, a lesson secular Mus- lims everywhere are having to learn to their detriment.” Hadia Mubarak, “Breaking the
    

    Interpretative Monopoly: A Re-Examination of Verse
    4
    :
    34
    ,”
    Hawwa
    2
    , no.
    3
    (
    2004
    ):
    261
    –
    

    89
    ;
    264
    .
    

    However, the problem with the position that Mubarak takes as regards scholars’
    

    responsibilities to engage with the “society in which they live” and remain within an “Is- lamic framework”—a position which she bolsters with Barlas’s pragmatic view that an- choring debate in Quranic teachings is essential since otherwise the arguments advanced will lack legitimacy and thus be ineffective—is that such commitments may seriously interfere with another fundamental scholarly commitment: that of engaging forthrightly and without compromise with the issues at hand. Although it may be (or may appear to be) pragmatically a more effective strategy to remain within the preset bounds of ac- ceptable thought, how persuasive in the end is the work of a scholar who explicitly and for whatever reasons, pragmatic or otherwise, commits herself or himself a priori to thinking only within the preset boundaries? What of the scholarly obligation to explore the commitments and assertions of communities as to the meanings and implications of words and ideas they hold to be sacred? (Mattson, for example, asked “more and more questions” of the nuns and priests of her Catholic faith and eventually left that faith be- cause those she spoke with had no acceptable answers.) Similarly, what of the scholar’s obligation to articulate the issues and concerns—as she or he sees them—that inhere in particular views or positions their communities affirm, regardless of whether their ex- plorations and findings are likely to find acceptance?
    ‌
    

13. Mubarak, “Breaking the Interpretative Monopoly,”
    263
    –
    64
    .
    

14. Useem, “Does the Quran Tolerate Domestic Abuse?”
    

15. See, for example, John L. Esposito and Dahlia Mogahed,
    Who Speaks for Islam
    (New York: Gallup,
    2007
    ), chapter
    4
    ,
    118
    –
    19
    . See also Dahlia Mogahed and Irshad Manji, “Who Speaks for Islam?” a conversation between the two authors hosted by Aspen In- stitute, July
    1
    ,
    2008
    .
    

16. Karen Bauer, “‘Traditional’ Exegeses of
    4
    :
    34
    ”; Kecia Ali, “‘The Best of You Will Not Strike’: Al-Shafi‘i on Qur’an, Sunnah, and Wife-Beating”; Ayesha Siddiqua Chaudhry, “The Problems of Conscience and Hermeneutics: A Few Contemporary Approaches”; Laury Silvers, “In the Book We Have Left Out Nothing: The Ethical Problem of the Exis-
    

    tence of Verse
    4
    :
    34
    in the Qur’an,” all in
    Comparative Islamic Studies
    2
    , no.
    2
    (
    2006
    ).
    

17. Amina Wadud,
    Inside the Gender Jihad: Women’s Reform in Islam
    (Oxford: Oneworld,
    2006
    ),
    221
    .
    

18. Muslim Women’s League, “Muslim Women Meet in Morgantown, [West Vir- ginia,] to Create Historic New Women’s Rights Group,” n.d. http://www.mwlusa.org
    

    /news/muslim_women_meet_in_morgantown.htm. Accessed April
    30
    ,
    2010
    . The Mus-
    

    lim Women’s League, based in Los Angeles, describes itself as a “nonprofit American Muslim organization working to implement the values of Islam and thereby reclaim the status of women as free, equal and vital contributors to society.” Core members of the Daughters of Hajar group included Asra Nomani, Amina Wadud, Saleemah Abdul-Gha- fur, Sarah Eltantawi, and Samina Ali.
    

19. Quotations in this and the following paragraph are from “WVU Women’s
    

    Studies to Co-Sponsor Literary Reading by Renowned Muslim Women,”
    West Virginia Today,
    June
    6
    ,
    2004
    . http://wvutoday.wvu.edu/n/
    2004
    /
    6
    /
    6
    /
    3934
    . Accessed April
    30
    ,
    2010
    .
    

20. Laurie Goodstein, “Women’s Mosque Protest Brings Furor in the U.S.,”
    New York Times,
    July
    22
    ,
    2004
    .
    

21. Andrea Elliott, “Woman Leads Muslim Prayer Service in New York,”
    New York Times,
    March
    19
    ,
    2005
    .
    

22. Omid Safi, ed.,
    Progressive Muslims: On Justice, Gender, and Pluralism
    (Ox- ford: Oneworld,
    2003
    ),
    2
    .
    

23. In Europe, for example, Tariq Ramadan takes up the issue in several of his books, including
    Western Muslims and the Future of Islam
    (New York: Oxford Univer- sity Press,
    2004
    ).
    

24. The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, September
    1
    ,
    2009
    . “Below is
    

    the list of some of the expected attendees at tonight’s White House dinner celebrating Ra- madan.” http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Expected-attendees-at-tonights
    

    -White-House-dinner-celebrating-Ramadan/. Accessed September
    3
    ,
    2009
    .
    

25. All information in this paragraph taken from the ASMA Society website.
    http://www.asmasociety.org. Accessed April
    30
    ,
    2010
    . As of early September
    2010
    (and since the completion of this manuscript), Imam Rauf and Daisy Khan have become widely known nationally as a result of the controversy that erupted around Park
    51
    , the Islamic Community Center which Imam Rauf and others proposed building two blocks from Ground Zero.
    

26. Rasha Elass, “Guiding Light for Gender Progress.”
    National
    [Abu Dhabi],
    

    United Arab Emirates, updated July
    17
    ,
    2009
    . Posted on ASMA Society website,
    http://www.asmasociety.org, under “What’s New ... Press Releases.” Accessed April
    30
    ,
    2010
    .
    

27. Asifa Quraishi, University of Wisconsin Law School website.
    

28. Saleemah Abdul-Ghafur, Introduction, in
    Living Islam Out Loud: American Muslim Women Speak,
    ed. Saleemah Abdul-Ghafur (Boston: Beacon,
    2005
    ),
    1
    .
    

29. Abdul-Ghafur,
    Living Islam Out Loud,
    3
    –
    4
    .
    

30. Samina Ali, “How I Met God,” in Abdul-Ghafur,
    Living Islam Out Loud,
    

    30
    –
    31
    .
    

31. Khalida Saed, “On the Edge of Belonging,” in Abdul-Ghafur,
    Living Islam Out
    

    Loud,
    208
    ,
    90
    .
    

32. Saed, “On the Edge of Belonging,”
    92
    .
    

33. Precious Rasheeda Muhammad, “To Be Young, Gifted, Black, American, Mus- lim and Woman,” in Abdul-Ghafur,
    Living Islam Out Loud,
    37
    ,
    40
    .
    

34. Muhammad, “To be Young,”
    45
    .
    

35. Muslim Media Watch,
    http://www.muslimahmediawatch.org. Accessed April
    

    30
    ,
    2010
    .
    

36. Mohja Kahf, “Spare Me the Sermon on Muslim Women,”
    Washington Post,
    

    October
    5
    ,
    2008
    ; Kahf, “The Muslim in the Mirror,”
    Living Islam Out Loud,
    131
    ,
    207
    .
    

37. Abdul-Ghafur,
    Living Islam Out Loud,
    4
    –
    5
    .
    

38. Yousra Y. Fazli, “Fumbling Toward Ecstasy,” in Abdul-Ghafur,
    Living Islam Out Loud,
    76
    .
    

39. I am grateful to my former student Amina Chaudary, who first drew my at- tention to this trend in a research paper she wrote: “De-Veiling: The American Muslim Woman’s Experience,” Spring
    2009
    . Chaudary is preparing this paper for publication
    

    and presenting a portion of it at the American Academy of Religion meeting, November
    ‌
    

    2010
    .
    

40. Andrea Useem, “Taking Off My Hijab,” Beliefnet.com, no date. http://www
    

    .beliefnet.com/Faiths/Islam/
    2008
    /
    08
    /Taking-Off-My-Hijab.aspx. Accessed May
    1
    ,
    2010
    .
    

    See also Useem, “Loving and Leaving the Head Scarf,” Slate.com, May
    12
    ,
    2008
    . http://www
    

    .slate.com/toolbar.aspx?action=print&id=
    2191103
    . Accessed May
    1
    ,
    2010
    . See also Darah Rateb, “The Dehijabization Phenomenon,” Altmuslim, March
    30
    ,
    2009
    . http://www.alt muslim.com/a/a/a/
    2999
    /. Accessed May
    1
    ,
    2010
    .
    

41. Useem, “Taking Off My Hijab.”
    

42. “Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow,” ASMA Society webpage. http://www.asma society.org/religion/mlt_
    04
    retreat.html. Accessed May
    1
    ,
    2010
    .
    

43. A number of studies cast interesting light on Islamic schooling, hijab, and fem- inism: among these most notably are Jasmine Zine,
    Canadian Islamic Schools
    (Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
    2008
    ); K. Haw, “Why Muslim Girls Are More Feminist in Muslim Schools,” in M. Griffiths and B. Troyna, eds.,
    Antiracism, Culture, and Social Justice in Education
    (Stoke-on-Trent, U.K.: Trentham,
    1997
    ); and M. Parker-Jenkins and
    

    K. Haw, “Equality Within Islam, Not Without It: The Perspective of Muslim Girls in a Muslim School in Britain,”
    Muslim Educational Quarterly
    3
    , no.
    3
    (
    1996
    ):
    17
    –
    34
    .
    

44. See Mahmood Mamdani,
    Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, the Cold War, and the Roots of Terror
    (New York: Pantheon,
    2004
    ), capitalized as given here.
    

45. Asra Q. Nomani,
    Standing Alone in Mecca: An American Woman’s Struggle for the Soul of Islam
    (San Francisco: HarperSan Francisco,
    2005
    ),
    103
    .
    

46. Nomani,
    Standing Alone,
    103
    ,
    30
    .
    

47. Irshad Manji,
    The Trouble with Islam: A Muslim’s Call for Reform in Her Faith
    

    (New York: St. Martin’s,
    2004
    ),
    10
    –
    11
    .
    

48. Hirsi Ali writes that her mother “flourished in a country with such a strict re- ligious climate.” Ayaan Hirsi Ali,
    The Caged Virgin: An Emancipation Proclamation for Women and Islam
    (New York: Free Press,
    2006
    ),
    71
    . For discussions and reviews of Hirsi Ali’s work see among others Deborah Scroggins, “The Dutch-Muslim Culture War,”
    Na- tion,
    June
    27
    ,
    2005
    ; and Ian Buruma,
    Taming of the Gods: Religion and Democracy on Three Continents
    (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
    2010
    ).