Women and Peace in the Islamic World: Gender, Agency and Influence

by Yasmin Saikia (Editor), Chad Haines (Editor)

Overview

How realistic is the prospect of peace in the Muslim world? This question is the predominant focus for global analysis today in the contemporary times, but its debate frequently ignores the cultural and social complexity of the Muslim world, reducing it into the region to a system of states and selectmajor actors figures. This book addresses such a failing by exploring how the everyday interactions of women, in accordance with Islamic personal ethics, can offer the world a new interpretation of peace. Drawing upon original research from different parts of the Middle East, North Africa and Asia, including Iran, India, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bosnia, Egypt and Sudan, the authors offer a refreshing new look at Muslim women as peacemakers, challenging any assumptions of Islam as an inherently violent religion. Such a timely work provides a new and important perspective on the role of Muslim women in forging new pathways of peace in the contemporary world.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780857737250
Publisher:	I.B.Tauris
Publication date:	01/20/2015
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	440
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Yasmin Saikia is Professor of Peace Studies at the Center for the Study of Religion and Conflict at Arizona State University and also Professor of History at the university. Her books include In the Meadows of Gold: Telling Tales of the Swargadeos at the Crossroads of Assam, Fragmented Memories: Struggling to Become Tai-Ahom in India and Women, War and the Making of Bangladesh: Remembering 1971.

Chad Haines is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Arizona State University. He is the author of Nation, Territory and Globalization in Pakistan: Traversing the Margins.

Table of Contents

PART I: DELIBERATIONS: QUESTIONING THE NORMATIVE
1. Ungendering Peace Talk; Miriam Cooke
2. Dialogical Din and Everyday Acts of Peace: An Islamic Perspective; Chad Haines
3. Negotiating Islamic Feminism: Echoes of Medieval Theological Disputes in Modern Islam; Richard Martin
PART II: INTERVENTIONS: CLAIMING PUBLIC SPACE
4. Women, Islam, Transnationalism: The Question of 'Politics of Location' and other Contentions in Women's Organizing in Bangladesh; Elora Halim Chowdhury
5. An Exploration of Three Contemporary Acehnese Peace Leaders; Asna Husin
6. The Role of Muslim Women in Engendering Peace: Bilad al-Sudan (Sudan and Nigeria); Souad Ali
PART III: FORMATIONS: ENGENDERING PEACE DIALOGUES
7. Women and Peace-Building in the Muslim World; Ayse Kadayifci-Orellana
8. Crime and Reconciliation: Women's Peace Initiatives in the Islamic Republic of Iran; Arzoo Osanloo
9. Religion, Women and Peaceful Revolutions: Perspectives from the Arab Middle East; Azza Karam
PART IV: RELATIONSHIPS: BUILDING COMMUNITIES
10. Strangers, Friends, and Peace: The Women's World of Abdullah Hall, Aligarh Muslim University; Yasmin Saikia
11. The Living Monuments of Mourning: Struggles for Memory and Peace in Post-Revolutionary Iran; Shahla Talebi
12. Merhametli Peace is Woman's Peace: Religious and Cultural Practices of Compassion and Neighbourliness in Bosnia and Herzegovina; Zilka Siljak
Epilogue: Dialoguing Peace
Two Muslim Peacemakers; Daisy Khan and Cemalnur Sargut
Gender, Peace, and War: A Western Feminist Perspective; Sally Kitch
Author's Biographical Sketches
Bibliography