Miscellaneous

Talaq-l-Tawfid: The Muslim Woman’s Contractual Access to Divorce

This book analyses legal campaigns and cases in a number of Asian, Middle Eastern and North African countries, and describes a strategy for challenging these laws – delegation to the wife of the right to pronounce divorce on the behalf of her husband on their marriage – to equalise the right to divorce.

Publications by Shirkat Gah Women’s Resource Centre

The titles listed below can be ordered directly from Shirkat Gah Women's Resource Centre. Write to them at pubs@sgah.org.pk for more details.

Islam, Islamisation et Femmes en Afrique

Cette série sera consacrée aux origines historiques de l'Islam, à son expansion et son évolution dans différents pays ou régions d’Afrique. L'accent sera mis sur la diversité des contextes musulmans, qu'ils soient spécifiquement régionaux ou nationaux. Cette série tentera de rassembler la recherche et les écrits disponibles à la fois en Afrique et à l'extérieur, concernant les femmes et les communautés musulmanes, le rôle et l'attitude de l'état envers les autorités religieuses, les positions actuelles des mouvements sociaux islamistes, etc.

Dossier 19

The increased labeling of diverse immigrant communities of Muslim background in Europe as having a common culture since they share a common religion is appearing as a dominant trend. Religion is becoming equated with “culture”.

Dossier 18

The Dossiers explore and synthesize a broad range of feelings, interpretations and strategies of women on issues of feminism, nationalism, internationalism, and religion. Our dossiers had announced the first two Asian lesbian conferences; we are now beginning to recieve articles about the situation of lesbians in Muslim countries and communities which we will be publishing in the future issues.

Dossier 16

Highlighting the debate on women's human rights in Muslim countries and communities, this dossier presents the testimony on violations of women in Algeria which opened the Women's International Tribunal at the NGO forum-Beijing Conference on women; it is followed by a testimony on the practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) amongst the Bohra Muslims in India. Both contributions show that certain local practices are being extended to other geographical areas.

Dossier 19: The Challenge of Fundamentalisms

Few developments in the post-Cold War era have captured public attention, stirred primal fears, stoked the fires of racism, and stymied critical thinking quite so thoroughly as the rise of fundamentalism. Although it is a force to be reckoned with in virtually every area of public endeavour, the rise of fundamentalism presents a very specific, and somewhat unique, challenge to the emerging field of reproductive health and rights.

Dossier 19: Mehr: An Advantage or Dependency Reinforced?

One of the most frequent questions I am faced with in the process of my dialogue with men regarding the personal laws and women’s rights is whether or not we, women - think Mehr is a provision which is an unjust imposition on men. They further ask whether or not we, women - who demand equality for ourselves be against this provision?

Dossier 20: Identity and its Discontents: Women and the Nation

The aim of this paper is to explore some contradictory implications of nationalist projects in post-colonial societies. It examines the extent to which elements of national identity and cultural difference are articulated as forms of control over women and which infringe upon their rights as enfranchised citizens.

Despite the extensive literature on nationalism, there are relatively few systematic attempts to analyse women's integration into nationalist projects. The little there is conveys seemingly contradictory messages.

Dossier 14-15: From Ethnic Fundamentalism to Religious Fundamentalism

Editor’s comment: The article of Stasa Zajovic from the Women in Black-Belgrade rings a bell to all of us who live in multi ethnic, multi religious, multi cultural countries, threatened by growing nationalism- or communalism-, where the hatred of the Other closely entwined with population policies (as a mild form which can evolve into its drastic form of ethnic cleansing) put women at the forefront of these policies.