December 1st was World AIDS Day, and among the many AIDS-related stories from various places were some involving Muslim women. Tahmina Haidar is a 26-year-old Tajik woman, a widow, and HIV-positive, but she sees her infection as her destiny, which, she says, has affected her life also in a positive way. Faghmeeda Miller is from South Africa, she married in 1994 and became a widow the same year, not knowing that her husband had died of AIDS. She now battles... Read more
Over the past few years, I have been quite interested in Chinese Islamic practices. Part of it comes from my own Chinese ancestry, which is often clouded by strong Mexican traditions and marital institutions. Although today my mother’s family acknowledges that my great-great-grandfather was Chinese, a few decades back, no one was thrilled to admit that my great-great-grandmother engaged in an extra-marital affair with a man who “used to bow to pray,” as my great-grandaunt says. Although I will probably... Read more
The Kerala “Gulf Boom” refers to the mass migration of a large number of people from the Indian state of Kerala to the Gulf Countries from 1972 to 1983. The movement of many migrant workers from Kerala to the Gulf Countries continues to the present day. By 2008, the Gulf countries contained a total Keralite population of more than 2.5 million, who annually send home a sum of around $ 6.81 billion (US), which was more than 15% of the... Read more
Courts in the Swiss canton of Thurgau have overturned on appeal the cantonal school district’s decision to forbid two Albanian girls from wearing the headscarf to school. The story begins in 2011, when two 14-year-old girls were forbidden from wearing their headscarves to classes. What ensued was a two-year legal battle that saw the school’s decision approved once by the courts, then now overturned. Surprising to me is that the ruling found that a blanket ban on headscarves was disproportionate... Read more
At Muslimah Media Watch, many of our posts are critical of the way Muslim women are portrayed in various films, literature, and news articles—Muslim women (and other racialised women) are not given the space and time to share their personal stories of struggle and triumph on their own terms. Women’s stories are often mired with assumptions that women’s cultural and religious backgrounds condone the ill treatment they receive from their communities, that their personal experiences of abuse are common narratives... Read more
Last Friday Malaysian activists slammed the wedding of a 12-year-old girl to her 19-year-old boyfriend and said they are renewing their calls on the Malaysian government to outlaw child marriages. The girl’s father allegedly said that it is better for his daughter to get married, than to do something “improper.” Female Genital Mutilation is said to be on the rise again in Egypt after being officially banned in 2008. Now some Islamists are pushing the government to revoke the ban... Read more
There seems to be nothing more exciting for tabloids than publishing pictures of white women in hijab. Well, unless it’s publishing pictures of white women converts in their racy, hedonistic, pre-Islamic days. Last month Amy Sall and Heather Matthews told their conversion stories to the tabloid press. And instead of using the stories to dispel myths about Muslims, educate the public about Islam, or even come up with something remotely newsworthy, both news sources emphasized their incredible transformation from “former... Read more
Nurul Izzah Anwar comes from a political family. She is the current Vice-President of the Malaysian political party PKR (People’s Justice Party), and is also the daughter of Anwar Ibrahim, a former Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister who was jailed in 1999 and banned from politics until 2008 for charges of corruption and sodomy (but arguably because he was a prominent critic of the then Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad). Her mother Wan Azizah Wan Ismail is the President of PKR. Nurul Izzah is also... Read more
Journalist Abigail Haworth shares her experience about the day she attended a religious event in Indonesia, where 248 girls underwent genital mutilation in return for a cash handout and a promise of spiritual purity. Genital mutilation is on the rise in Indonesia, where the practice is deemed by many to be an Islamic requirement for women. This weekend a new online campaign will be launched, called Take Back The Tech, which aims to end (online) violence and discrimination against women and empower women... Read more
I can’t remember when I first learned that “Paradise is under the feet of mothers.” But I do remember the first time my parents quoted the story when the Prophet was asked who has greater right, the mother or the father, and replied ”Your mother, your mother, your mother, then your father.” This three-fold reiteration of the privileged status of the mother in Islam is central to those endless articles on “Women in Islam,” which tend to collapse the status... Read more
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