WHO IS INVITED?
The workshop is open to all members of the BCDSS (including MA students), other members of the University of Bonn, and invited guests. BCDSS PhD Researchers can earn 1 CP toward the BCDSS Doctoral Certificate for full and active participation in the workshop. Since the event is of interest to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion efforts at the BCDSS, those who attend the workshop will also receive credit toward the new DEI Certificate. To receive full credit for the workshop, participants must read and come ready to discuss the pre-circulated texts.
WORKSHOP LED BY
Prof. Dr. Miriam Cooke is Braxton Craven Distinguished Professor emerita of Arab Cultures at Duke University. Her writings have focused on the intersection of gender and war in modern Arabic literature and on Arab women writers’ constructions of Islamic feminism. She is the author of War's Other Voices: Women Writers on the Lebanese Civil War (1988); Women and the War Story (1997); Women Claim Islam (2001); and Nazira Zeineddine: A Pioneer of Islamic Feminism (2010). She has also published a novel, Hayati, My Life (2000).
WORKSHOP ORGANIZERS
Dima al Munajed, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Coordinator, BCDSS
Dr. Emma Kalb, Postdoctoral Researcher, BCDSS
Rev. David B. Smith, PhD Researcher, BCDSS
MORE ABOUT THE WORKSHOP THEME
In addition to marking International Women’s Day 2024, this International Workshop on ‘Islamic Feminisms and Dependency’ will also take place during the Research Area E thematic year on “Gender (and Intersectionality)” at BCDSS.
Prof. Cooke’s approach to the discourse surrounding Islamic feminism(s) may prove especially helpful to scholars of asymmetrical dependency when we place her work on “multiple critique” in conversation with intersectionality theory. Over the course of several decades, Prof. Cooke has traced the ways in which “some are developing a multilayered Islamic feminist discourse that allows them to engage with and criticize individuals, institutions, and systems that limit and oppress them” (Women Claim Islam, 109). The oppositional stance adopted in this discourse can be termed “multiple critique.” Like intersectionality theory, multiple critique acknowledges multi-faceted and multi-vectored webs of marginalization experiences so that they can be constructively targeted by oppositional discourses.
The relationship between Islamic feminism(s) and enduring forms of asymmetrical dependency has yet to receive substantial attention. Nevertheless, Islamic feminism has long engaged with structures that we at BCDSS might define as asymmetrical dependencies. Twenty-four years ago, Prof. Cooke asserted, “Some women are joining religious groups despite their gender conservatism. Others are fighting these same groups, fearing the dangerous chemistry of politics and religion. Whether through or against religion, they are choosing to become part of the struggle for a better world” (55). Within the discourses that emerge out of diverse experiences of religious and gendered identity, “Islamic feminism works in ways that may be emblematic of postcolonial women’s jockeying for space and power through the construction and manipulation of apparently incompatible, contradictory identities and positions” (59). Indeed, “the term ‘Islamic feminist’ invites us to consider what it means to have a difficult double commitment: on the one hand, to a faith position, and on the other hand, to women’s rights both inside the home and outside” (59).
The aim of this workshop will be to begin a conversation on the relationship between Islamic feminist thought, intersectionality, and asymmetrical dependency research in hopes that it will open new pathways of engagement on the theoretical, analytical, and conceptual levels.
PROGRAM
- 13:00-13:15 Welcome & Introductions by Workshop Organizers
- 13:15-14:30 Input from Prof. Dr. Miriam Cooke and Preliminary Discussion
- 14:30-15:00 Coffee Break/Meet and Greet
- 15:00-16:30 Discussion of Pre-Circulated Readings
Click here for details of the Public Lecture by Prof. Dr. Miriam Cooke on "Arab Feminism and Politics" at the Center for Development Research (ZEF) the following day, February 8, 2024.