Mar 11: Rountable on Islam and Women
Border Crossings celebrates the Int'l Women's Day and Women’s History Month with a round table discussion about the state of Muslim women in South Asia. Our guests include Elora Sehabuddin, Asma Barlas and Amna Buttar
The yardstick for the liberation of Muslim women that the US
media uses seems to be whether women are wearing hijab or not.
But what problems and issues do Muslim women face in South Asia.
What are the real oppressive attitudes (not just how women are
dressed). We will highlight the oppressive, unjust Islamic and
civil laws and social attitudes that contribute to women's
oppression. We will have a round table discussion with our guests
about the state of Muslim women in South Asia. Our guests include
Elora Sehabuddin, Asma Barlas and Amna Buttar
About our guests:
Dr. Asma Barlas is associate professor and chair of the
Department of Politics and former director of the Center for the
Study of Culture, Race, and Ethnicity at Ithaca College, New
York. She has a B.A. in English Literature and Philosophy and an
M.A in Journalism from Pakistan, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in
International Studies from the University of Denver in Colorado.
Dr. Barlas was born in Pakistan, where she was one of the first
women to be inducted into the Foreign Service. Her career was cut
short, however, when General Zia ul Haq fired her for criticizing
his military regime. She then joined an opposition paper, The
Muslim, as assistant editor but was forced to leave the country
in 1983. Dr. Barlas has received several fellowships and grants,
including from the United Nations Department of Public
Information, the American Association of University Women, and
the American Institute of Pakistan Studies.
Her most recent work has focused on how Muslims produce religious
knowledge, especially patriarchal exegesis of the Qur'an. She has
explored this theme in her book, "Believing Women" in Islam:
Unreading Patriarchal Interpretations of the Qur'an (Austin, TX:
University of Texas Press, 2002) as well as in book chapters and
journal articles published in the Journal of Qur'anic Studies and
in Macalester International. She has presented her work at many
international conferences and venues.
Dr. Elora Shehabuddin is Assistant Professor of Humanities and
Political Science at Rice University. She received her PhD in
Politics from Princeton University and her BA from Harvard
University. Her dissertation was selected as the best
dissertation in Religion and Politics by the American Political
Science Association in 2002. Her current research explores the
intersections of gender, development, secularism, and Islam in
Bangladesh. Dr Sehabuddin has just been awarded a fellowship
from the Harvard Divinity School to pursue this research there
next year. Over the years, she has been affiliated with the
Grameen Bank, the pioneer of micro-credit for landless women, and
with Ain-o-Salish Kendro, a legal aid organization that promotes
alternative modes of dispute resolution, both in Bangladesh.
Dr Amna Buttar is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the
Indiana University Center for Aging. She is a member of
Association of Pakistani Physicians of North America (Appna) and
founder of Asian-American Network Against Abuse of Women in
Pakistan (Anna) with the aim of highlighting the issues related
to the victimization of women and providing every possible
assistance to the victims.
