Reflections on “Engaging” Islam…

Islam has been defined by some as “engaged surrender,” (Wadud, p. 19) an active definition which points to the way which one approaches submission to divine reality, to the practice of the din or religion of Islam. Perhaps no time is this vigor more apparent than during the month of Ramadan. This Ramadan I attended a conference entitled: “Engaging Islam: Feminisms, Religiosity and Self-Determinations,” at the University of Massachusetts in Boston. This conference consisted of a five day submersion within an environment of listening and learning about Islam as a religion, a social code, a mode of governance and law. What emerged from this experiment was a picture of an Islamic religion which contains a multitude of perspectives, inspirations and judgments. As one of the guiding principles of the conference presenting scholars brought the rigorous interrogation characteristic of feminist critique to every topic, most especially towards a definition of Islamic feminism.

Throughout the presentations which were as diverse as a paper looking at the practice of ‘Sabir’ or patience among a community of women in the weaving industry of Konya, to a study on the Grameen Bank and the formation of ideas of masculinity in South Asia- in each instance there was a process of definition and re-definition of the terms of Islamic feminism. In this pursuit, many questions were considered, such as the true meaning of secularism, the relationship between secularism and faith-based perspectives, as well as differing conceptions of agency for women in Islamic and western contexts.
Throughout the conference what was most notable was the level of secular and academic language utilized by the presenters. For the most part if a scholar or presenter was a practicing Muslim, one would not be able to discern this from either his or her dress or language. One was left to assume that the women who were studying Muslim women or Islamic women from varying contexts, had little or no direct experience of the kinds of oppression or interaction with the issues being discussed and studied. One wonders if this was actually the case or just an attempt to try to adhere to normative standards of academic objectivity as if it would somehow irrecoverably shift the quality of the data if the scholar or researcher was in fact, a practicing Muslim. Some participants addressed this apparent disconnect in academic contexts dealing with Islam. The other-ing of religious or observant scholars within a realm of greater Islamic other-ing, in relationship to normative Judeo-Christian academic contexts.
Of course, one may argue that academe is known for this sort of distancing of subject and observer, revealing the hidden assumption that to be Muslim, a woman and a researcher/scholar places you in the margins, far from the center-point of the secular western academic norm. Perhaps this fact was made more obvious to me being that I was asked to present a paper on my research on Women and tasawwuf in the west, which was part of a panel entitled, “Pedagogy and Islam.” My paper, unlike all (save one) of the papers presented at the five day conference, was focused on the ritual lives of Islamic women today. The primary issue I discussed was female access to knowledge systems, as well as leadership positions within traditional and western/contemporary tasawwuf institutions. The paper also looks at the ways in which female spiritual aptitude has been conceptualized within Islamic history, taking as specific examples the spiritual contributions of women like Rabia al’Dawiyya and Aisha bint Abi Bakr.
What made this stark difference so apparent between the other papers presented and my research material was the fact that in the other papers the focus was primarily upon a conception of agency that was either aligned or opposed to western definitions of agency and freedom, privileging secularism and modernity, over faith and tradition. Despite the consciousness of many of the scholars who argued that this very conception of agency needed to be reconsidered or even needed to be excised from Islamic feminism, nevertheless the secularist discourse remained, although steps were taken to try and integrate the perspectives of women who chose to follow the moral and physical codes and laws of the shariah. For instance, the closing talk given by the only veiled woman at the conference, asked that more veiled women be given the chance to speak in academic contexts. The question remains, are veiled, as well as religious women somehow purposefully excluded by the powers that be like the concluding speaker suggested or in fact can the answer to the question of the integration of religious women in academe be found within the decisions and choices of these women for themselves, based upon how they conceptualize their own place, within both Islamic feminisms, and within greater academic contexts.

As we all gather in our mosques and places of worship in these last days of Ramadan, I invite all of you to join me in contemplating the ways in which we may ‘other’ or accept ourselves, as women, as pious subjects before Allah, and how we interact with the structures of our religion, question and interact with accepted mores and social norms, and ‘engage’ with our brothers and sisters in faith. Inspired inquiry into the gender norms of Islam, coupled with decisions about ways in which change can be made while retaining deeply loved traditions and following shariah law will only enrich our experience as Muslim women in our religious communities, in our workplaces and in our homes.