Named from an Afghan saying that “However tall the mountain, there’s always a road,” However Tall the Mountain: A Dream, Eight Girls, & A Journey Home is the true story of a project conceived by the book’s author, Awista Ayub, to bring teenaged girls from Afghanistan to the United States for soccer training.  The story […]

It reads as if the pages were lifted right from the script of Mad Men. Dozens of eager women primping and pinning every loose strand of hair into place, applying the last touch of lipstick, giving each other catty glares and then waiting, like sitting ducks, to be called upon by the handsome leading male […]

A Map of Home by Randa Jarrar is a book that does not fall into a category easily. A Map of Home provides the vivid portrait of a girl, who is Muslim, who is Palestinian and Egyptian and Greek and from Kuwait and born in America, who fulfills her parents’ expectations and dashes them fiercely. […]

I’ve been working on a curriculum project involving novels and memoirs about Muslim women, so the next few posts from me will probably be focusing on some of the books I’ve come across, even if none of them were published especially recently.  So, for those of you who like following our posts about literature (some […]

One of the most anticipated Ramadan series this year was 3ayza Atgawez, (“I Want to Get Married”), based on a blog-turned-bestselling-book by Ghada Abdel Aal. The series stars Hend Sabry as Ola, an Egyptian pharmacist under pressure to marry having reached the age of thirty and facing the social stigma of spinsterhood. Each episode focuses […]

This was written by Arwa Aburawa. Regular readers of Muslimah Media Watch may remember last year’s article criticizing the coverage of Muslim women in Marie Claire. Guest contributor Asma Uddin pointed out that the magazine’s coverage showed Muslim women as “sequestered, brainwashed, and victimized, if by no one else than their own, naive, unknowing selves.” […]

The back of her novel describes Taslima Nasrin’s Revenge: In contemporary Bangladesh, Jhumur marries for love and imagines life with her husband, Haroon, will continue much as it did when they were dating.  But once she crosses the threshold of Haroon’s family home, Jhumur finds she is expected to be the traditional Muslim wife: head […]

This post was written by M. Lynx Qualey and originally appeared on her blog Arab Literature (in English). Last Friday, the Independent reported that poet Joumana Haddad has been called the “Carrie Bradshaw of Beirut.” Yesterday, National Public Radio said that Ghada Abdel-Aal, blogger and author of Ayza Atgowaz (now a Ramadan TV series), is […]

Faiza Hussain is a British Muslim super heroine of Pakistani descent, introduced in the 2008-2009 comic series, Captain Britain and MI:13. For people who are unfamiliar with the shared universe of Marvel Comics: in 2008, there was a large scale alien invasion in the Marvel universe, and in order to reflect the international nature of […]

After watching Moolaadé, I recalled that I had come across a story several months ago of how FGM is combated in Senegal in Kristof and WuDunn’s Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, released in 2009. Kristof and WuDunn devote the thirteenth chapter of the book (chapter: “Grassroots vs. Treetops”) to looking […]