As MMW’s Artsy Niqab Spotter, man my hands are full!  If I’m not checking out French performance artists or Swiss campaign posters with minarets and niqabs, there are just so many people using niqabs as their accessory du jour and not enough time to write about them all.  I can’t keep up! So I had […]

A few days ago, Lubna Shaikh posted this calligraphic collage craft idea for children on Suhaibwebb.com, in honor of the remembrance of the birth of the Prophet. Lubna writes that there is a need to “seek creative ways of imparting the knowledge of our deen” to children, to help them cultivate a personal connection with […]

Many Egyptians have watched the YouTube video “Message From Iranian Women to Tunisian and Egyptian Women,” which warns Egyptian and Tunisian women about their position after the revolution; the resemblance with the Iranian revolution is called “uncanny.” In Southern Lebanon, Al Akhbar visits Jamila Nasser, the mother of activist Anwar Yassine, eight years after he […]

Tuesday, January 25th, 2011: the day thousands of Egyptians—Christians and Muslims, men and women, young and old—lined the streets of Tahrir Square in non-violent, civil-resistance in attempt to overthrow the regime of then President, Hosni Mubarak. A year later, Wikipedia hosts a page titled “2011 Egyptian Revolution;” Egyptians mourn the loss of their sons, brothers, […]

I bought this book after reading a review in the New York Times. The review largely described Al-Muhaddithat as a women-focused yet Islamically-indigenous text that could lead to the rediscovery of women’s importance in Islam.   The book is written by Mohammad Akram Nadwi, a Muslim scholar who puts emphasis on what he sees as a […]

Susan Friedman has described the homonym roots/routes as “two sides of the same coin: roots, signifying identity based on stable cores and continuities; routes, suggesting identity based on travel, change and disruption.” I have always visualized veteran artist Zarina Hashmi’s home on wheels as embodying this duality. Like much of her work, her piece entitled […]

The Favored Daughter—One woman’s fight to lead Afghanistan into the Future, by Fawzia Koofi with Nadene Ghouri, tells the important story of a courageous Afghani woman, Fawzia Koofi.  The biography starts near the time of her birth up to her election and current role Afghanistan’s first female parliament speaker, with the country’s political history always […]

Mali has adopted a new family law, which is actually a step back for the position of women in this predominantly Muslim country. According to this new law, women have to obey their husbands and men are head of the households. After her retirement, Prof. Hasnath Mansur committed herself to the improvement of the lives […]

Just a month ago, here on MMW, I tried to highlight the fact that mainstream media was focusing on Islamists’ statements regarding what women wear, while, in fact, what was even more dangerous was their vision regarding women and child law. I referred in that article to quotations from Dr. Manal Abul-Hassan about allowing female […]

Slate recently ran a piece about Azza al Garf, dubbing her a “culturally regressive trailblazer,” and likening her to well-known American female conservatives such as Michele Bachman and Sarah Palin. Azza al Garf, a female member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party who was recently elected to the post-revolutionary Egyptian Parliament, had not […]