Islam & Gender

Gender dynamics in Islam and Muslim communities have been the focus of intense and polemical debates both in the Muslim world and in the West.

This course investigates the complexity of different ideas related to Gender in Islam in an interdisciplinary way. It teaches the students to analytically and critically engage with different topics related to Islam and Gender and offers them an opportunity to work together to render these complex and polarized themes legible and accessible by producing a joint special issue journal.

After addressing important methodological and theoretical insights in the anthropology of Islam, attention will go to the historical, theological, political and legal foundations for women and gender in Islam. Although Muslim women are still cast as victims of Muslim men and Islamic society and communities at large, we will look into the scholarly tradition that discusses Muslim female agency and contemporary Muslim feminist movements.

Besides an exploration of the complex position of women in Islam, this course pays special attention to Islamic masculinities in the geo-political context of the post 9/11 war on terror. This course concludes with mapping current developments in the study of sexuality and Islam since it is inevitably intertwined with gender questions within Islam.