“Gender, Islam, and the West” Series Continues

UC Berkeley’s Institute for European Studies (IES) continues its yearlong exploration of the impact of Islam and Western secularism on the lives of Muslim women with “Gender, Islam, and the West.” Developed with a generous grant from the Social Sciences Research Council, the series is hosting an array of academics, public intellectuals, activists, artists, and writers throughout the 2008–9 academic year.

On February 10, Lila Abu-Lughod, a Palestinian-American professor of Anthropology and Women’s and Gender Studies at Columbia University, will present “Do Muslim Women Want Rights.”  Drawing on her extensive fieldwork in Egypt on women, gender politics, and expressive culture, she will address what the idea of “women’s rights” might mean to women in various parts of the Muslim world.

The French controversy around Muslim women’s headscarves will animate a discussion of secularism and gender equality on February 26. Olivier Roy, a research director at the French National Center for Scientific Research, will be joined by Princeton’s Joan Wallach Scott, an American historian of France who has made groundbreaking contributions to gender and intellectual history. The event, “Secularism and Gender Equality,” will also address the stark opposition between the sacred and the secular and how it affects contemporary politics.

For a full list of upcoming events, see the Institute of European Studies Web site: http://ies.berkeley.edu.