Cole and Ahmed Discussion Questions

Discussion Questions for Juan Cole’s article   

1.  What kind of diversity in veiling practices does Cole point to in the pre-modern period?  What is the significance of this diversity?
2. What are the characteristics of  “state feminism?”  How does the state try to coopt women’s movements?  What are the consequences of this state-sponsored feminism?
3. What is the significance of Cole’s statement on p. 27: “Veiling .... is, therefore, the farthest thing from “traditional?”
4. What are the various forces which have shaped and continue to shape gendered identities and roles in the Middle East?

Leila Ahmed, “The Transitional Age”

Sura 33, verse 35 of the Qur'an, as translated by Maulvi Muhammad Ali
Image courtesy of the Online Library of Liberty

1. Ahmed states on p. 66: “They hear (women and men) and read in its sacred text, justly and legitimately, a different message from that heard by the makers and enforcers of orthodox, androcentric Islam.”  How does she make this case and why is this significant?
2. What are the various competing voices within Islam?  How does this diversity affect how we relate to Islamic history and thought?
3. Why is it important to take into consideration power relations when particularly discussing gendered identities and roles?.
4. Why is it important to establish the importance of textual interpretation and control of access to it? 
5. What does Ahmed mean when she says on p.67 that “The political, religious, and legal authorities in the Abbasid period ... heard only the androcentric voice of Islam.”  What were the consequences of this androcentric view?
6. What were al-Ghazali’s views on gender roles?
7. What were some of the external forces shaping ‘Abbasid views on gender?
8. How does the history of women’s lives in the pre-Islamic and early Islamic period challenge ‘Abbasid notions of gendered identitites?
9. What is the significance of the statement (p. 71): “Religion was the political idiom of the day - and the language in which issues of political power, social justice, and private morality were discussed.”