GSC 20425 - Islamic Societies of the Middle East and North Africa: Religion, History, and Culture, Fall 2005
This new course offers a panoramic survey of the Islamic societies of the Middle East and North Africa from their origins to the present day. It will deal with the history and expansion of Islam, both as a world religion and civilization, from its birth in the Arabian peninsula in the seventh century to its subsequent spread to other parts of western Asia and North Africa. Issues of religious practices, political governance and movements, gender, social relations and cultural norms will be explored in relation to a number of Islamic societies in the region. The course foregrounds the complexities and diversity present in a critical geographic area of what we call the Islamic world today.
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Gender Studies Program University of Notre Dame |
William Merrit Chase, Portrait of a Young Woman, c. 1888.
Courtesy of the University of Notre Dame Snite Museum of Art.
Gift of Mr. Peter C. Reilly. Used with permission.
About the Gender Studies Program
Gender Studies helps us to understand men and women's situation today: our roles and experiences in dating, marriages, families and other relationships, our perceptions and expectations of ourselves, our career opportunities, our treatment in academia and the greater world. It also considers the role of the body in the formation of human sexuality and spirituality and in the formation of individual identity.
Gender studies helps us to understand the role of women and men in the creative arts, in literature, and in music. It discovers the contributions of men and women to the fields of the physical and social sciences, government, philosophy, and theology.
