070809 KU Women in Islamic History (2008S)

This course explores the ways women in the Islamic world have lived and defined themselves in family, work, politics, literature, art and religion. The course covers the time period from the lifetime of the Prophet Muhammad to the present and focuses on women's voices and experience.
The class will have a lecture format; but it will also have an active-learning component in the form of panel discussions lead by the students. The students will investigate important issues in Muslim women's history such as, for the early period: Women in the Qur'an, women in the life of the Prophet and his immediate successors, women scholarship, role in the development of Sufism, Fiqh and Hadith traditions, literature and the role of harem as a locus of power. For the modern period, themes comprise: the history of feminism in Islamic countries, women's spirituality and religious practices, their encounter with colonialism, their role in the nationalist struggle, their social, intellectual, artistic and political activism, the veil controversy.