Muslim Women's Rights

Tabassum Fahim Ruby is an assistant professor at West Chester University of Pennsylvania, USA. Her research focuses on Islam and gender discourses, liberal-secular epistemology, and globalization. Her most recent publications have appeared in Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, Women’s Studies International Forum, and Feminist Formations.

• Preface, Acknowledgments, Glossary of Arabic Words, 1. Liberal-Secular Sensibilities and a Genealogy of the Ontario Shari‘ah Tribunals 2. From Orientalism to Neo-Orientalism: Discourses of Race and Imperial Hegemony in the Name of Gender Equality 3. Liberalism, the Court System, and Multiculturalism: Examining Epistemic Claims 4. Secularism and Its Discontents: Social Hierarchies that Matter 5. Aversion or Conversion: A Missed Opportunity? 6. Ideology, Ontology, and Epistemology: Shari‘ah Debates and the Tawhidi (Unitary) Weltanschauung 7. Conclusion: Signs are Enough for Those Who Think

"This excellent study of the Shar'iah debates in Ontario demonstrates how readily secular-liberal discourses extend orientalist constructs of Muslims and Islam. Rather then protect Muslim women's status or interests, liberal concepts of rights actually further these women's disempowerment argues the author. Taking to task the 'neo-orientalism' of Muslim and non-Muslim activists who worked to close off Muslim women's access to faith-based arbitration, this book exposes the hypocrisies of the secular feminist 'saviour' complex."-- Sunera Thobanil, Associate Professor at the Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality and Social Justice at the University of British Columbia