Secular Muslim Feminism

Hind Elhinnawy, a Senior Lecturer at Nottingham Trent University, UK. She has dedicated over two decades to challenging the status of women in Muslim societies. Her groundbreaking work, including "Rethinking Gender in the New Muslim Public Sphere," (2012) has contributed to significant law and policy reforms, sparking vital conversations on gender equality within the Islamic world.

• PrefaceAcknowledgmentsNote on text/transliterationGlossaryAbbreviationsI. IntroductionSituating secular Muslim feminismUnpacking ‘secular’-‘Muslim’-‘feminism’The power and pitfalls of terminologyNavigating methodological challengesThe organizing of the bookII. Demystifying secular Muslim feminismDon’t label me!Which ‘Muslim woman’?Which ‘feminism’?And whose ‘Islam’?A ‘secular’ champion of religious freedomChallenging multiple frontsEmerging counter-narratives?III. Islam, feminism, and secular resistanceEarly feminist consciousnessMuslim women’s scholarshipMuslim women’s activismBetween the religious and the secularIV. The politics of ‘saving’ the Muslim womanOrientalism then and nowOrientalism, gender, and empireIn the crossfires of changeThe unresolved legacies of colonialismMapping feminist responsesNavigating the path aheadV. Beyond resistance versus subservienceTheorizing ‘agency’‘Piety’ and the ‘agency’ turnThe limits of pietist ‘agency’Beyond faith and agencyVI. Islam, secularism, and the woman’s questionSecularism in a post-secular ageSecularism confronts IslamThe ‘Muslim’ woman’s questionSecularism in the Muslim worldBeyond Western conceptualizationsReimagining SecularismVII. Can the secular Muslim feminist speak?Silenced voices in their homelandsDismissed by the international communityThe ‘native informant’ conundrumThe impasse of apologismThe limits of relativism (and) universalismSolidarity across difference is possible!Concluding remarksAbout the AuthorAbstractNotesBibliographyIndex

This provocative and complex book explores the overlooked voices of secular Muslim feminists who claim adherence to secular beliefs without engaging with anti-Muslim discourses.