Fatima Mernissi: Evolving Feminism(S) Essay Example

of showing where Mernissi’s scholarship began and then the contribution Mernissi made to Islamic feminism. First, this paper supplies a little background information about Fatima Mernissi in order to provide context about this scholar. This paper then discusses Mernissi’s original articulation of her view of achieving omen’s rights through secular feminism, often characterized by reconstructionist views, in Beyond the Veil. Next, Mernissi’s contribution to Islamic feminism is explored by focusing on Mernissi’s evolution of approach to Islamic reformist thought in her publication The Veil and the Male Elite. Significant to this discussion is Mernissi’s important role in asserting the right of women in Islamic society to engage in ijtihad and the responsibility of women to educate themselves and seek an understanding of the Islamic framework they struggle for equality within.

Fatima Mernissi was born into a traditional and wealthy family in the city of Fez, Morocco in 1940 (Belhachmi 1411). Born into a harem, Mernissi was exposed to the conflict between tradition and modernity within Morocco from a young age (Coleman 36). Mernissi was constantly surrounded by women sequestered behind the high walls of her family home, who influenced her development and growth, as she later documents in her memoir Dreams of Trespass: Tales of a Harem Girlhood. Mernissi’s mother espoused ideas of gender equality, encouraging Mernissi to pursue her obligation to “transform the world” (Coleman 36).

Mernissi attended religious school from a young age where she began to learn the Qur’an. Mernissi, growing up in a time of societal change in Morocco, was able to attend school and become literate; she was one of the first women in her family to leave the harem and become

educated (Coleman 36-37). Upon Morocco’s independence from France, the harem life Mernissi was born into continued to disintegrate and disappear. She took advantage of the freedom of this change and achieved a master’s degree in politics from Muhammad V University (Coleman 37).

Mernissi continued her education by studying political science at the Sorbonne, and afterward earned a doctorate from Brandeis University in Massachusetts (Coleman 37). Upon receipt of her doctorate degree, Mernissi returned to Morocco to teach at Muhammad V University (Coleman 37). Mernissi returned to her home country to find that significant transformation had occurred in the lived experiences of middle and upper-class women as a result of increasing access to education and the entrance of women into the workplace.

However, these changes had not yet permeated into the rural areas of Morocco, gender relations were still dictated by patriarchal traditions, and the family legal code of Morocco (articulated through the Mudawana) still held women as legal minors (Coleman 37). In this context, Mernissi took up her mother’s invocation to transform the world by becoming an outspoken activist and scholar of women’s rights. Many of her works respond directly to her societal experiences of patriarchy in Morocco.

In her early scholarship Mernissi responds to this patriarchy by advocating a reconstruction of society. Mernissi later moves to a more societal reformist approach grounded in an Islamic framework, which has strengthened and contributed to the emergent phenomenon of Islamic feminism. However, first returning back to Morocco in the 1970s from her educational experience in the West, her discourse reflects the influence of Western ideology in her book Beyond the Veil: Male-Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society.

Mernissi’s book, Beyond the

Veil, was first published in 1975 and a revised edition was released in 1987. In this work, Mernissi argues that women’s goals are “being phrased in terms of a global rejection of established sexual patterns, [which are] frustrating for males and degrading for females. [She claims] [t]his implies a revolutionary reorganization of the entire society, starting from its economic structure and ending with its grammar” (“Beyond Veil” 176).

Scholars Barlow and Akbarzadeh argue this statement and approach to women’s rights: was a revolutionary assault on the social, political and religious establishment, as [Mernissi] presented the liberation of Muslim women as part and parcel of a broader movement to stimulate stagnant Muslim societies and to drag them from under the yoke of tradition and Islamic orthodoxy. (1483) Mernissi rejects aspects of Islam and Islamic thought which she considers misogynistic and creates or facilitates patriarchal systems in society. Throughout most of Beyond the Veil, Mernissi establishes and discusses ideological links between patriarchy and Islam.

Mernissi discusses Muslim society’s adherence to the supremacy of shari’a and Allah’s role as “head of the umma” (“Beyond Veil 20) and “Sole Legislator” (“Beyond Veil” 20). She describes shari’a as a rigid and uncompromising governing system that has continually placed restrictions and constraints upon women since its establishment through the Prophet Muhammad in seventh century Arabia (“Beyond Veil” 20-22). Furthermore, as part of this conversation, Mernissi expresses doubt that the “Islamic framework could ever accommodate a fully desegregated society” (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1484).

Mernissi expresses this most clearly in her statement “that there is a fundamental contradiction between Islam ... and equality between the sexes. Sexual equality violates Islam's premises, actualized in its laws, that heterosexual

love is dangerous to Allah's order” (“Beyond Veil” 18-19), especially considering the patriarchal structure of the Muslim family. Mernissi postulates that the Islamic construction of family developed as a means to control women’s sexuality during the period of hijra.

In a departure from conventional views about the origins and spread of Islam, Mernissi claims that the position of women in pre-Islamic Arabia during the period known as jahiliya was overall superior to the position experienced by women within Islamic society (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1484). Many scholars argue that “Quranic reforms freed women from pre-Islamic tribal ties and practices, in which 'women were treated as chattel, as property with no rights in a totally male-dominated society'” (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1484).

Mernissi argues against this and connects patriarchy to Islam by suggesting: a close causal link between the monotheistic nature of Islam and the suppression of the woman. According to this hypothesis, to end the pre-Islamic Arabian belief in polytheism, Islam found it not only necessary to purge all divinities that might threaten Allah's monopoly, but also to end the autonomy of women. Within the conjugal unit the woman has the potential to interfere in Allah's direct relationship with man, threatening his divine monopoly.

In order to abate this threat, revelations have been utilised to establish and entrench men's control over women. (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1484) Mernissi explains that the means of control that were established by the Qur’an include the rules concerning polygamy, repudiation, prohibitions of zina, and guarantees of paternity thorough idda (“Beyond the Veil” 46-64). Mernissi argues that these were: all designed to foster the transition from a family based on some degree of female self- determination [during jahiliya] to

a family based on male control.

The Prophet saw the establishment of the male-dominated Muslim family as crucial to the establishment of Islam. (“Beyond Veil” 64) Furthermore, Mernissi reinforces the idea that during the control and “civilization” (“Beyond Veil” 46) of sexuality through the creation of the Islamic family, only female sexuality was controlled and civilized, while male sexuality continues to go uncontrolled. (“Beyond Veil” 46) In Beyond the Veil, Mernissi suggests that because of the inherent links between patriarchy and Islam, societal reconstruction is necessary as a means for attaining access o women’s rights. Mernissi establishes the view through Beyond the Veil that “Islamic tradition rests on patriarchy, institutionalised and produced over the centuries” (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1485). She clearly articulates her position by stating that “Muslim societies cannot afford to be reformist” (“Beyond Veil” 175) instead supporting a reconstructionist view of change necessary to improve the condition and status of women in Muslim majority countries. Mernissi approaches the concept of “women's rights enshrined in international conventions as Western in origin” (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1485).

Scholars Barlow and Akbarzadeh argue that Mernissi “acts as an agent for modernity” (1485) by “arguing her case for the adoption of Western-originated norms on human rights and discarding the rigid Islamic practices that have served to entrench patriarchy in Muslim societies” (1485). According to Mernissi’s scholarship in Beyond the Veil, achieving access to women’s rights would involve disregarding certain aspects of the Islamic framework, including certain tenets of shari’a law and Qur’anic foundations such adherence to Allah as the “only lawmaker” (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1485-1486).

Mernissi’s revolutionary call for societal change and reconstruction seems to have been influenced and changed by the effects of

Islamic revivalism in Morocco during the late 1970s and 1980s (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1486). As a result of the failing modernization paradigm in Morocco (and much of the Middle East), the country experienced a rise of Islamist rhetoric and the emergence of the idea of Islam as a solution to social ills. Furthermore, “Western secularism was identified with the entire range of problems [economic stagnation, political oppression, poverty] that were being experienced in Muslim societies” (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1486).

Resultantly, a shift in the approach and methodology of Muslim feminists occurred in the 1990s, with Mernissi pioneering the change. As scholars Barlow and Akbarzadeh state: Muslim feminists were compelled, or chose, to recognise the centrality of Islam to Muslim identity, as well as its power as a source of legitimacy and popular mobilisation. It appeared necessary for Fatima Mernissi to redefine her feminist project in a manner that Muslim women perceived as a more authentic accommodation of modernity to their religion and culture. (1486) Mernissi accomplishes this through her 1991 publication of The Veil and the Male Elite.

In The Veil and Male Elite, Mernissi changes her position to reflect and adopt a reformist discourse expressing that women’s inferior position in society is the result of powerful male-dominated misinterpretations of Islam, rather than Islam itself. Mernissi argues for a re-evaluation of Islamic heritage by focusing on the specific hadith and Qur’anic injunctions toward women that have historically served patriarchal agendas. Mernissi directs attention to the specific “historic-political conditions” (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1487) in which these Qur’anic commands were revealed.

This contextualization of Islamic precepts and teachings constituted a less revolutionary reformist approach that allowed Mernissi to separate her previous assertion and

coupling of patriarchy to the Qur’an and inherent within the foundation of the Islamic framework (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1487). In this way, Mernissi was able to provide a useful model demonstrating how to create an intellectual space where “opposing male domination does not equate with opposing Islam” (Barlow, Akbarzadeh 1487), but instead provides a base and foundation toward reform and combating Islamic conservatism.

Most importantly, through this pivotal work, Mernissi asserts the right of women in Islamic society to engage in ijtihad and women’s obligation toward education and reinterpretation in order to combat the patriarchal notions, responses, and structure women face daily. As scholar Dean states, “although Mernissi respects the Qur’an as the holy book and the religious text of her Islamic faith, her scholarly works treat it as a political and cultural reference upon which to build a theoretical premise” (2).

Mernissi begins building an Islamic feminism theoretical premise in 1991 with The Veil and the Male Elite. Mernissi’s book, The Veil and the Male Elite, begins with a story about one of Mernissi’s personal confrontations with patriarchy during a mundane grocery run in Morocco. Out shopping and engaging in casual conversation, Mernissi asks her local grocer (male) if a woman can be a leader of Muslims. He responds in horror with a resounding no and exclamations of dire consequences should this become a reality.

A schoolteacher joins the conversation and effectively ends it by quoting a well-known hadith: “Those who entrust their affairs to a woman will never know prosperity” (“Veil and Male Elite” 1-2). Mernissi was powerfully silenced, consequentially furious, and determined to find a way to contradict and combat this discrimination against women. In many

ways, this story resonates with the experience of women who now engage in Islamic feminism. These women experience discrimination by men who increasingly ground and justify their actions as inherent in the Islamic faith.

As a result Muslim women find themselves in a position that requires they respond within an Islamic discourse. Mernissi paved the way in The Veil and the Male Elite by providing one of the first examples of how to respond to patriarchy in a “progressive Islamic voice” (Badran 303). After relating her experience with her grocer and the school teacher, Mernissi proceeds to challenge and place the hadith quoted by school teacher in historical context. She does this by establishing and asserting her right to engage in ijtihad to better understand her faith and promote an egalitarian Islam (Cooke 71).

Mernissi worked with religious scholars, studied Islamic history, jurisprudence, and hadith evolution to understand and approach the reinterpretation or rather, recontextualization, of the hadith “those who entrust their affairs to a woman will never know prosperity. ” This particular hadith was part of the collection of ninth-century Imam al-Bukhari. Bukhari’s hadith reports are accepted by most as sahih (Coleman 61) and therefore rarely contested. However, Mernissi challenges this hadith regardless.

Her reformist approach may be less revolutionary, but her actions most certainly are not. Mernissi proposes several reasons and details that challenge the validity of this specific hadith. Mernissi argues that it was related by Abu Bakra, a man of questionable character. Mernissi’s historical investigation reveals that Abu Bakra was a former slave with a record of relating “politically opportune” (“Veil and Male Elite” 61) hadith and had even been flogged for qadhf (“Veil

and Male Elite” 61).

Mernissi concludes her dismissal of this misogynist hadith by discussing the historical contestation of this particular hadith by the fuqaha, citing al-Tabari as one of the main religious authorities who took a position against the hadith (“Veil and Male Elite” 61). Mernissi spends the rest of The Veil and the Male Elite contextualizing and reinterpreting other Islamic issues such as the hijab and the Prophet Muhammad’s view of women. Mernissi also extends the discussion to women’s role in society, which she describes as one of involvement and participation.

Mernissi establishes women’s public participation as a right established by the Prophet’s wives during the founding of Islamic history. Therefore, Mernissi not only engages in ijtihad, opening this door for other women, but she also urges women to become educated and involved in society. Mernissi’s view about women’s education and involvement is best articulated in her preface to The Veil and the Male Elite where she asks: Why is it that we can find some Muslim men saying that women in Muslim states cannot be granted full enjoyment of human rights?

What grounds do they have for such a claim? None—they are simply betting on our ignorance of the past, for their argument can never convince anyone with an elementary understanding of Islam’s history. Any man who believes that a Muslim woman who fights for her dignity and right to citizenship excludes herself unnecessarily from the umma and is a brainwashed victim of Western propaganda is a man who misunderstands his own religious heritage, his own cultural identity. “Veil and Male Elite vii-viii) In this way, Mernissi sends out a clarion call to other women to

join her by becoming educated and involved in the struggle to ensure access to the rights of women articulated in the Qur’an and Islam. Fatima Mernissi, the godmother of Islamic feminism, did not begin her career in the tradition of Islamic feminism. While her scholarship always worked toward defending and ensuring access to women’s rights in Muslim society, Mernissi’s ideological approaches experienced an evolution throughout her career.

Mernissi began her publication career espousing a secular feminist reconstructionist approach that linked patriarchy to the Qur’an and an Islamic framework. Mernissi originally described gender equality and an Islamically structured society as incompatible, therefore calling for a reconstruction of society to incorporate the Western ideals of an international standard of human rights. Later in her career, responding to her environment, Mernissi’s ideas and approach shifted to a reformist approach that served to provide some of the basic tenants of the discourse and phenomenon currently defined as Islamic feminism.

Currently, Mernissi’s research interests center on the role of the digital revolution and women’s struggles in Muslim society (“Fatema Mernissi” website). While uncomfortable with the label Islamic feminist, it is undeniable that Mernissi’s scholarly contributions have proven invaluable to women’s Islamic reform movements within Muslim majority countries. Mernissi provides an exemplary model of how Muslim women can fight for their rights, societal change, and address claims of patriarchy within their religion while still retaining their Islamic identity.

Works Cited

Badran, Margot.Feminism in Islam: Secular and Religious Convergences. Oxford: Oneworld Publications, 2009. Print. Barlow, Rebecca, and Shahram Akbarzadeh. "Women's Rights in Muslim World: Reform or Reconstruction? " Third World Quarterly 27. 8 (2006): 1481-94. Web. 16 Apr. 2011.

Belhachmi, Zakia. Al-Saidawi’s and Mernissi’s Feminist Knowledge With/in

the History, Education and Science of the Arab-Islamic Culture. PhD thesis. University of Montreal, Montreal, 1999.

ProQuest Dissertations and Theses. Web. 02 April 2011. Coleman, Isobel. Paradise Beneath Her Feet: How Women are Transforming the Middle East.

New York: Random House, 2010. Print. Cooke, Miriam. Women Claim Islam: Creating Islamic Feminism Through Literature. New York: Routledge, 2001. Print. Dean, Darlene J. Arab Women’s Agency in Fatima Mernissi’s Colonial to Postcolonial Literature. PhD thesis. Arizona State University, Phoenix, 2006.

ProQuest Dissertations and Theses. Web. 02 April 2011. Mernissi, Fatema. Fatema Mernissi. Ed. Manuela Abel and Heike Staff. N. p. , 2002. Web. 22 Apr. 2011. ;http://www. mernissi. net/index. html;. Mernissi, Fatima. Beyond the Veil: Male-Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society. 2nd ed.

Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1987. Print. Mernissi, Fatima. The Veil and the Male Elite: A Feminist Interpretation of Women's Rights in Islam. Cambridge: Perseus Books, 1991. Print.. With publications such as Beyond the Veil: Male-Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society.

• Starting with The Veil and the Male Elite.
• Resulting in her being labeled as the godmother this phenomenon.
• Independent intellectual investigation of the Qur’an and other texts (Badran 3).
• And by extension Muslim society.
• Located in Rabat, Morocco. Rabat is the capital of Morocco.
• Mudawana is Morocco’s Family Code based in Shari’a. Influenced by Islamic law (shari’a), it contains the legal codes that govern the home and family. Legal rights such as marriage, divorce, and child custody, are codified within the Mudawana.
• This is the date given in my introduction that many scholars cite as the publication date, although, the first edition was published in 1975 as an extension of her doctoral research and scholarship.
• Islamic Law -
  

Allah’s will for humanity.

1. Umma means world-wide Muslim community.
2. Known as year one of civilization, or rather, the introduction of Islam to society (“Beyond Veil” 46).
3. The pre-Islamic time period, often characterized as a time of barbarism, ignorance, and uncontrolled sexuality (“Beyond Veil” 46).
4. Sexual relations (premarital or adulterous) outside of marriage (“Beyond Veil” 58-59).
5. The period of time (three menstrual cycles) a women must wait before remarrying. (“Beyond Veil” 62-63).
6. Original emphasis in text.
7. The Veil and the Male Elite was originally banned in Mernissi’s home country of Morocco (Coleman 39). 17 ]. Recall: Independent intellectual investigation of the Qur’an and other texts (Badran 3).
8. Original emphasis in text.
9. Recall: “Those who entrust their affairs to a woman will never know prosperity. ”