Muslim Women Speak:Claiming The Right to Public Participation

Is it true that Islam does not engage in and support women's rights? Is feminism compatible with Islam? Or is it merely a Western concept? Is it important for women to participate in the decision and law-making process? Who has the power to speak about Islam?

Speakers:

1. Prof. Kecia Ali ( USA)
2. Dr. Ziba Mir Hosseini ( London)
3. Cassandra Balchin (Women Living Under Muslim Laws)

Moderator : Prof. Norani Othman


Muslim Women Speak: Claiming The Right to Public Participation

Date: 19th March 2006 (Sunday)

Time : 8.00 – 10.00 pm

Venue : Ballroom 3 Level 10, Crown Princess hotel, Jalan Tun Razak, Kuala Lumpur


Since seats are limited, please register soonest possible so that the necessary arrangements could be made. Please contact Nurul at 03 7960 6121 or email to yati.sistersinislam@gmail.com.

Brief Biodata of the Speakers :

ZIBA MIR HOSSEINI is an Iranian Anthropologist who lives in London. She works as a freelance researcher and consultant on gender and development issues and has done extensive fieldwork in rural and urban Iran as well as urban Morocco . Since the 1979 Revolution in Iran , she has done research in Teheran family courts and has followed developments in family law debates about gender issues in the Islamic Republic. Her first book, Marriage on Trail;A Study of Family Law in Iran and Morrocco (l.B.Tauris,1993) inspired Kim Longinotto to collaborate with her on this film. She is also the author of Feminism and the Islamic Republic: Dialogues with the Ulema ( Princeton,1999) and Islam and Gender, the Religious Debate in Contemporary Islam.Dr Hosseini is currently teaching in the Hauser Global School Law Program at New York University .

KECIA ALI is a Mellon post-doctoral fellow in Islamic Studies and Women's Studies at Brandeis University, USA . Her research works focus on Islamic jurisprudence. From 2001 to 2003, she worked with the Feminist Sexual Ethics Project, writing about women and gender in Islamic texts and Muslim communities. She received her Ph.D. in Religion (Islamic Studies) from Duke University and has contributed articles to the anthologies Progressive Muslims: On Justice, Gender, and Pluralism and Taking Back Islam: American Muslims Reclaim Their Faith. She is completing a book on marriage and divorce in ninth-century law and working on a collection of essays about sexual ethics in Islamic scripture, tradition and law.

CASSANDRA BALCHIN is the coordinator for Women Living Under Muslim Laws - a global solidarity network for Muslim women throughout the world. The network aims basically at providing linkages and support to women whose lives may be affected by Muslim laws.