Course details

Name: ENGL - 230

Title: IMAGES OF MUSLIM WOMEN IN 20th CENTURY LIT AND FILM

Section: 01

Semester: Spring - 2015

Credits: 3

Description:
The aim of this course is to provide you with some tools of analysis for the study of Muslim women in a variety of cultural settings, through attention to literary and filmic texts.
This is an introductory course meant to raise awareness and understanding about issues and questions regarding the literary and cultural work produced by women writers of Muslim background, residing within and outside of the USA.
Why do some Muslim women wear the hijab? What are the similarities and differences between the hijab, the chador, the veil, the burqa? Is wearing one of these pieces of clothing a sign of cultural, religious, class or political identity? Is it a sign of “freedom of choice” or “coercion” through ideology? Are Muslim women oppressed? What does it even mean to ask such a question of geographically, culturally and socially very different groups of women? What are the sex lives of Muslim women like? How prevalent are “love” as opposed to “arranged” marriages in Muslim culture/s? Can one be a Muslim woman and a lesbian? Are all Muslim women religious? Are there feminists in the Muslim world? Or is Feminism a dirty word when it comes to Islam and women’s rights? What do Arab Muslim women have in common with their “sisters” in Pakistan, or Iran, or Turkey? Are Muslim-American women a different breed from those who live in predominantly Muslim countries? What political vision of the world do these women share, if any?
We will read novels, short stories, poetry, plays, critical essays by Muslim women writers from Morocco, Egypt, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, Iran, and the USA including literary writings of such famous writers like Nawal el Saadawi of Egypt, Fatema Mernissi of Morocco and Assia Djebar of Algeria, alongside "minority" writers of USA like male Muslim Pulitzer winning playwright Ayad Akhtar, Harvard-based Muslim theologian and memoirist Leila Ahmed and sexologist Shereen El-Feki.

Last updated on 2014-10-24 By Afzal-Khan Fawzia (khanf)

Schedule: Tuesday,Thursday From 2:30 pm To 3:45 pm

Graduation requirements:

  • Any Literature (1e)
  • ()
  • ()
  • Post-1900 (1d)
  • International Issues (3a)
  • Women and Gender Studies (3c)

Teaching Faculty: Afzal-Khan Fawzia (khanf)

Is course canceled: No