RELI-3445 Islam, Gender, and Power

Gender is crucial to understanding the religious, political, social, economic, and intellectual life of Muslim communities throughout history. This course explores how gender impacts the construction of authority in public and private domains. How are conceptions of gender and gender ideals interpreted from diverse authorative sources of Islam, such as the Qur'an, the Sunna, and the classical intellectual tradition? How do contemporary Muslim thinkers from the colonial and post-colonial eras uphold, reject, or negotiate these discourses? This course thus uses gender as an analytical category to better understand Muslim thought and practice, as well as non-Muslim perceptions of Islam. (Offered every other year.) Prerequisite: 1 Course in Religion or consent of instructor.