According to the photographer, she had a number of attendants and was dressed extremely finely in a “robe of rich Turkish tissue of silk and gold”. Her dress covered most of her face, with only her hand visible. The purpose of the visit had been to impress upon the young queen the advantages of becoming a French colony. But she vehemently resisted.
The burqa existed long before the Taliban, worn by Pashtun women to mark “the symbolic separation of men’s and women’s domains.” Although it could be argued that this reinforces patriarchal ideas of women belonging at home, we must remember that many saw the burqa as a “liberating invention”.
Many men rejected the verses in Wallada’s poems because they were not “womanly” but this pushed her to write even more. She was a woman who took criticism as a tool to come back stronger, making her poems passionately vivid and influential.
Asma Lamrabet offers a motivational reading of religious history where God repeatedly upholds the equality of women who are made of the same stuff as men. That’s a great place to start a conversation on how power is balanced between men and women within Islam.
Aleppo’s diplomatic position was never as strong as it was under the rule of Queen Dhayfa Khatun. Besides her diplomatic strength, however, Dhayfa took a special interest in architecture and sponsored learning in Aleppo where she founded two schools.
As a queen, Al-Khayzuran improved the condition of women. She was committed to removing the harmful structures that prevented women from living their full lives. She was also very charitable, especially to women.
The knowledge that once upon an Islamic empire, in a golden city of wisdom, walked a woman who wove law and algebra together with utmost perfection that her history couldn’t be completely obliterated gives us hope that what once was, could definitely be again, and perhaps has started to become.
For what it’s worth, it’s important to discuss the sex scenes in ‘Bridgerton’ and analyse whether or not they are a representation of what good sex should look like. In this writer’s humble opinion, ‘Bridgerton’ sex is terrible and should never be a model or a “how-to” manual for sex. This is especially in relation to female orgasm because as women, we deserve better. Bad sex scenes are unfortunately common in a lot of TV shows and ‘Bridgerton’ is not an exception.
The way the scenes were written especially with the characters who defended the rapist and the characters who stood up for Janna was extremely eye-opening. As Muslims, this book serves as a daily reminder not to put scholars and hafidhs on a pedestal. Do the research and listen to the victims when they try to speak up.
In ‘It’s Not About the Burqa’, Muslim Women, as a minority group in the West, tell their various points of view in their various essays, while focusing on one main goal: How Muslim women can overcome their struggles for identity amidst the multiple layers of oppression and injustice confronting them today.
