Why Sharia Matters in the Struggle for Gender Equality in Islam

Kecia Ali in conversation with Laury Silvers

Date: Saturday May 23, 2009
Time: 6:00 p.m.
Location: Auditorium, Noor Cultural Centre
Admission: $5

An Assistant Professor of Religion, Kecia Ali received her Ph.D. in Religion from Duke University, where she was the recipient of the James B. Duke fellowship, in 2002. Her specialization was Islamic Studies. Prior to beginning her studies at Duke, she completed her undergraduate education at Stanford University. From 2001 to 2003, Ali worked as a research analyst for the Feminist Sexual Ethics Project at Brandeis University. Her recent book, Sexual Ethics and Islam: Feminist Reflections on Qur’an, Hadith, and Jurisprudence (2006), grew out of her work with this Ford Foundation initiative. In 2003-2004, Ali was a research associate in Harvard Divinity School’s Women’s Studies in Religion Program. From 2004-2006, she held a Florence Levy Kay postdoctoral fellowship in Islamic Studies and Women’s Studies at Brandeis University. Her research interests center on Islamic religious texts, especially jurisprudence, and women in both classical and contemporary Muslim discourses. Her main research focuses on the ninth century, and in addition to her current book in progress, Marriage, Gender, and Ownership in Early Islamic Jurisprudence, she is also working on a biography of the jurist al-Shafi‘i. Ali has served on the Steering Committee for the Study of Islam Section of the American Academy of Religion since 2003, and on the Steering Committee for the newly formed Consultation on Religion and Sexuality since 2004.

Laury Silvers is a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department for the Study of Religion at University of Toronto for the 2008-2010 academic years. Her scholarship focuses on Islam in the Formative Period in particular Sufism, Sufi Metaphysics, and Gender. Her book, A Soaring Minaret: Abu Bakr al-Wasiti and the Rise of Baghdadi Sufism will be published by SUNY Press in 2009. She is preparing a second book, Simply Good Women: Gender in Early Piety and Sufism.

Painting credit: Shahrad Malek Fazeli