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Gönül Dönmez-Colin's book, Women, Islam and Cinema, comes not a day too soon. At a time when controversies rage over the wearing of the veil in school, reality seems to be catching up with fiction. Dönmez-Colin speaks of the insidious and conservative ways in which cinema in many Islamic countries has portrayed women. Her sweep is large: she covers India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Indonesia, Iran, Turkey, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan and draws careful analogies and contradictions that exist within and among these countries. Inevitably, cinema's depiction of women as actresses, directors and spectators grows out of the prevailing social and political atmosphere: stifling patriarchy and female subordination.

Property and wealth are entwined in the structure of society, with ties formed through blood and marital relations, and the orderly transfer of wealth is a fundamental part of Islamic law. The supreme purpose of the Islamic system is material provision for surviving dependants and relatives. This research tries to describe the important factors at work of religion to which women have an opportunity to contribute of their aspiration for the formulation of Islamic Law. The question to be considered is how does the pre-existing, culturally rooted perception of women influence the interpretation of the Qur'anic position on women? The interpretation of the Qur'an itself is influenced by social, moral, economic and political concerns, including interpretation regarding women. For example, Verse 34 of surah 4 of the Qur'an teaches that the superiority of men over women is justified by the fact that men provide women with "nafaqa," the resources necessary to maintain human life. This verse commonly has been cited to subjugate women in the name of Islam. But Muslim women are asking the question "How should this verse be interpreted?†Is the link between the relationship of domination and consumption limited to the sexual relationship, or is it institutionalized in other spheres?

Women have made less progress toward gender equality in the Middle East than in any other region. Many observers claim this is due to the region's Islamic traditions. I suggest that oil, not Islam, is at fault; and that oil production also explains why women lag behind in many other countries. Oil production reduces the number of women in the labor force, which in turn reduces their political influence. As a result, oil-producing states are left with atypically strong patriarchal norms, laws, and political institutions. I support this argument with global data on oil production, female work patterns, and female political representation, and by comparing oil-rich Algeria to oil-poor Morocco and Tunisia. This argument has implications for the study of the Middle East, Islamic culture, and the resource curse.

Asma Barlas's objective in this book is to uncover the essentially egalitarian message of the Qurءan by defining the best methodology for reading the Qurءan and by applying this methodology to better understand its message concerning the ontological and social status of women. In Part I, she draws on the work of previous scholars to fashion a critique of interpretations that conflate the Qurءan with secondary texts such as a hadith and tafsīr, texts she views as instrumental in the incorporation of misogynist beliefs and customs into Islam. She calls for a reaffirmation of the primacy of the Qurءanic text but read in a new way—holistically and as a historically situated text. A Muslim who does not question the divine origin of the Qurءan, Barlas insists on the individual responsibility of its readers correctly to uncover its meanings through the use of their intellects, using the tool of ijtihād rather than the blind acceptance of traditional interpretations.

AbstractThis article investigates the history of women's relationship to political Islam in Indonesia over the last century. It addresses three questions: how Islamic women have been politically active in Indonesia, how Indonesian women have been affected by political Islam, and how they have influenced political Islam. Independence marked a turning point. In the colonial period, women were more active within radical Islamic organisations than in moderate ones. Since independence, however, the situation has changed. Instead, the role of women has strengthened in moderate organisations while radical Islam has kept women in the background.