Who Gets to be a Prophet? Miracles, Privileges and the Discourse of Meritocracy
15TH Annual Prophetic Voices Lecture
Ayesha S. Chaudhry
University of British Columbia
顿补迟别:听April 12, 2016
Abstract
Today, America stands at the intersection of key debates on race, gender and class privilege. Students on campuses around the country are demanding constructive platforms for discussing race, gender and class in ways that matter to them. From the heated debate about rape at Columbia University and Brown University, to the arguments about race at Yale University and听University of Missouri, we see that students are clashing with bureaucratic structures that are not immediately open to critical self-reflection. At the same time, #BlackLivesMatter has become an urgent national movement and discussions about immigration, refugees, affirmative action and Islamophobia are taking center stage in the endless election cycle. Throughout these debates, religion, morality and ethics have played crucial but often conflicting roles. What does it mean to stand up for justice, how should we think about privilege, what should systematic change look like? Religious frameworks come with their own sets of privileges and oppressions, which intersect in various ways with political, social and economic structures of power. In this talk, Chaudhry will discuss the religious imperatives available to us through the lens of Islam. How can an Islamic framework contribute to discussions about race, class and gender facing America today?
Speaker Bio
Ayesha S. Chaudhry听is the Rita E. Hauser fellow at Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. She is听Associate Professor of Islamic studies and gender studies at the University of British Columbia. She is the author听of听Domestic Violence and the Islamic Tradition: Ethics, Law, and the Muslim Discourse on Gender听(Oxford University听Press, 2014). She has consulted on high-level national and international cases concerning human rights and religious听pluralism and freedom, as well as on divorce cases involving Muslim-majority countries.
At Radcliffe, Chaudhry is working on a project that constructs a feminist Shari鈥檃 by re-imagining the narrative of 鈥樐�鈥檌sha,听Mu岣mmad鈥檚 youngest wife. Constructions of '膧'isha are central to justifying and supporting patriarchal Islamic laws,听especially those regarding women鈥檚 political and religious leadership, women鈥檚 testimony, polygamy, child marriage and听virginity testing, slander and corporal punishment for illicit sex, and domestic violence. Therefore, creating a feminist听narrative of 鈥樐�鈥檌sha is necessary for Islamic legal reform. Chaudhry is examining premodern, patriarchal constructions of听鈥樐�鈥檌sha, investigating modern Muslim debates around these laws and proposing strategies for reimagining 鈥樐�鈥檌sha to听frame a narrative for a gender-equal Islamic law. Looking at major Muslim debates about gender through the lens of听鈥樐�鈥檌sha will provide a counter-narrative to conceptions of a patriarchal Islam.
Chaudhry earned her PhD in Middle East and Islamic studies from New York University and a collaborative MA in Near听Eastern civilizations and women鈥檚 studies from the University of Toronto. She is a contributor to the Globe and Mail.听Chaudhry has been an Early Career Scholar at the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies at UBC.听
Read More
Books
Chaudhry, Ayesha.听.听(Oxford University Press, 2013).
Chaudhry, Ayesha. 鈥淲omen鈥� (core entry) in听听(Princeton University Press, 2012) 595-9.
Chaudhry, Ayesha. 鈥淥ncofertility as Divine Intervention in the Qur鈥櫮乶鈥� in听. ed. T. K. Woodfuff, L. Zoloth, L. Campo-Engelstein and S Rodriguez. (Springer, 2010) 287-94.
Articles
Ayesha Chaudhry's article in听Journal of Religious Ethics,听鈥�"
Ayesha Chaudhry's article in听Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics,听鈥�."
Ayesha Chaudhry, Rachel Muers and Randi Rashkover's article in听Feminist Theology,听鈥�."
Ayesha Chaudhry's article in听Journal for Comparative Islamic Studies,听鈥�."
In the News
2015 saw a heightened media presence and swelling public discourse surrounding Islam, Islamic civilization, and鈥攎ore broadly鈥攓uestions on the status of the world鈥檚 multiculturalist values. In the wake of this international commentary, Iran鈥檚 President Hassan Rouhani has called on the global Muslim community鈥攕pecifically Muslim countries鈥攖o improve the image of Islam, and to reduce the propagation of negative imagery of Islam in both cyber space and in personal discourse,听听This spring,听Ayesha Chaudhry听will deliver the听15th Annual Prophetic Voices Lecture听and present a case for how the Islamic framework can act as a positive force to address issues of race, class, and gender in the United States.