Gender and National Identity: Women and Politics in Muslim Societies

This lucid and accessible collection explores gender and national identity within political movements in the Middle East, the Maghreb and South Asia. It reveals how nationalism, revolution and Islamization are gendered processes, and argues that in periods of political change, women are central to efforts to construct a national identity. The book focuses on predominantly Muslim movements, and includes Algerian women's experience in the national liberation movement; the struggle to construct a Bengali national identity and the creation of Bangladesh; events leading to revolution and Islamization in Iran; revolution and civil war in Afghanistan; and the Palestinian intifada.