The Study of Islamic Feminism; Mapping in Laila Aboulela’s The Translator

Abstract

This paper aims to make personality analysis in the characters of Sammar, Nahla, Mahasen, and Yasmin from Leila Aboulela’s novel The Translator under the lens of Islamic Feminism, which was first, named by Margot in 2002. In this research the rules and regulations and rights which are set for the betterment of the women by Allah Almighty Himself are being discussed in the light of Sunnah, Hadith and Qur’an which is also taken as the sacred text. Different words, phrases and expressions are interpreted on the basis of religion and culture. Under this term it is believed that Islam has provided women with all sorts of rights consisting even of those which one could not even imagine, it gives the message of equality and also commands its believers to protect them like a treasure but also gives a free will to them. Where the society wants to treat them differently and creates such roots in the mind of people that a man’s conscious and unconscious simultaneously control his personality; his actions as well as his discourse for treating Muslim women as inferior to them thus since childhood all sorts of knowledge, discourse, myths, stories, beliefs, art, literature, fairy tales and culture etc. influence their unconscious mind. In The Translator Leila Aboulela in a unique way explains these archetypes through the life of her protagonist and that how religion in being intertwined by culture and that how much a lady specially have to fight for using her Shariya rights. To show that there is need to unveil certain mysteries in the universe, which hold connections and ties among different phenomenon.