Colonialism and Islamic Reform: Bodies, Minds and Freedom

Abstract

This essay engages a broad geographic, demographic, and chronological scope on the topic of colonialism and Islamic reform to avoid the reinforcement of colonial era inventions and gender(ed) myths across education, the law, enslavement, hierarchies of gender, and Islamic reform. This essay argues that understanding women and gender in various colonial contexts is an important avenue for recovering the restorative work that women have done to reject colonial ideologies throughout history. Reflecting upon scholarship situated at the intersection of modern Islamic thought and feminism, new possibilities emerge to reframe the meaning of justice and freedom in this historiography and beyond.