Contesting Feminisms explores how Asian Muslim women make decisions on appropriating Islam and Islamic lifestyles through their own participation in the faith. The contributors highlight the fact that secularism has provided the space for some women to reclaim their religious identity and their own feminisms. Through compelling case studies and theoretical discussions, this volume challenges mainstream Western and national feminisms that presume homogeneity of Muslim women's lives to provide a deeper understanding of the multiple realities of feminism in Muslim communities.

This book resists the homogenization of Muslim women by detailing the diversity in their lives and by challenging the dominant paradigm of Arabized Islam as the sole interpreter of the faith. Though much has been written on the Middle East, there is a huge gap in research on Asia, which has two-thirds of the world's Muslim population. These essays reveal that the lives of Muslim women are impacted not only by Islam but also by local politics, class, religion, and ethnicity. Through ethnographic research and other methodologies, the contributors describe how economic globalization,...

Contesting Feminisms explores how Asian Muslim women make decisions on appropriating Islam and Islamic lifestyles through their own participation in the faith. The contributors highlight the fact that secularism has provided the space for some women to reclaim their religious identity and their own feminisms. Through compelling case studies and theoretical discussions, this volume challenges mainstream Western and national feminisms that presume homogeneity of Muslim women's lives to provide a deeper understanding of the multiple realities of feminism in Muslim communities.