The Two Year Initiative on Islam and Other Religions

Visiting Scholars

Juliane Hammer

• October 13, 2011
• 5:30 pm in Lane's Center for Meeting and Learning
• CML 220 (capacity of 120)
• Free and open to the entire community.

Islam in America:

American Muslim Women, Religious Authority, and Activism: More Than a Prayer:

Abstract:

Can Muslim women lead prayers? The wide range of pre-modern and contemporary answers to this question has occupied an important discursive space in American Muslim communities. This lecture traces the outlines of this debate in its relationship to broader questions of women's religious authority, the negotiation of gender norms, innovative approaches to interpreting the Qur'an, and the particular dynamics of American Muslim communities. It also addresses issues of women's roles in society, women's religious leadership, and the dynamics of media representations.

Bio:

Juliane Hammer is assistant professor and Kenan Rifai Fellow in Islamic Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. She holds an MA and PhD in Islamic Studies from Humboldt University in Berlin, Germany, and specializes in the study of American Muslims, contemporary Muslim thought, women and gender in Islam, and Sufism. Her forthcoming book American Muslim Women, Religious Authority, and Activism (University of Texas Press, 2012) examines gender discourses in American Muslim communities through the writings of American Muslim women and with a focus on the 2005 woman-led and mixed-gender congregation Friday prayer in New York City. She is currently working on a new study focusing on American Muslim efforts against domestic violence.