Italy: Female Muslims to discuss their rights on Women's Day
Comments: I support the sisters in my mother country (that's not a mixed metaphor, is it?) for doing this, I see it as part of the wave of Muslim sisters doing it for themselves that has been building in the past couple of years, from the women's council on Islamic law begun in New York in 2006 to the current Muslim women's organizing in Toronto.
But another sign of the times that I take issue with is fear of the F-word. I still can't get over how many people these days are promoting feminist ideals ("a free woman in a free society") while refusing to identify as feminist. You might say it's just a word, just a label, so what you call it isn't important. As a professional linguist and editor, I have a healthy respect for words, because they have power. One of the tasks of feminism in the present day is not only to keep liberating women, but also to hold up pride in feminist identity, to preserve continuity with our long and honorable history of liberating women under the name of feminism. I cherish the memory of our feminist foremothers who struggled for many years, and our carrying on their work into the future. We owe so much to them.
Women's rights are human rights.
Female Muslims to discuss their rights on Women's Day
Milan, 26 Feb. (AKI) - To commemorate International Women's Day on 8 March, Muslim women's groups in Italy have organised a meeting discuss their rights.
Entitled 'A free woman in a free society', the event will be held in the northern Italian city of Milan on 9 March. The meeting has been promoted by the women's section at Milan's House of Islamic Culture.
"This is the second year that we are promoting this initiative which talks about women and in a particular way, Muslim women," the organiser of the event, Sumaya al-Barq, told Adnkronos International (AKI).
"We have taken the occasion of 8 March to meet those who are interested to know us and listen to us," she said.
Al-Barq, who is a member of the Young Muslims of Italy (GMI) said that those involved in the main round-table discussion include women from the Association of Muslim Women of Italy (ADMI), Young Muslims of Italy (GMI) and the European Forum of Muslim Women.
At the meeting, women are also expected to recount their personal experiences of integrating into Italian society.
"They are women who want to be active, constructive protagonists," said al-Barq. "We have adopted the general motto launched by the the European Forum of Muslim Women in 2008: The Role of the Woman in the Promotion of the Culture of Dialogue and of Peace in Europe"," she said.
"We want to reappropriate the rights that Islam already granted us 1,400 years ago but which some men have taken away from us," said al-Barq.
"This is not a feminist path, at least not a Western model, which in my opinion has been a failure, because it demanded the exclusion of men," she told AKI.
"Ours has to be a path for both women and men together, a path of shared growth," she said.
But another sign of the times that I take issue with is fear of the F-word. I still can't get over how many people these days are promoting feminist ideals ("a free woman in a free society") while refusing to identify as feminist. You might say it's just a word, just a label, so what you call it isn't important. As a professional linguist and editor, I have a healthy respect for words, because they have power. One of the tasks of feminism in the present day is not only to keep liberating women, but also to hold up pride in feminist identity, to preserve continuity with our long and honorable history of liberating women under the name of feminism. I cherish the memory of our feminist foremothers who struggled for many years, and our carrying on their work into the future. We owe so much to them.
Women's rights are human rights.
Female Muslims to discuss their rights on Women's Day
Milan, 26 Feb. (AKI) - To commemorate International Women's Day on 8 March, Muslim women's groups in Italy have organised a meeting discuss their rights.
Entitled 'A free woman in a free society', the event will be held in the northern Italian city of Milan on 9 March. The meeting has been promoted by the women's section at Milan's House of Islamic Culture.
"This is the second year that we are promoting this initiative which talks about women and in a particular way, Muslim women," the organiser of the event, Sumaya al-Barq, told Adnkronos International (AKI).
"We have taken the occasion of 8 March to meet those who are interested to know us and listen to us," she said.
Al-Barq, who is a member of the Young Muslims of Italy (GMI) said that those involved in the main round-table discussion include women from the Association of Muslim Women of Italy (ADMI), Young Muslims of Italy (GMI) and the European Forum of Muslim Women.
At the meeting, women are also expected to recount their personal experiences of integrating into Italian society.
"They are women who want to be active, constructive protagonists," said al-Barq. "We have adopted the general motto launched by the the European Forum of Muslim Women in 2008: The Role of the Woman in the Promotion of the Culture of Dialogue and of Peace in Europe"," she said.
"We want to reappropriate the rights that Islam already granted us 1,400 years ago but which some men have taken away from us," said al-Barq.
"This is not a feminist path, at least not a Western model, which in my opinion has been a failure, because it demanded the exclusion of men," she told AKI.
"Ours has to be a path for both women and men together, a path of shared growth," she said.