Shattering the Stereotypes:
Muslim Women Speak Out

Fawzia Afzal-Khan, ed. 
Northampton, MA: Olive Branch Press, 2005. 338 pages.

Ever since the West’s initial contact with the East, Muslim women have
occupied center stage as highly politicized subjects who the West has
claimed to liberate from the oppressive East and who the East has claimed
to protect from the hedonistic West. Despite their central role as pawns in
this political struggle, women have been strikingly silent subjects. This
book belongs to an emerging collection of books that seek to give voice to
these silent subjects. Nawal El Saadawi, in her emotionally charged
“Foreword,” captures the book’s tone quite well in her expression that “the
personal is political” (p. x). Through personal stories, this anthology seeks
to dissociate Islam from both terrorism and the oppression of women.
Fawzia Afzal-Khan’s anecdotal introduction reveals that her goal is
twofold: first, to connect various strands of conversation between Muslim
American women from different backgrounds since 9/11, and, second, to
enlighten both Muslim and non-Muslim readers of the varied realities of the
“Muslim Woman.” 

This anthology is divided into six sections. Section 1, “Non-Fiction,”
contains several personal accounts of Muslim American women’s encoun-
ters with 9/11. In her piece “Unholy Alliances,” Afzal-Khan vents her frus-
tration on several targets, including Israel, American foreign policy, Salman
Rushdie, women who choose to wear the hijab, as well as the Montclair
University Muslim Students’ Association and the Global Studies Institute.
Nadia Ali Maiwandi, Zohra Saed, and Wajma Ahmady reflect on the
responses they encountered and experienced amidst the Afghan-American
community in the aftermath of 9/11. Eisa Nefertari Ulen’s genuinely toler-
ant article encourages Muslim and non-Muslim women to work together.
Writing from her perspective as an African-American convert, she identifies
issues of gender and religion as mere smokescreens used by the “oppressor”
to separate women (p. 50). Humera Afridi’s witty and refreshing work func-
tions as a social commentary on the climate of New York City after the 9/11
attacks. One of the most edifying pieces is Rabab Abdulhadi’s “Where is
Home?” This piece, written as a series of journal entries, captures the strug-
gles of identity faced by an exiled Palestinian woman as she tries to make a
home in New York City in the aftermath of 9/11. 

106 The American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 22:4



The second section consists of a collection of poems. Some are moving,
powerful, and political, such as those of Suheir Hammad, and deal with the
political scene post-9/11. Others are more introspective, like Mohja Kahf’s
“Little Mosque Poems,” which look at inconsistencies within the American
Muslim community. The third section, “Journalism,” contains a collection of
articles written for publication in the media or by journalists for this anthol-
ogy. Nadirah Z. Sabir’s contribution is a collection of articles published in
her Atlanta Journal-Constitution column. These are the well-written reflec-
tions of an American Muslim woman on how 9/11 affected the United States
and the global Muslim community. Positive responses from her readers are
also included. At the risk of sounding self-congratulatory, these responses
help counterbalance some of the collection’s other writings that seem to
imply that most Americans are intolerant of Muslims. 

Section 4, “Religious Discourses,” contains articles by Muslim women
in academia. Azizah al-Hibri’s article attempts to rescue Islam from culture
in order to save its integrity. She oversimplifies the categories of “religion”
and “culture,” associating oppressive practices justified in the name of Islam
as originally belonging to culture and then being superimposed on religion.
This article also contains several factual errors. For instance, when dis-
cussing Job’s story, (particularly with regards to his wife losing her faith and
blaspheming and Job taking an oath to strike her as punishment), which she
asserts is in the Qur’an, al-Hibri conflates the Hadith literature with the
Qur’an by presenting the entire story as a Qur’anic paradigm. Kahf’s entry
is a well-written version of “pamphlet Islam.” It is a good introduction of
Islam for readers who only have access to mainstream American concep-
tions of Islam. Finally, the interview with Riffat Hassan is engaging and
brings to light her clearly intolerant stand on what she considers “conserva-
tive” Islam, or at least of Muslim women “who choose to wear the hijab.” 

The last two sections are creative in nature. Section 5, “Fiction,” con-
tains short stories written by American Muslim women. Farah Qidwai’s
“Witness” is the rarely told story of an American Muslim woman’s survival
in New York City’s suddenly hostile post-9/11 environment. Section 6 con-
tains plays. Maniza Naqvi’s “That Sarah Aziz!” comes across as a thinly
veiled attack against women who choose to wear the hijab. Betty Shamieh’s
“Chocolate in Heat” helps convey this anthology’s message for Muslim
women – “Arab American” is not a monolithic category. 

While the book seeks to reveal the complexity of the “Muslim Woman”
category, some voices are genuinely tolerant, whereas others, although call-
ing for tolerance, pluralism, and acceptance of their own positions, are intol-

Book Reviews 107



erant of more conservative perspectives. For instance, women who wear the
hijab are subjected to a great deal of demonization and essentialization (pp.
16, 25, and 293). But to its credit, this anthology also contains articles by
Muslim women who consider their hijab a defining aspect of their identity.
In addition, it should be noted that many of the entries are written from a per-
spective of victimization. While this perspective is important, as it affirms
the experience of victimization felt by some Muslims in the United States
post-9/11, it is also problematic, since it is sometimes forced – especially
when vastly different experiences of oppression are conflated to seem com-
parable. An example of this is found in Afzal-Khan’s article, where she
equates what she perceives to be the oppression of women by conservative
Islam with the occupation of Palestine (p. 25). 

Despite its shortcomings, this book is an important contribution to the
anthropological study of an emerging Muslim American identity, as it cap-
tures many cultural and identity-forming moments. It is also a valuable
resource for mainstream readers, for whom this book will no doubt shatter
preconceived notions regarding the oppression of Muslim women.

Ayesha Siddiqua Chaudhry
Ph.D. Candidate, Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies Department

New York University, New York

108 The American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 22:4