Tunisian women researchers address sensitive issues (Women, Islam & Power)

In a special feature on August 17, Al Akhbar daily highlighted three books published recently by a group of women Tunisian researchers on Islam, power and other controversial topics. The publications include a series of research works which vary in their commitment to an accurate methodology often but which sometimes are partial to literature. The research is high-impact, serious borrowing correct anthropological tools to avoid falling in the trap of western perceptions of women and Islam. The researchers seek to give a better understanding of history itself not the history of the ruling power in order to have the proper knowledge tools to comprehend the present. One of the co-editors, Salwa Belhaj Saleh, Al Akhbar wrote, draws a historic relation of Islam with women through its relation with female priests in the pre-Islamic era. Samah Yahyawi, maintained that Islamic history has ignored accounting the history of women in Sufism, reporting only what men related. Ulfa Youssef addressed complex and controversial issues in the Islamic law making concerning hijab, women and alcohol. (for more on the feature, kindly visit the link below: https://bit.ly/2NBvBs7). (Al Akhbar, August 17, 2019)