Pitfalls of Secularism in Turkey

Deniz Kandiyoti is Emeritus Professor of Development Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. Her work on gender, development, nationalism, and Islam has been deeply influential within feminist studies, development studies and Middle Eastern studies. Her path-breaking essay ‘Bargaining with Patriarchy’ appeared in the journal Gender and Society in 1988. She is the author of Concubines, Sisters and Citizens: Identities and Social Transformation (1997) and the editor of Fragments of Culture: The Everyday Life of Modern Turkey (2002), Gendering the Middle East (1996), Women, Islam and the State (1991).

postmodern Post-feminism without Women

This article aims at showing the way in which the discursive constructivism and ethical relativism characteristic of postmodern feminism and post-feminism leads to a neo-liberal and conservative political agenda that threatens women’s sex-based rights. The article will especially focus on the thought of Paul-B Preciado as a post-feminist activist. It draws a comparison also with the work of Saba Mahmood. In such a context, we will point out the necessity of a neo-material and realist framework able to account for the ontological reality of women, and their irreducibility to social hetero-norms. Keywords: Constructivism, nominalism, embodiment, sexual difference, human rights, materialism.

Review of Faith and Feminism in Pakistan by Afiya Zia and The Women’s Movement in Pakistan by Ayesha Khan

Books Reviewed: Faith and Feminism in Pakistan: Religious Agency or Secular Autonomy? By Afiya Zia (Sussex Academic Press, 2018) The Women’s Movement in Pakistan: Activism, Islam and Democracy by Ayesha Khan (I. B. Tauris, 2018)

Perils of Fundamentalism in France

Caroline Fourest is a French feminist writer, film director, journalist, radio presenter at France Culture, and co-founder and editor of the magazine ProChoix. She has been a columnist with Charlie Hebdo and Le Monde and has written several influential essays on the political and religious right in France and the US. She is the author of a biography of the far-right politician Marine Le Pen and of a number of books including In Praise of Blasphemy: Why Charlie Hebdo is Not ‘Islamophobic’, Brother Tariq: the Doublespeak of Tariq Ramadan and most recently The Offended Generation. Stephen Cowden teaches in the School of Social Professions at the London Metropolitan University. He is an editorial collective member of Feminist Dissent.