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The day after

The Day After

“Alhamdulillahi Rabbi I Alamin for the safety of all observers who were physically present at the Polling Units during the 2023 Elections and also the members at home who were praying fervently for Allah’s protection for those on the fields.The situations were scarry.
May Allah SWT accept the service to our Nation as acts of Ibadah from us all.
May He grant us the much needed Peace and Love in our Fatherland”

Member on the What’sapp chat

The Sunday following the last chapter of the 2023 General Elections, the local FOMWAN organized their anual Pre-Ramadan lecture. In fear of post-electoral violence, they maintained it with the memories of past violent events. It was the day after, the first day of the next five years. Full of hope of change for some, of disappointment for others.

But for all the prayer :

“May He grant us the much needed Peace and Love in our Fatherland”

“You can make Nigeria great again by voting wisely”

[Title taken from the what’sapp message in image 1]

Over the past months, the women of FOMWAN Oyo State have been preparing for the elections, increasing awareness among members to register and then collect their PVC (Permanent Voters Card).

“It is our civil responsability, whether you like it or not” reminded the Oyo Chapter’s naiba (second to the amirah) a few weeks ago.

The election committee officers of Oyo State Chapter have been participating for several months in workshops and meetings held by international NGOs such as TOSATAN “peaceful conduct on Election Day & the role of Women in Election”, or other local and international agencies such as the Oyo Peace Commettee and its two day workshop “Youths, Women, and Persons with Disabilities on peace building ahead of 2023 general Election”.

January 11th, FOMWAN National obtained approval as an accredited election observer throughout the country (see INEC publication below number 53). Since then, members are invited to register as election observers for their pooling units through a google form shared on WhatsApp groups.

In Oyo State, executive committee members remind others at all meetings that a minimum of two members per local government are required as observers. All excos are expected to register as observers. On Sunday 5 February, during the General Meeting, the election committee members involved the women in an observation and reporting exercise.

When I asked a member what the role of the observers was, she replied: “The task is to report on the events happening wards during the PVC collection and at the pooling units. We make sure there is no pressuring and intimidation of the people, no bribes paid to officers or vote buying.”

Furthermore, the members are extremely active on the organisation’s WhatsApp group where they post and repost practical information related to the elections, awareness-raising messages (image 1 & 2), or standpoints from local and national Muslim groups such as the MSSN The Muslim Students Society of Nigeria (image 3) and The Muslim Umah of South-West Nigeria (image 4).

The latter is interesting as it raises the question of the intersection of regionalism, ethnicity and religion in Nigeria’s general elections. Indeed, with less than a month to go, separatists rhetorics have become increasingly audible. If such discourses preceded the election period, they have been exacerbated by a simplistic ethnic, religious and regionalist analysis of the three main candidates: Atiku, a Muslim for the north, Obi, a Christian Igbo for the south-east and Tinubu, a Muslim Yoruba for the south-west. While the first two reject the ethno-religious-regional game, the latter seems to rely on it to secure the votes of the south-west.

1. Election awareness 1 – What’s App group
2. Election awareness 2 – What’s App group
3. Repost of Muslim Students Society of Nigeria (MSSN) – What’s App group
4. Re-post of Muslim Umah of South-West Nigeria – What’s App group

“This election should even come and go, and we will rest”

Extract from a conversation with one of my fieldwork sister

Election is messing with our heads, collage, January 2023, S.Okoekpen

On 25 February 2023, Nigeria will hold its seventh consecutive general election since the return of democracy in 1999. For the first time, the two political parties that have shared power for the past 24 years are threatened by a third party. Insecurity and inflation are the main issues on which the candidates are campaigning, nothing new under the blazing sun.

In the interests of brevity, but with sufficient clues for the foreign reader, here are a few words on each candidate: APC candidate Bola Ahmed Tinubu, former governor of Lagos State, is a Yoruba Muslim who helped Muhammadu Buhari to the presidency. The PDP’s candidate, Abubakar Atiku, a former vice president, is a liberal businessman from the Muslim north. The Labour Party’s candidate, Peter Obi, a former PDP candidate in the 2022 primaries, a Christian Igbo, is said to be the candidate of the urban youth and the Diaspora (who cannot vote).

From my daily encounters I observe that :

Some argue that the moment has come for a Christian presidency of the South given the unstated political pattern (Christian South / Muslim North). Others believe that having a Muslim president in the South is essential “for the survival of the Muslim community in Yorubaland” as Yoruba Muslims feel threatened by the growing influence of evangelical churches. There are those generally young and highly educated, who say they do not care about ethnic and religious background as long as their president is not APC or PDP, is young and brings them hope. In contrast, others prefer an older, experienced candidate to take the reins of a country considered complex and on the verge of collapse.

Campaign posters and rallies have come and gone…

In the street, some queue for four hours for fuel and four hours for cash while the rest of us struggle to buy the newly redesigned naira notes for 20% of their numeral value.

It is to fight against vote buying, they told us as they announced the old naira notes will not be admitted as of February 1st (a deadline they extended to February 11th due to the new note scarcity).

This morning, my neighbor tells me in anger :

“They play politics as a game in which they will never lose, while we die here”.

World Hijab Day

I will not cover my head in black because I am already black. If I wear black, I will disapear!

Iya A.

Iborun literally “something used to cover the neck” is the most common head covering I have seen among older Yoruba Muslim women during Programs (weddings, religious gatherings, naming ceremonies, burial, prayers, etc.).

© S.Okoekpen

The light polyester, sometimes see-through, the fabric is often embroidered with flowers and beads. The size of it is big enough to be wrapped around the head and breast and cascade over the shoulder.

It is usually worn over a gele, a head-tie in the same material and patterns as the gown.

© S.Okoekpen

The first time I went into the city to buy a hijab, I was overly conscious of my bare head, thinking about what the sellers would think of me. When I tried on my first hijab, sky-blue with sparkling stones, I was surprised to hear the young women who helped me adjust it:

“Ma! You look so beautiful, keep it, don’t take it off!”

And then I realised: when was the last time I heard discussions about hijab and beauty in French? Are our public spaces, media and politics so preoccupied with issues of oppression/freedom, religion/secularism, that we forget the basics of beauty practices, of fashion?

From the beginning of my fieldwork, it was clear that issues of beauty and fashion were deeply intertwined with piety in the way women (both Muslim and Christian) covered their heads. The International Hijab Day became an excuse for me to start open discussions with the women around me.

Keep posted for the work on Beauty Practices and Head Corvering we are doing with my colleague Adejoke Rafiat Adetoro

General Meeting – Praying, Reporting & Organising Together

© S.Okoekpen

General meetings for the state are held fortnightly, hosted by a different branch each time.

All LG (Local Government) branch members are welcome, but it is almost compulsory for those holding offices, especially Amirahs and Naibahs (Amirahs’ seconds), who submit reports on the branch’s activities.
However, it is difficult for women to spend one Sunday every two weeks away from home due to the increased cost of fuel and transport and the domestic responsibilities that fall on their shoulders.

“When the girls were small, I couldn’t go as I go now! It is of most importance to take care of our children and husband first.”

Thus, they will mostly come when the Meeting is held in their zone and send their reports (when they do) through the general or Amirahs-only WhatsApp platforms.

This time, apart from the executives from st State Chapters, only 6 of 34 Fomwan Local Governments are represented.

FOMWAN Oyo Chapter Bus, transporting members from Ibadan (fee is between 1’000 and 2’000 per person) © S.Okoekpen

The meeting usually follows the same following structure

  • Asalatu : reading and recitation of the booklet printed by the FOMWAN Oyo State chapter containing a selection of quranic surahs or ayats. The first to arrive starts the recitation until everyone has joined.
  • Coran reading
  • Health Talk
  • Presentation of State executive members, Zonal coordinators and LGs Amirahs
  • Reading and correction of the last meeting’s minutes
  • Discussion of important topics concerning the whole State (Hijab Day, Elections, Ramadan lectures, etc)
  • Submission of reports
  • Final prayer
  • Performing of salat together (prayer)
  • Sharing of one meal prepared by the hosting branch.
© S.Okoekpen
© S.Okoekpen

During the meeting, members are invited to sign their names in a large book and the Muslim organisation/association they represent. The woman in charge of marketing goes around the room and introduces the members to the new merchandising items that can be purchased to support the state chapter: small and large purses, handkerchiefs, hijabs, scarves, water bottles, and others, with prices ranging from N150 to N12,000.

Each time, they will also set up a table where the health officer takes the blood pressure of the members who wish to do so and answers any questions they have about their health.

Harmatan has come, elections are next

but “where is our government

Tede town at dusk – © S.Okoekpen

We all held the belief that the fuel shortage would end after the holiday festivities.

Yet, 15 days into the new year, nothing has changed, and it appears that this will continue until the general elections (publication to come).

The most affected by the shortage are the rural towns, where the litter currently costs 380 nairas at the pump (from N168) and 500 nairas on the black market.

“We are working against each other. Your neighbor will go and buy fuel for 360 in the next city and sell it for you at 500”

“So now, we trek (walk)”.

© S.Okoekpen

Meanwhile, the cost of cooking gas is also a factor affecting the lives of rural dwellers: “we didn’t buy any gaz since last time we bought it together (about 4 months ago)”. They cook outside with wood collected on their farm “Thank God for the farm”.

Every two days or more, the teenagers walk or drive the motorbike with the 9 jerrycans to fetch water at the next available (forage). Since there hasn’t been any light for the past three days and they can’t use solar power to pump, the two closest areas (forage) are empty.

This is a Town, and it serves as the regional administrative center, not a village.

However, there hasn’t been a government project for at least the past ten years.
“Makinde is a fine governor for the State, but he withdrew all the Local Government’s money, and they only have what is needed to pay the salaries, no projects, and no infrastructure for those of us who are sitting far from the government (Oyo State Government in Ibadan)”

“There is no light. There is no roads. Our schools are falling apart and teachers contribute to buy their own chalk. But what can we do?”

The new naira bank notes the Nigerian government introduced in December are in short supply; I haven’t had any in my hands yet. The old notes will be declared worthless as of the first of February.

© S.Okoekpen

Often they ask “where is our government”

“Will you vot for Makinde’s second tenure ?”

“I don’t know… Allah only can help us in this Nigeria”

The country’s current state makes it often ethically difficult for a researcher to “stay at people’s place” as our discipline recommends. In my case, the families categorically refuse any compensation or participation for housing me. However, I see them striving every day to make ends meet.

We are the head

On being daughters, sisters, mothers and wives

As a bouquet of roses with their red geles and deep green dresses, they all gather around the old man’s bed. Their five voices joined in a singing prayer.  With the softness and confusion of their ten hands, they lift him from his bed, raising his back against the cushions.  His low and quivering voice joins his daughter’s. Tears flow from the eyes of some, while his own are closed in blindness. They share a handkerchief.  

They are seven sisters of the same mother. He has two wives. Alhaja is the first born, she is the only muslim. The names of Jesus, Allah and Oluwa (God in yoruba) merge in the sisters’ prayers.  

I record at their request. 


This short piece is a composition of the different songs and prayers they asked me to record. These are only the voices of these women. They sing about the joy that has just started and how fortunate they are to be of the house of Baale Agbe

We are all in the cage. 2am.

As we lay on an “orthopaedic” mattress in her uncle’s house in her mother’s town, she wakes me up.

Listen ! It is the egungun. He is driving away the evil of our streets […] It is forbidden for a woman to meet him you know […] He’ ll be there for 7 nights 

The night is filled with strange noises I am unaible to recognize; like the hooting of owls and the barking of a dog. They fade away and then return.   

We are silent. No NEPA, no gen, the darkness is as deep inside as outside.  

Yesterday he also visited our mother’s side, but I didn’t hear him. The girls chatted all night. They heard him.  I didn’t want to sleep with them tonight, I don’t want them to wake me up with their chatter, tomorrow I’m the one driving all of us home!

When I ask about the last time the sisters were all together and saw their parents :

We are are all in the cage. It is hard. You know, when you are in the husband’s house, they don’t like you to leave it again.  


She often tells me about her mother, about her sisters and her daughters. Narrating their life, their challenges and the love she has for all of them.

As the eldest of the family, she bears the responsability of taking care of everybody: making sure her mother is well taken care of, supporting her sisters who mostly contact her when they needs something and making sure her own daughters (six if you count the adopted ones) are pursuing their dreams. This without forgetting caring for her husband and her sisters in Islam.

Even though she mentionnes the burden of these responsabilities and these roles she has to perform, she also tells me about the beauty and joy she experiences of being a daughter, a sister, and especially a mother and a wife.

In fact, she tells me many times :

Everyday I pray for you to experiment the same joy of motherhood and marriage  

When They Pray, The Night is Filled with Colors

Facing the fear of traveling and the growing insecurity in the pre-election context of Nigeria, hunfreds of muslim women have traveled from all parts of the country to meet in Port-Hacourt for the FOMWAN National Conference : Bridging the inter-generational gap of sustainable development

© S.Okoekpen

They met in the south Est of the country, in the Delta region. Some travelled up to 18 hours by bus on roads known to be dangerous and subject to frequent kidnappings.

© S.Okoekpen

In a context where religious and ethnic differences are instrumentalized for political purposes, these muslim women of various ethnic origins, social classes and generations discussed their role for the future of their country, the importance of their unity and political participation in the 2023 presidential elections.

© S.Okoekpen

“The light comes and goes, but mostly, we stand in the dark”

Fieldwork notebook, September 2022
© S.Okoekpen
© S.Okoekpen

Between Lectures and Prayers – Part 2

Cabin biscuits & 3 Crown milk

Ramadan in Tede, Ink, May 2022, S. Okoekpen
Ramadan in Tede 2, Ink, May 2022, S. Okoekpen

When I return to Tede on the 18th of April, everything feels different than Eruwa. The town’s pace is slower and calmer, revealing the differences that exists when the majority of the community is Muslim. People sit on bamboo structures in front of their shops and houses, in the shade of trees.

Each night before ten, after breaking the fast and spending time with family and neighbor in front of the television, the family I stay with walks down to the central mosque. They pray there until 4 a.m., when I hear  music and singing intended to wake people up for the final meal before dawn and prayer.

Iya (I will refer to as such from now on to protect her anonymity) sleeps for a few hours. Before seven, she goes to bath her newborn nephew, first son of her younger brother’s second wife. When she returns, she finds me alone on the front porch, reading.

The teen-aged children and her husband have gone to the farm and will return  around 11 a.m. before they head to school for exam revisions.

Just before 10 a.m., we dress ourselves, and leave the house to meet the FOMWAN members at a house in the town center.

There for more than two hours, sitting on the plastic raffia mats in front of the house, we recite in a singing and melodious invocation, the 94 pages of the Oyo states FOMWAN Prayer Book. Tired from their night of prayer some women fall asleep whith their lips occasionally still praying. Their neighbour awakens them, smiling, until it is their turn to doze off.

Following the Surat al Waki’a (The Inevitable) and the 99 Beautiful Names of Allah, the women each pray for the household that host us.

It is during these prayers that the members and the hosts family (usually women) contribute 10 – 20 – 50 Naira bills to a small aluminium pot in front of us.

Iya later explains:

“We get change ahead, so that we can put small amounts depending on our own fortunes. It is for the host that we pray, and it is they who provide for us.”

The host brings some gifts for all of us, usually 5-7 Cabin biscuits in sachets and 1-2 cans of 3 crown milk, or 100gr salt and sugar sachets.

Standing up, we great our host goodbye and walk on to a second house where we repeat the exact same ritual. By the afternoon, heads full prayers, we will all walk back home. The sun slows our pace, the tiredness shuts our lips.

“We were inspired to do so by another Local Government and I proposed it to the women this year.

We used to go to each other’s house to pray, or tho the poor and sick ones of the community. But we realized we could not sustain economically, we needed to find a way to get more money for the organization.

So this year, since the beginning of Ramadan, we visit two rich or more important people’s house every day, and we pray for them. They are very happy, nobody ever prayed for them like this. Some invite us, some we propose.

You know, in Tede, we don’t even have our own mosque and there is no money to build now. We only have a land. We pray everyday to be able to go forward with our project.

We have many challenges here, and it is only few of us that are invested.”

Iya A.


This morning just after seven, Iya leaves to bath the newborn. When she comes back, the baby sleeps on her back. She sweeps the house and feeds the goats and chickens as I write my notes on the porch.

The teenagers left for the farm on their father’s bike with their eyes still closed with sleep.

Just before ten, we wrap our scarves, and leave the house to meet the women at a house in in the outskirt of the town. When everybody arrives, we lay the raffia mats out on the front porch and take our green booklets out. The host brings a tray with an empty pot and a box of Cabin biscuits and lays it in front of us.

In an almost automatic way, we recite the content of the booklet. I say ‘our’ as my own lip follow the same mechanical recitation process, no thinking, reciting… 

Our voices rise in the melodious La illah illa allah (There is no God but Allah).

I hear my neighbors voice fainting soon to be replaced by a soft breathing. The women in front of me throws her tasbih (prayer beads) at her in a vain attempt to wake her up.

The host stands in the door frame. some young children sitting and playing in the middle reciting some verses with us.

When we finish, the host helps us out of the compound. I feel hungry and thirsty from all this talking, but I don’t dear to drink from the bottle in my bag since all the women fast. As we walk under the sun, they discuss and laugh at some things I can’t understand. A few women always insist on walking next to me, the younger ones (maybe 35 y.o.) holds my arm.

In the next house we are invited to sit in the living room on huge sofas that cannot accommodate all of us. We share seats, and some of us sit on the floor.

Once more, we recite, we donate, we pray, and we receive.

Walking back toward the town, we pass by a small mosque where the women stop to pray. I sit outside under a mango tree, guarding all their bags.

When we get home, the teens are asleep in their rooms and Iya lies down on the couch. Soon after she falls asleep. The heat is too much for me to do the same. My head is full of the melodies of the prayers.

Just before 6 p.m., the girls light a fire under the lemon tree in the in the yard and cook the evening meal. To save money on gaz, they use two fireplaces, one with charcoal the second with chopped wood. I assist Iya in peeling off the beans with the mortar. Tonight, as almost every night before and every night after, we will eat moimoi (bean cakes) and drink koko (a form of milliet porridge).

They break the fast at 7 p.m. with the soft dates I brought from Ibadan. “We’ve never eaten any dates this soft and sweet; it is like honey!” exclaims Daddy. I had to get them from a Lebanese store, as all the dates I found in Nigeria were dried and dusty. We share pieces of the pawpaw brought from the field in the morning before they head to the small mosque two house away for the prayer.

We dine in front of a Live TV broadcast of Meqa. We have not seen light (electricity) since I arrived in Tede. Every evening from 8p.m. to about 10p.m., the family turns on the gen (generator) and the neighbor’s children, as usual, arrive running with all of their familys devices to charge. They stay to watch TV with us, sitting stiffly on the sofas’ side.

Tonight, the only TV channel we have that is not Live Meqa is broadcasting Warcraft.

The action fantasy film with orcs, gore war scenes and dark fantastic magic is a disrupting contrast to our prayer day.


They leave shortly before 10pm as sleep overtakes me.

The next morning she returns just before 9 am, the baby nephew had his bath. I’ve already swept the floor and sip my nescaf’ while enjoying the morning sun’s caress.

At 10, we hurriedly put on our hijabs; Daddy arrives too late from the farm to drive us to the first house, so we began to walk. The place is far away, and Iya’s knee is paining her. She refuses to let me carry her bag because it balances her, she says…

The women are already sitting when the okada drops us at the house. Some of them still arrive. The host brings a small empty pot on a stainless tray.

. . .

Between Lectures and Prayers – Part 1

 

Lecture ! Lecture !! Lecture !!!

After meeting the Amirah and FOMWAN participants in Tede I travelled to Eruwa to meet an Alhaja (I will refer to her as Alhaja from now on to preserve her anonymity) to whom I had been introduced through the same contact in Ibadan. Ramadan had begun the night before, and she invited me to join her family in celebrating the holy month.

Coming back from Tede, I was surprised to hear that this town was described as “rural”. The town is only about 60km from Abeokuta and about 70km from Ibadan. At first glance, it appeared to be quite large and lively. Though for Alhaja, if not for the Poly (Adeseun Ogundoyin Polytechnique a higher education institution) the town would be “a village in the bush”.


In Eruwa, the stones are wide and on their flat surfaces dries the white cassava chunks. In Eruwa some stones stand straight, some host houses, churches and mosques, some pile up toward the sky, some are huge hills covered by ‘bushes’, and some, like this one, just stand like eggs on a plates. Alhaja says as she ‘snaps’ it (take a picture): it is God’s grace that makes it stands and never fall!

It is Sunday morning, we’re on our way to another FOMWAN’s member’s house very close to her own. She is already waiting for us in the car, and we greet her with loud “Asalaam Alaikum”.

We will meet the other members at the FOMWAN’s mosque and all together travel to Lanlate, the neighboring town, for the Sunday Ramadan Lecture. During Ramadan, each branch hosts one or more Lectures to which local Muslim figures – men – are invited as guest speakers.

The FOMWAN has built a mosque in central Eruwa for a community who hadn’t access to one. A second mosque will be built soon, the funds have already been secured. They requested my presence on their next visit to the land.

“When you visit one FOMWAN branch, always ask about their projects… we all need to have ongoing projects as part as our FOMWAN participation. We have building projects as well as humanitarian projects that help people in need”

Says Alhaja.

The organization’s name is carved on the outside wall of the small mosque small mosque the women refers to as “our mosque”.

Today is a casual reunion for me to meet the various members.

As we sit all in the women’s section, Alhaja stands and introduces each women as much as she introduces me and my research; I barley say a word before they all pray vigorously for the success of my work. After a few practical discussions about the next meeting, we squeeze ourselves into the few available cars.

Arriving in the town of Lanlate, the cars climb on top the hill, the road is bad, full of potholes barely tarred.

The 11 a.m. heat is intense, I sweat under my black shirt hijab and skirt.

Two black tents stand next to a construction site, the bigger one for the public, the second one for the days lecturer and the ‘high table’.

“They (FOMWAN Lanlate) are building an event center; it will be beautiful”.

Lanlate, April 2022. S. Okoekpen

Eruwa’s Amirah and Lanlate’s Amirah coldly greet themselves as we sit in the left part of the tent. Lanlate’s branch stands for Ibarapa North-East Local Government despite the fact that this LG does not exist on a federal administrative level. Alhaja briefely explains without any details how Ibarapa East (Eruwa) and Ibarapa North-East (Lanlate) used to be the same Ibarapa East Branch, but the women from Lanlate requested their recognition as an independent one. Their members are all dressed in matching white embroidered veils and burgundy dresses. The FOMWAN delegation from the Ibarapa Central Local Government arrives, wearing matching orange embroider veils and blue/orange Ankara dresses, later joined by the Ibarapa North delegation.

Almost a hundred women and children of various organisations and colors quickly occupy all of the chairs. The high table facing us hosts only a few men until the lecturer arrived: Chief Imam of the Ansar’ud Deen Mosque and community of Lanlate.

As with every Ramadan lecture we’ve attended thus far, one man stands as the MC for the day, accompanied by a few younger men in the reading of the Qur’ran, prayers, and singing.

They MC introduces the day’s speaker and special guests before urging the (female) audience for donations while praying. The women rise one by one dancing, praying and singing their way to the space between the two tents where a black bucket for donations has been placed. 50, 100, 200, 500 and some 1000 Naira notes are tossed in a demonstrative way, ensuring that the public to witnesses the amount.

When it is time for the health talk (which I always mistakenly understand as head talk), a local pharmacist discusses the health benefits of fasting. To my surprise he makes the connection between Ramadan fasting and the very current trendy intermittent fasting for weight loss.

Next on the printed program I received at the beginning is written : Lecture! Lecture!! Lecture!!!

Ramadan Lecture, Lanlate, April 2022. S. Okoekpen

After some more prayers and donations, the Imam stands up and presented the title of his intervention:

“How is gender equality destroying our society”.

The heat is much. I see smiles on the audience’s the faces, and laughter as he repeats “How is gender equality destroying our society”. Is it a joke that I am unable to get because of my poor yoruba skills? Goose bumps up my arms and my guts knot up. My face stays passive showing no emotions. But in the depth of my flesh I am screaming.


 

“I know you disagree with what the Imam said in the lecture”

Alhaja says later that day as she comes to lie down next to me in the room’s second bed. I can’t help but smile as she unveils the dilemma that had been going on in my head since.

 

Later that night, in my troubled sleep, I invoked two inspiring scholars I cherished whose work and thoughts have been by my side since the beginning of my research:

I recalled what Saba asked herself and her readers:

 Do my political visions ever run up against the responsibility that I incur for the destruction of life forms so that ‘unenlightened’ women may be taught to live more freely? Do I even fully comprehend the forms of life that I want so passionately to remake? Would an intimate knowledge of lifeworlds that are distinct from mine ever question my own certainty about what I prescribe as a superior way of life for others?
(1) 

A low voice I could not shush in my mind asked: “But what about the right to freedom that for which we fight as feminists?”

Lila answered:

What does freedom mean if we accept the fundamental premise that humans are social beings, raised in certain social and historical contexts and belonging to particular communities that shape their desires and understandings of the world?
(2)

And Saba suggested:

The liberatory goals of feminism should be re-thought in light of the fact that the desire for freedom and liberation is a historically situated desire whose motivational force cannot be assumed a priori but needs to be reconsidered in light of the other desires, aspirations and capacities that inhere in a culturally and historically located subject
(3)
A discussion with Mahmood & Abu-lughod. Ink, Mai 2022, S. Okoekpen

 References

  1. Mahmood, S. (2006). Feminist Theory, Agency, and the Liberatory Subject: Some Reflections on the Islamic Revival in Egypt. Temenos: Nordic Journal of Comparative Religion 42:1, p.61.
  2. Abu-Lughod, L. (2015). Do Muslim women need saving?. Sage UK: London, England: SAGE Publications. p.10
  3. Mahmood, S. (2001). Feminist Theory, Embodiment, and the Docile Agent: Some Reflections on the Egyptian Islamic Revival. Cultural Anthropology16(2), 202–236. http://www.jstor.org/stable/656537. p.225