Review of 'Secular Muslim Feminism: An Alternative Voice in the War of Ideas' by Hind Elhinnawy (Bloomsbury, 2024)

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DOI:

https://doi.org/10.31273/fd.n8.2025.1991

Abstract

I cannot express how excited I was when a friend sent me a link to this new publication. At last, a book about Muslim women ‘that challenges the oversimplified and monolithic portrayals of Muslim women’ as passive, subjugated victims of Islam that has dominated for far too long. Instead Elhinnawy presents us with the rich and long history of feminist activism in non-western and Muslim majority countries, of diverse struggles, contexts and ideologies as well as a glimpse of the immense potential for change that secular Muslim feminists can  and are creating for themselves, their communities and the wider world.  This book is a must read for anyone interested in gaining wider insight and knowledge of the struggles that face Muslim feminists in the West and in Muslim majority countries from religious fundamentalists and the Right.

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Author Biography

  • Yasmin Rehman

    Yasmin Rehman is a feminist, human rights activist and researcher. Yasmin is currently CEO at Juno Women’s Aid in Nottingham/South Nottinghamshire. In addition to her day job, Yasmin is often called as an expert witness in legal cases providing expert reports on faith-based abuse, honour-based abuse, forced marriage and polygamy.

    Yasmin has worked for more than 30 years predominantly on violence against women and girls, race, faith and gender, and human rights. She co-edited a book, Moving in the Shadows: Violence in the Lives of Minority Women and Children, contributing two chapters on faith based abuse and polygamy. She is working on a second book examining polygamous and temporary marriage and its links to violence and abuse of women and girls.

    Yasmin is currently an Honorary Researcher at University of Kent and a member of the editorial board of Feminist Dissent. She is a former Board member of Centre for Women’s Justice, a former fellow of the Muslim Institute, EVAW (End Violence against Women Coalition), National Secular Society Council and the Cross-Government Working Group on Hate Crimes.

    Yasmin was awarded the Irwin Prize for Secularist of the Year 2017.

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Published

2025-07-14

Issue

No. 8 (2025): Human Rights in an Age of Populist Authoritarianism

Section

Book Reviews

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Copyright (c) 2025 Yasmin Rehman

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