A review by chaibreaks
Beyond the Veil, Revised Edition: Male-Female Dynamics in Modern Muslim Society by Fatema Mernissi

3.0

Fatema Mernissi's book written in the 1960s and focusing on the dynamics of Arab (especially Moroccan) Muslim Society is an interesting study and echoes through other Muslim cultures too. It doesn't explain the problems faced in the current social order, but it does explore some similar aspects and gives you a timeline of change. Mernissi chose to focus on sexual dynamics and how sex plays the foremost role in regulating behaviour and traditional Muslim marriages, and she makes some excellent and bold arguments, though some are unagreeable. Her contrast of Imam Ghazali's view of sexuality and the Freudian concept of sexuality is fascinating. She maintains the argument that the "feminist" emancipation of women in the Muslim world is fundamentally different from the Western. Though outdated and having anti-religion undertones throughout the text, it is an intriguing read.