Revisiting Ali Shariati on Women’s Question

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This paper seeks to critically analyze Ali Shariati’s (1933-77) ideas and ideals in regard to the question of women and gender rights. It argues that Iranian religious intellectuals, compared to their counterparts in other Muslim countries, have been mostly “gendered-blind” and ambivalent about women’s right. However, Muslim leftists including Ali Shariati, Mahmood Talegani (1911-79) and the new Shariati discourse maintained a relatively better record of addressing women rights and issues. They articulated a socially relevant and culturally aware alternative to the state-sanctioned gender discourse of the Pahlavi regime (pseudo-modernized/assimilated women) and the orthodox Leftist gender narrative (annihilated femininity of revolutionary women) to achieve gender equality and women's empowerment.

 

While in his early works, written abroad, Shariati optimistically demanded full equal socio-political rights for women, soon after his return to the country, he realized that more fundamental rights are at stake, tailored his demands and thoughts accordingly. He, first, borrowing religious memories and traditions, seeks to articulate a religiously rooted role model for the society. To encourage women's participation, he idealizes and praises Zainab, the granddaughter of the prophet, as a prominent socio-political figure, and proudly addresses Fatemeh, the daughter of the prophet, as an Imam, appreciating her leading role in a patriarchal, traditional society of the time. To challenge the traditional division of labor (women in charge of housework), Shariati cites how housework were equally delegated between Ali and her wife Fatemeh. 

 

He then articulates his strategies for achieving a more gender-equal society including heightening awareness and educating the public about the patriarchal ideologies and ‘women’s domestication’ as well as motivating and encouraging women to challenge themselves the patriarchy, social norms and values that exhibit the characteristics of the traditionally defined role for women, perpetuating men's political and social domination. He particularly emphasizes the importance of internalizing gender equal roles, norms and values confronting the male-dominated culture and men who benefit from women's marginalization and exclusion.

 

Noting the reactionary backlash from Iran’s traditional, patriarchal society to pseudo-modernization of the Pahlavi regime, which claims female sexual liberation as the true meaning and aim of the women’s rights movement, Shariati cautions that recognizing women equal power/rights and not the reactionary and conservative contestation is the only path ahead.         

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