Fatema Mernissi, the Demon of Coloniality and Decolonial Exorcisms

Raja Rhouni

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Chapter 18 Fatema Mernissi, the Demon of Coloniality and Decolonial Exorcisms

In: Contemporary Moroccan Thought

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Raja Rhouni

Raja Rhouni
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Type:: Chapter

Pages:: 476–497

DOI:: https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004519534_019

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Abstract

How do you do feminism as a Muslim woman living in times of coloniality? This question is at the centre of any debate on women’s rights in Muslim postcolonial societies. This chapter attempts to provide an answer to this question through an examination of the work of feminist sociologist Fatema Mernissi (1940–2015), who devoted her life to fighting “the demon of silence” which muffles the voice of women. Taking the cue from the criticisms levelled by postcolonial and decolonial scholars such as Lila Abu Lughod, Carine Bourget, Sirin Sibai Adlbi and Ramon Grosfoguel (to cite only a few) against Mernissi’s discourse and its relationship with Orientalism and modernity/coloniality, I argue that the kinds of pitfalls and naiveté these critics rightly point out do not concern her entire work. Mernissi’s scholarship and activism could be divided into three main phases. The first one, which one might call “the Orientalist phase,” corresponds to her scholarship of the 1970s which displays a secularist (anti-religious) feminist position and has quite obvious Orientalist overtones (although not devoid of anti-colonial criticisms and positions). The second phase, which I call “post-Orientalist,” begins in the mid-1980s with her “Islamic feminist” writings in which she tried to confront the demon of Orientalism and break free from its grip. The last phase, which I call “the decolonial turn,” starts in the late 1990s, which demonstrates an incredulity towards the rhetoric of modernity, and deploys inspirational decolonial strategies. For lack of space, this chapter only hints at the first phase, choosing to focus on “the post-Orientalist” and the “decolonial” moments of Mernissi’s work, which form its two main sections.

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Contemporary Moroccan Thought

On Philosophy, Theology, Society, and Culture

Series: Handbook of Oriental Studies. Section 1 The Near and Middle East, Volume: 186

E-Book ISBN:: 9789004519534

Publisher:: Brill

Print Publication Date:: 24 Oct 2024

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Part 1 Projects in Philosophy and Philosophical Thought

Part 2 Projects in Theology, Theological Politics, and Sufism

Part 3 Projects in the Social Sciences and Cultural Studies

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Chapter 18 Fatema Mernissi, the Demon of Coloniality and Decolonial Exorcisms

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Contemporary Moroccan Thought

On Philosophy, Theology, Society, and Culture

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