Listen here to the audio documentary– The Pluralities of Islam: Sisters Doing It for Themselves

Aruna Boodram

My audio documentary project is intended to show the pluralities of women that Islam has affected, whether they be practicing Muslims or not. I want to show the ways in which Islam has made a positive and empowering impact on women within and outside of the religion.

The interviews allow the listener to work their way through the documentary as it is shaped by the commentary of these women, specific to their experiences with the religion.

I wanted to know how they understood Islam, how they understood feminism, and determining what the combination of the two would mean for them as Muslim women or those in solidarity with Muslim women. I also wanted to know how Islam has provided the vehicle in which these women have understood and managed realms of empowerment, strength and resistance to globalization, Western discourses and every day problems.

The question of agency and choice, which has been a critical question within our course was also something that I attempted to engage with the participants.

I interviewed ten women, from Kingston, Toronto and Montreal, all from different social, economic, political and racial backrounds, that also transcended experiences of geographical boundaries and borders.
All the participants were interviewed either over the phone or in person, and were made aware of the specifics of the project.
I did not attempt to engage in any type of false notion of objectivity, as my position and agenda was made clear after the interviews were done. These conversations were part of a bigger series of talks that I have been having with other class-mates and friends, which lead to my project being solely interested in these specifically located voices of women within Islam.

I decided to use hip hop as undertones and backround music, as well as Islamic hip hop and Nasheeds, spoken word and sermons throughout the piece. The use of hip hop was because of the original intention to remix the music with the interview, but it lead to me searching for instrumental tracks of rap songs that are similar to what was being said in the interview.

While you cannot hear the lyrics of the original song, they were carefully chose to match the rest of the documentary. I also chose to start the entire piece called “Modern day Marys” by Poetic Pilmgrimage because I felt that it started off in a great way of showcasing the ways in which Muslim women are pronouncing their love for Islam in avenues that were historically and culturally denied from them. (I.e. singing and hip hop)

The documentary is then split up into four parts, each starting with a cultural text to transition each section for the progression of the interviews.
The four sections are: 1) Islam and its meaning to your identity/life/self, 2) What are the possibilities of Islamic feminisms?  3) The Hijabi women’s agency and choice; and 4) Islam as a vehicle for resistance, power and strength.

I do not attempt to speak for ALL Muslim women, but rather am trying to further examine the pluralities of voices that are alternative to those that are pre-dominately portrayed and controlled by the West, in imperialist attempts at further subjugating the “imperilled brown woman”.

I truly do think it is important to attempt at showcasing the plurality and ways that Islam, like many other religions is being used in positive and empowering ways of building community, resistance to patriarchy, figuring out new ways of knowing and selfhood, that is destroyed with the amount of anti-Islamic sentiment that is a part of the imperialist project that exists today.

That being said, I am not saying that there aren’t issues with the ways that Islam can be co-opted and interpreted to being very patriarchal and violent, but as the participants tell us through the documentary, that’s not the only part that we should acknowledge. The hegemonic discourse of the West, which is racist, Islamophobic and patriarchal in essence takes us down that path far too often to fall into for us to do it as well. As those who are critical thinkers around systems of domination, we must address the ways in which we ourselves may be guilty of generalizing very complex and intricate things, such as Islam.

I did thoroughly enjoy this project, and while it took me a lot longer than I would have hoped, I learnt a lot of things about the intricacies yet simplicities of my friend’s lives as Muslim women. It gave me more hope for a new type of movement where women recognize the stability and instabilities that come with identity politics and awareness of each other. It was an eye opening experience as well to listen to the multitude of voices, opinions and expressions that made up this fierce group of women. I also made this documentary in hopes that future groups/individuals/organizations will use it!

I ended this documentary with a song by the Pearls of Islam, who are a group of young Muslim women who sing nasheeds and other songs in the name of Allah. Within the various examples of both the cultural texts of spoken word and songs, combined with the personal interviews, I hoped to have laid out a dynamic collaboration of Islamic women’s voices who do not rely on feminism to engaged their strength, womanhood and collective energies, but rather, they find that within Islam itself.