Insight with Leila Ahmed- A Quiet Revolution

25/05/2011 – Raised in Cairo in the 1940’s, by a generation of women who never wore the veil or headscarf, Leila Ahmed set out to discover why so many women now wear the veil, and what this shift means for women, Islam and the West.

Leila Ahmed, who is the Victor S. Thomas Professor of Divinity at the Harvard Divinity School, will be joining us at the Club in conversation with Azadeh Moaveni, Iranian-American writer, journalist and author of Lipstick Jihad, to discuss her new book A Quiet Revolution: The Veil’s Resurgence, from the Middle East to America and her surprising discoveries about Muslim women, Islamism and democracy.

At a time when both Islamist and democratic forces are dramatically changing the Middle East, Leila Ahmed’s analysis of the resurgence of the veil from Egypt to Saudi Arabia challenges many assumptions about women’s rights and activism.

Leila Ahmed was the first professor of Women’s Studies in Religion at Harvard University and is author of Women and Gender in Islam.
[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0H5akemSsM]