page_title: Women in Islam
section_title: Modern debate on the status of women in Islam
hierarchical_section_title: Women in Islam / Modern debate on the status of women in Islam
caption_attribution_description: English: Anousheh Ansari in her spacesuit
context_page_description: The experiences of Muslim women vary widely between and within different societies. At the same time, their adherence to Islam is a shared factor that affects their lives to a varying degree and gives them a common identity that may serve to bridge the wide cultural, social, and economic differences between them.
  Among the influences which have played an important role in defining the social, spiritual, and cosmological status of women in the course of Islamic history are Islam's sacred text, the Quran; the Ḥadīths, which are traditions relating to the deeds and aphorisms of Islam's Prophet Muḥammad; ijmā', which is a consensus, expressed or tacit, on a question of law; qiyās, the principle by which the laws of the Quran and the Sunnah or Prophetic custom are applied to situations not explicitly covered by these two sources of legislation; and fatwas, non-binding published opinions or decisions regarding religious doctrine or points of law.
context_section_description: Within the Muslim community, conservatives and Islamic feminists have used Islamic doctrine as the basis for discussion of women's rights, drawing on the Quran, the hadith, and the lives of prominent women in the early period of Muslim history as evidence. Where conservatives have seen evidence that existing gender asymmetries are divinely ordained, feminists have seen more egalitarian ideals in early Islam. Still others have argued that this discourse is essentialist and ahistorical, and have urged that Islamic doctrine not be the only framework within which discussion occurs.
caption: Anousheh Ansari, the first Muslim woman in space.
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