- Examines how women draw upon their faith to address the issues they face in the changing contexts of globalization, religion and spirituality, and feminism
- Reveals the myriad ways in which women across Asia are mobilizing to become agents of change while remaining firmly rooted in their religious and cultural traditions
- Highlights how religion can be a powerful force for social change
Religion has often been perceived as the source of constriction for women’s roles in society. This volume explores how modern women across Asia are mobilizing their faith traditions to address existential issues encountered in both the public and private realms, relating to economics, public participation, politics, and culture. As such, it is revealed that religion can be a powerful force for social change and ameliorating women’s lives, despite use of religious doctrine in the past to limit women.
Editor Zayn R. Kassam, PhD, and the contributors cover not only the commonly considered “Asian” traditions of Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism but also Christianity, Judaism, Bahai, and indigenous traditions.
Source: Women and Asian Religions by Zayn R. Kassam, Editor – Praeger – ABC-CLIO
Zayn R. Kassam, PhD, is John Knox McLean Professor of Religious Studies at Pomona College, Claremont, CA. She is the author of Greenwood’s Introduction to the World’s Major Religions: Islam and editor of Praeger’s Women and Islam. Kassam has also published numerous articles on gender and serves on the editorial board of Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion. A two-time winner of the Wig Award for Distinguished Teaching at Pomona College, she has also won the national American Academy of Religion Teaching Excellence Award.