This provocative collection addresses the ways in which Arab women writers are using Islam to empower themselves, and theorizes the conditions that have made the appearance of these new voices possible.

Miriam Cooke is Professor and Director of Asian and African Languages and Literatures at Duke University. She is the author of Women and the War Story (1997) and Gendering War Talk (1993), and co-editor of Opening theGates: A Century of Arab Feminist Writing (1990).

Chapter 1 Arab Women's Literary History; Chapter 2 In Search of Mother Tongues; Chapter 3 Reviewing Beginnings; Chapter 4 A Muslim Sister; Chapter 5 Multiple Critique; Chapter 6 Changing the Subject; Conclusion Conclusion;