Tomalin (2013) and Dugal (2022) Gender & Religions

Secular, mainstream feminism

• Largely rejects religion as it sees religion as against women’s interests

No one religion

stands out as more gender inequitable than another. All are equally bad in various ways lol

GAD vs. Religion

• Many poor people still find religion important and don’t see the cultural relevance of feminism

• Mainstream secular feminism largely see religion as against women’s interests

• GAD approaches are typically materialist & secularist. Religion, therefore, is not considered as a meaning framework

Gender Bias

Empirically, across the board women are at a disadvantage because of economic marginalization, violence, social difference, etc.

WID WAD

• Women’s development means inclusion

• Role of women in economic development. The econ. development of a country is stunted bc no women are involved (half the population)

• Failed to consider the limitations:

  • Why are women marginalized in the first place?

  • What was keeping women subordinated despite being included?

  • Is it enough to increase women’s resources or to challenge gender patriarchal relations as a whole?

GAD

• Understand root of gender equalities—the constructive input

• Not just addressing exclusion but their continued subordinate status

• Practical & Strategic Needs

• Challenges of the 1st & 3rd World are very different. “Isolation” or housework is not pointed as the problem…

Practical Needs

• Basic needs, employment, food, water, health, etc.

Strategic Needs

• Break glass ceiling, improve labor conditions, domestic abuse, legal recognition, equal opportunity

Global Gender Gap Report EEHP

• Economic participation

• Educational attainment

• Health & Survival

• Political Empowerment

challenging patriarchal gender relations

Not enough to increase women’s access to resource. Matter of ____

Gender mainstreaming

• Systemic procedures and mechanisms

• Romantic assumption of moving toward empowerment → Not just participation

Limitation of GAD

• Widespread adoption of GAD becomes “another box to tick” Rather than informed radical, transformational, development thinking

• Closes further critique

• Can be used to “opt out” of further feminist objectives

Attitudes toward Women in Religion

• Religious discourses make women equal to but different from men

• Most traditions have movements of women campaigning for access—-to not only practice but be recognized at the same level as men (with status and opportunities)

• Religion used as a moral framework

• Religion is entangled with patriarchal values & dominantly male perspectives

  • NGOs may refuse to engage with religion “so as to not interfere” with local culture

Religious Feminism

• Openness to what female empowerment can look like across views and strategies

• “Internal” reform can very often draw from the ideas of “external” advocates for change

• Religion as not a barrier but smth important to women’s rights

• Religion is entangled with patriarchal values, esp. with GAD originating as a tool from the West

Religion as patriarchal moral framework?

• No religious basis for dowry violence, female inticide, widow burning, or child marriage

Laws of Manu (Masumriti; Hindu text)

• Used for negative attitudes towards women in India

• “Proper” treatment of women means no independance

Religious Fundamentalism

• Tendencies of religion with ‘vigorous promotion & enforcement of gender roles’ explicitly intends to subordinate women

• Fundamentalist Agenda: Control women’s minds and bodies to support the patriarchal family model

• Manifestations

  • Islamic response to adultery is stoning

  • Justify military campaigns by the West to Muslim countries

  • “Loosening of women” prominent feature of modern western secularism

  • Afghanistan Taliban as “backed-up by tradition” when they banish women from the work force, cant see male physicians etc.

When they don’t have to be

Women in the idealized past, as primarily constructed by men, are portrayed as self-sacrificing____

Reproductive rights and choices

• Access to reproductive services (contraception & abortion)

• Reflects tensions between universal rights AND cultural or religious particularisms

• Religion’s influence on reproductive choices (family planning, Muslim-Catholic alliance)

• Case Studies

  • Mexico City Policy - Prohibiting any organization receiving US funding from providing abortions

  • Catholic Latin American countries -  Catholic restrictions on birth control. Increased contraceptive use could cut maternal mortality (risky teen pregnancies and unsafe abortions). But not all Catholics are opposed to this.

  • Confusian China - One child policy

Sanskritization

• Emulation of upper-caste culture, values, and lifestyles by those considered 'low' in the hierarchy to attain upward social mobility

• Implication on reproductive rights and choices

secular legal strategies

To oppose religious obstacle’s to women’s right through the use of _____ might not be appropriate in every situation

Baha’i Faith

Equality of men and women as a foundational principle

The bird cannot fly until both wings are equally developed, meaning highest social development is impossible without gender equality

Working together as equals

Religious Freedom

Opportunity to investigate the full range of human existence, explore beliefs, and hold or change beliefs of one’s choosing—a central human development freedom

Women’s Freedom of Religious Belief

Frequently denied but by being force to adapt to husband’s faith or forbidden to convert

Women as Internal Enforcers

Sometimes, women themselves act as conservative actors who enforce patriarchial norms within religious traditions

Two-way influence

• Religious freedom and the advancement of women go hand in hand.

• Norms and social structures that inhibit one tend to also undermine the other.

• But influence runs in ihe opposite direction, as well. As growing numbers of women come to take meaningful roles of responsibility and leadership in their communities; as their perspectives and aspirations are accorded more weight in deliberations on the future;