Bringing women's voices together, unaltered, unadulterated
Ramadan brings to mind an array of sights in the mind’s eye – eager faces turned up to the sky as they wait to witness the beauty of a slight crescent moon which signals the start of a month filled with peace, serenity and forgiveness; laden iftaar tables just waiting to be set upon by …
You never think it’s going to happen to you… until it does. Just over a week ago, I was in a queue with my four-year-old son. We were waiting for a train ride around the park near my parents’ house, when I received a phone call from my mum. It was the phone call that nobody ever …
Deviating slightly from our usual posts, we wanted to share with our readers an interview between Anne Dijk, a female Sunni scholar based in the Netherlands and Arjen Buitelaar, a male Shia scholar also from the Netherlands. They were interviewed by Arek Miernik who is from Poland, and the interview has been translated to English. You …
Read Part 1 here. In addition to depression, I was diagnosed with anxiety, which tends to worsen during exams. Even though I take medication for depression and anxiety, I still experience panic attacks before, during and after exams. I wanted to share with you a few things that help me get through exams without letting …
If you’ve met me, just like everyone else does, you wouldn’t expect me to be dealing with a mental illness, especially of this severity. I’m in my final year of university, expected to graduate with a 2:1 (Inshallah), VP of a society and always up for hanging out with my friends or getting involved in …
by Maaiysa Valli @Maaiysa Every year, Ramadhan comes. And every year, I struggle. Not with the fast – which this year is around 20+ hours long – but with NOT being able to fast. It’s a battle I quietly face every year. And here I’ll explain why. You may know that certain groups are exempt …
by Roszeen Afsar @Roszeen The literalist way of thinking among certain Muslims is sad to say the least. I’ve been exposed to it many times, but the most memorable was in my university prayer room. I remember being hauled into a discussion about Sufism amongst a group of girls who carried a negative opinion of …
It’s difficult to be a Muslim online these days; if you’re not receiving backlash from Islamophobic trolls, then you can definitely rely on your own community to take the position of judge and jury when it comes to your morality. Okay, so I’m being a little facetious. But I see it time and time again, …
by Roszeen Afsar In my previous post; ‘The Smiling Sister; Paintings of Hijab’, I wrote that knowledge of spirituality today is very little, and as such female spirituality is never brought up in discussions on Islam. I was asked why that is. This is an interesting question and one I touched on in my final …
by Roszeen Afsar “The hijab is much more than the external solid scarf, but it is worn as an internal spiritual means of faith, these collections depict that so well.” – Nargis Akhter The above quote is the feedback I received from a friend after I showed her the piece I’d painted of her [above] …