Early Modern Period: Letters, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Montagu, Mary Wortley. The Letters and Works of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. Volume 1. Edited by her great-grandson Lord Wharncliffe. London: George Bell and Sons, 1887.

The following are excerpts from the letters of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1689-1762), a noted English essayist and one of the earliest advocates of women’s rights. She is perhaps best known for her letters from Constantinople, which she wrote to various friends and family members while living... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Photograph, Beautiful Fatima
“Beautiful Fatima.” Late 19th century photograph. Algiers. The Getty Research Institute.

Photography was critical to imperialism. The French army (and the British army in India) employed the camera’s lens to chronicle military exploits, first in Algeria during the 1850s, and later in Tunisia and Morocco. With advances in photographic technology, portrait studios were established in... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Autobiography, Fadhma Amrouche
Amrouche, Fadhma. My Life Story: The Autobiography of a Berber Woman. Translated and with an introduction by Dorothy S. Blair. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1989.

Fadhma Amrouche was the illegitimate daughter of an impoverished, illiterate Berber peasant woman. Born a Muslim, she was converted to Christianity by Catholic missionaries, produced one of the first autobiographies ever written by an Algerian woman, became a naturalized French citizen, and raised... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Newspaper, Hubertine Auclert
Clancy-Smith, Julia. “A Woman Without Her Distaff: Gender, Work, and Handicraft Production in Colonial North Africa.” In A Social History of Women and the Family in the Middle East. Edited by Margaret Meriwether and Judith Tucker. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1999. Documents from the Bibliotheque de la Ville de Paris, Fonds Bougle, Manuscrits Hubertine Auclert, “La Presse et le Feminisme, 1880-1914.”

From the middle of the 19th century on, European women settled in colonial empires in Asia and Africa in greater numbers. Some, even many, attempted to effect changes for the good of colonized women. One example of this in French Algeria was Hubertine Auclert, (1848-1914), the radical Parisian... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Report, M. Coriat
Clancy-Smith, Julia. “Albert Memmi and The Pillar of Salt.” In African Literature and Its Times. Edited by Joyce Moss. Los Angeles: Moss Publication Group, 2000.

North Africa has long been home to ancient, diverse communities of Jews, originally from Spain, Italy, Palestine, or elsewhere. Many claim to have inhabited the area stretching from Morocco to Tunisia for nearly two millennia—since around 70 CE—although others trace their roots even farther back... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Photograph, Fatima the Moroccan
“Fatima the Moroccan.” Le Miroir. 5eme année, number 81. June 13, 1915.

By 1900, only the Kingdom of Morocco remained more or less independent of European rule, although European competition for Morocco was intense between Spain, France, and Germany. Between 1899 and 1912, French armies progressively occupied the country using Algeria as a base. In 1912, the French... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Letters, Lalla Zaynab
Clancy-Smith, Julia. “The House of Zainab: Female Authority and Saintly Succession in Colonial Algeria.” In Women in Middle Eastern History: Shifting Boundaries In Sex and Gender. Edited by Nikki R. Keddie and Beth Baron. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992. Documents from the Archives d’Outre-Mer, Aix-en-Provence, Algeria, 2U22, 1897.

In North Africa, Muslim and Jewish women’s quotidian religiosity was expressed in popular observances and festivals preserved chiefly, but not exclusively, in oral traditions. The most visible embodiment of these beliefs and practices were saints’ shrine where women (and men) honored especially... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Personal Account, Captain Carette
Captain Carette. “Algérie.” In L’Univers pittoresque, Histoire et description de tous les peuples, de leurs religions, moeurs, coutumes, industrie. Paris: Firmin Didot, 1850.

To the east of Algiers is a rugged mountainous region, the Kabylia, whose loftiest peak is named after a holy woman, Lalla Khadija. The Berber-speaking inhabitants have always been known for their spirit of independence as well as for the veneration they accord to local Muslim saints, male and... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Paintings, Claude Antoine Rozet
Rozet, Claude Antoine. Maure riche. Mauresque en ville, avec le sarmah sur la tête. Maure artisan. Mauresque en ville. 1833. In Voyage dans la régence d’Alger ou, Description du pays occupé par l’armée française en Afrique. Paris: A. Bertrand, 1833.

One of the first tasks undertaken by the French military after the 1830 invasion was to visually depict, and thus classify, places, things, and people so as to rule more effectively. This is a pattern seen in all modern colonial regimes worldwide. To this end, in addition to cannons, rifles, and... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Personal Account, A Visit to Tunisian Harem
“On the Tunisian Harem.” Based upon three different eyewitness accounts by European women furnished to James Richardson, an English traveler in Tunisia. In his “An Account of the Present State of Tunis.” London Public Record Office, Foreign Office records, Tunisia, 102/29, 1845.

The harem (or harim) has exercised a powerful fascination over the Western imagination for centuries. Rarely (if ever) visited by European men, the secluded female quarters in urban elite households were, however, imagined and depicted by Western male writers and painters as places of deviance and... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Interview, Tewhida Ben Sheikh
Huston, Perdita. Motherhood by Choice: Pioneers in Women’s Health and Family Planning. New York: The Feminist Press, 1992.

Tewhida Ben Sheikh [1909- ] was the first North African Muslim woman to earn a medical degree from the Faculty of Medicine in Paris, in 1936, while Tunisia was still under colonial rule. After she was awarded her medical diploma in France, Madame Ben Sheikh returned to Tunis, where she opened a... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Interview, Djamila Bouhired
Lazreg, Marnia. The Eloquence of Silence: Algerian Women in Question. New York: Routledge Press, 1994, 123.

By the eve of the revolution, Algerian demands for even limited political and civil rights had been repeatedly rebuffed by the French colonial regime and the nearly one million European settlers in the country. The only possible solution was armed conflict, which broke out on All Saints Day,... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Law, Code of Personal Status
Charrad, Mounira. States and Women’s Rights: The Making of Postcolonial Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001.; Clancy-Smith, Julia. “Colonialism: 18th to Early 20th Century.” Methodologies, Paradigms and Sources of the 6-volume Encyclopedia of Women and Islamic Cultures, Vol. 1. Edited by Suad Joseph. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2003.

In 1956 one of the most revolutionary family law codes in the Arab or Islamic world was proclaimed in the newly independent Tunisian state which, paradoxically, had not suffered a political revolution in the way that colonial Algeria would. What historical factors explain why Tunisian women won... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Autobiography, Leila Abouzeid
Abouzeid, Leila. Return to Childhood: The Memoir of a Modern Moroccan Woman. Austin, Texas: The Center for Middle Eastern Studies, 1998.

In Morocco, after 1912, the colonial regime eschewed, for the most part, introducing overt changes into Islamic personal status law. Indeed the patriarchy of the reigning dynasty, the ’Alawis, and of the leaders of the great tribes, was reinforced, since France wanted Morocco to theoretically... [more]

Imperialism in North Africa: Song, Amina Annabi
Annabi, Amina. Amina: Wa di Yé. Mega Studio, Paris, 1992.

North African women have long, rich traditions of vocal and instrumental music. At weddings and other joyous occasions, including religious celebrations, female musicians sing, perform, and dance. One of the most popular singers and composers in Europe today is a Tunisian woman, Amina Annabi, whose... [more]

Islamic Empire: Religious Text, Women Sura
The Noble Qur’an, http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/quran/

This Sura (or chapter) of the Qur’an, known as al-Nisa’, or “Women,” details a variety of legal rights and restrictions for Muslims in the realm of marriage, inheritance, and other male-female relationships. Containing verses on polygamy, property maintenance, and child custody, it is one... [more]

Islamic Empire: Religious Text, Confederation Sura
The Noble Qur’an, http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/quran/

This Sura (or chapter) of the Qur’an, known as al-Ahzab, or the “Confederation,” is known for its many verses extolling modesty in women, as well as detailing aspects of ideal marriage. Because of its references directly to the wives of the Prophet Muhammad, there has been controversy over... [more]

Islamic Empire: Travel Narrative, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Tappan, Eva March ed., Russia, Austria-Hungary, The Balkan States, and Turkey, vol. 6 in The World’s Story: A History of the World in Story, Song, and Art. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1914.

In the 18th century, European travelers began to enjoy increased access to international destinations, and the Ottoman Empire was a particular favorite for many. In the travel narrative of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, we see a European woman attempting to reconcile her attraction toward the exotic... [more]

Islamic Empire: Religious Text, Marriage Customs
Muhammad, Shaykh, Hisham Kabbani, and Leleh Bakhtiar. Encyclopedia of Muhammad’s Women Companions and the Traditions They Related. Kazi Publications, 1998.

The Hadith, or ways of the Prophet Muhammad, were collected upon his death from those who were close to him in life. Known as the Companions, these people played a key role in filling in the sayings and practices of Muhammad and his behaviors, recording them for future generations. Many of the key... [more]

Islamic Empire: Religious Text, Mosque Customs and Public Behavior
Muhammad, Shaykh, Hisham Kabbani, and Leleh Bakhtiar. Encyclopedia of Muhammad’s Women Companions and the Traditions They Related. Kazi Publications, 1998.

The Hadith, or ways of the Prophet Muhammad, were collected upon his death from those who were close to him in life. Known as the Companions, these people played a key role in filling in the sayings and practices of Muhammad and his behaviors, recording them for future generations. Many of the... [more]

Islamic Empire: Poem, Abbasid-era
Ahmed, Leila. Women and Gender in Islam. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992.

The Abbasid period is known as a time during which women’s public roles became more restricted in the Muslim population (umma). With the conquest of Sasanian and Byzantine lands, Arabs incorporated ideals of cloistering females and eliminating them from political life, with many... [more]

Islamic Empire: Miracle Story, Rabi’a al-‘Adawiyya
Helminski, Camille Adams. Women of Sufism: A Hidden Treasure. Boston: Shambala, 2003.

Rabi’a al-‘Adawiyya from Basra was one of the most important founders of the mystical element of Islam, known as Sufism. The stories about her life and teachings illustrate a woman free from many of the traditional constraints placed on women’s lives. In miracle stories such as this one, we see an... [more]

Islamic Empire: Poem, Rabi’a al-‘Adawiyya
Helminski, Camille Adams. Women of Sufism: A Hidden Treasure. Boston: Shambala, 2003.

In these poetic lines by Rabi’a al-‘Adawiyya, one of the most important founders of the mystical element of Islam, known as Sufism, we see an essential element of Sufi thought, the creation of which is often attributed to her: the ideal of divine love. Using the language of romance, Rabi’a’s verses... [more]

Islamic Empire: Official Document, Jewish Marriage Contract
Gotein, S.D.. A Mediterranean Society: The Jewish Communities of the Arab World as Portrayed in the Documents of the Cairo Geniza. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967-1993.

Within the context of patriarchal societies, women are dependent upon their male relatives to look out for their best interests. In both Jewish and Muslim marriages, contracts have traditionally been drawn up, illustrating that a marriage is as much a familial contract as a union between two... [more]

Islamic Empire: Architecture, Ayyubid and Ottoman
ArchNet, http://archnet.org/library/

In the Islamic world, women were able to own and control their own property at a time when Christian women in Europe were unable to do so. Many wealthy women endowed public buildings as a mark of their piety. In these examples, we see the way that Ayyubid and Ottoman women used the endowment of... [more]