Lidwien Kapteijns

Sex and Society in Islam: Birth Control before the Nineteenth Century

In this study of birth control in the classical Islamic world, Basim Musallam demonstrates the wide range of evidence available to dispel many assumptions current today. Medieval Arabic discussions of contraception and abortion in Islamic jurisprudence, medicine, materia medica, belles lettres, erotica and popular literature show that birth control was sanctioned by Islamic law and opinion. Contraceptive methods were available throughout pre-modern times and were used to meet social, economic, personal and medical needs. Sex and Society in Islam considers the impact of birth control as a factor in demographic change, and therefore in social history.

Mahdist Faith and the Legitimation of Popular Revolt in Western Sudan

This article is based on a wider study of the history of the western Sudan, in particular the border area between the historical sultanates of Dar Fur and Wadai (Kapteijns, 1985). The period under discussion is 1882–1930, from the successful struggle against foreign domination led by the Sudanese Mahdi to the firm establishment of British colonial rule in the western Sudan. The theme which this article explores for this area and period is that of popular revolt and Islamic (specifically Mahdist) ideology. The source materials for this study consist of Arabic correspondence from the Mahdist archives, oral data and British and French colonial records.

Abusharaf Rogaia Mustafa. Transforming Displaced Women in Sudan: Politics and the Body in a Squatter Settlement . Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2009. xii + 183 pp. Photographs. Notes. References. Index.

This discussion of womens adjustments to life in segregated cities, including the importance of civic organizations, anchors Brookss later discussion of the personal and collective forms of resistance popularized in the 1950s and 1960s in both places. She shows how women saw themselves as personally invested in overthrowing the dual logics of race and gender that exercised undue influence over their ability to care for and provide for their families. In the radicalization of these ordinary women from different countries, one key similarity Brooks discusses lies in the importance of political organizations like the African National Congress (ANC) and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), labor unions, and the Communist Party. Brooks considers womens complex role in these organizations, while also detailing the creation of new entities—such as the ANCs Womens League—designed explicitly to address the unique position of black women in a racist and sexist society. Brookss greatest contribution lies in her unique approach to comparative study. She skillfully presents personal accounts of everyday life and struggle against white rule across generations of women, inviting the reader to situate the political action of the 1950s and 1960s within trajectories of individual lives. In addition, Brooks locates their experiences and the freedom struggles within a global context, relating them to key external factors, including World Wars I and II, as well as to other anticolonial and democratic movements unfolding at the same time. Robyn Autry Wesleyan University Middletown, Connecticut