Miriam Cooke
Miriam Cooke is an American born, British trained academic in Middle Eastern/Arab world studies. She focuses on modern Arabic literature, and connecting women's narratives of war stories to a critical reassessment of their role in the public sphere. Her first and last names are uncapitalized in publications and other professional contexts.[1]
She is a professor of modern Arabic literature and culture at Duke University. She received her doctorate from the St Antony's College, Oxford in 1980. She is the author of several books, including "Yahya Haqqi: the Anatomy of an Egyptian Intellectual", War's Other Voices: Women Writers on the Lebanese Civil War, "Women and the War Story", "Women Claim Islam: Creating Islamic Feminism through Literature", "Dissident Syria: Making Oppositional Arts Official" and a novel entitled "Hayati, My Life". She co-edited Opening the Gates: A Century of Arab Feminist Writing.
She describes herself as an advocate of "Islamic feminism" and asserts that "Islamic feminists are declaring that [...] Islam is the ideal just society, but that social justice entails equality for all, including women."[1] She encourages interpreting the Qur'an in a "very woman friendly-way."
References
- ^ See her faculty web page, for example: http://asianmideast.duke.edu/people?Gurl=%2Faas%2FAMES&Uil=mcw&subpage=profile