True to the defining characteristics of a feminist researcher, Makdisi posed a series of pertinent questions that she saw the conference as attempting to answer. Among them are questions like: what is the rightful place for feminism in a part of the world such as ours, where many of our populations have continued to suffer in the face of wars, sieges, violence, security states, debilitating poverty, and overcrowded cities? Where is the place of feminism in societies where radical religious fundamentalisms are making greater advances into the ordinary lives of people, where our land and our culture is continuously under relentless attack and subversion?

Makdisi spoke to the worries and challenges of many of us young feminists when she stated the conventional arguments used to silence us: Can we or should we, as women, make separate women’s rights demands in our societies? “We are often told to wait for the right moment,” she said, “and that now is not our time. We are told to be patient and our moment will come when “this” or “that” crisis ends. We are also constantly told to stop copying the “West.” We are accused of complicity with cultural imperialism or of undermining the family and its warmth. They – and sadly sometimes “they” includes other women – address us feminists as if we were children with no mind of our own, no history or culture of our own.”

Keynote Address of the Arab Feminisms Conference: What do Women Want? « Arab Feminisms Conference via igather