In the late 1900s the Islamic feminist movement arose in a time of an Islamic renaissance in the Arab world. Even though it started as an Arabic movement it quickly spread to the international arena and became global. Today there are Islamic feminists all over the globe and this study is a discourse analysis with a focus on the Islamic feminist movement of today. The aim of the study is to investigate what the members of the movement have in common and on what viewpoints their opinions differ. The material used for the study is Internet blogs written by Islamic feminists and the timeframe of the blog posts stretches from the start of the Arab Spring until today. There is a focus of the debate concerning hijab in the blog posts chosen in order to limit the available material.                                                                      The conclusion of the essay is that there are similarities to be found on all the blogs concerning the issue of hijab. A majority of the bloggers agree that wearing hijab is compatible with the Islamic feminist discourse, but there is no complete consensus on the subject. Overall the results show that there are many similarities to be found concerning Islamic feminism that points toward that the Islamic feminism can be viewed as a holistic movement today. All writes argue that the pre-Islamic society was patriarchal and that this patriarchal society influenced misinterpretations of the Qur’an. Women became wrongfully minimized through the faulty interpretations and the bloggers argue that the Qur’an should be reanalysed. The bloggers describe that God’s initial intention was an equal society.

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Den här studien identifierar brytpunkter inom feministisk korantolkning och belyser dem ur postkoloniala perspektiv. Aysha A. Hidayatullah har efter mångåriga studier av Amina Waduds och Asma Barlas feministiska korantolkningar utvecklat en kritik mot dem som hon menar pekar ut en ny inriktning för islamisk feminism. Den här studien kartlägger och jämför arbeten av dessa tre forskare för att identifiera och belysa funna brytpunkter ur två postkoloniala teo-retiska perspektiv formulerade av Allison Weir respektive Judith Butler.Wadud och Barlas tolkar Koranen som en tidlös radikal impuls för social rättvisa och absolut jämlikhet mellan könen. Även om den ibland uttrycker en patriarkal maktordning så uppmanar de att utifrån tron på Koranen som Guds fullkomliga uppenbarelse söka djupare. Hidayatullah kritiserar deras tolkningar som inkonsekventa, fundamentalistiska och anakronistiska. Hon fin-ner istället att Koranens syn på könsrelationer inte fullt ut är förenlig med hennes feministiska anspråk. Hon vill därför ompröva dogmen om Koranen som Guds ofelbara uppenbarelse.De postkoloniala perspektiven identifierar att deras olika ställningstaganden har kopplingar till koloniala och imperialistiska maktförhållanden där ”islamiskt” och ”sekulärt” blivit anta-gonister. Butlers och Weirs perspektiv belyser det antagonistiska läget i relation till väster-ländska, sekulära och hegemoniska narrativ om temporalitet och frihet. De två menar att skill-naderna mellan deras ställningstaganden inte är så stora som det kan verka och efterfrågar al-ternativa koncept om frihet och temporalitet för att öppna upp det låsta positionerna. De menar att det sekulära inte är den enda källan till kritik och ser det religiösa som ett diskursivt öppet fält för ifrågasättande och strider.

Muslim women’s rights, and gender equality in the Muslim world, are commonly discussed subjects within the academic world. Feminism, as a term, is often connected to this topic of discussion. This thesis aims to analyze two different perspectives concerning how these rights should be achieved: Islamic feminism, using internal resources, and Muslim feminism, using external resources. Islamic feminism, as a strategy, proposes that by interpreting the Quran, the ultimate revelation of God, Islam could provide the central and egalitarian meaning of the Quran. There is disagreement within the academic community whether Islamic feminism would enable these rights. Muslim feminism, as a counterpoint to Islamic feminism, proposes that the state must become secularized. Rendering Islam and the state as separate entities.    This thesis will utilize the theoretical perspective on Islam and feminism from five feministic academics. They all have different backgrounds, standpoints, and approaches towards the development of Muslim women’s rights, as well as what strategies they suggest to improve them. These strategies encounter different kinds of difficulties. The Islamic feminism, which uses the Quran, runs the risk of being too heavily associated with already established interpretations of the Quran. It may be seen as intertwined with existing fundamentalist views. On the opposite side of the spectrum, Muslim feminism may create a divide between Islam and women’s rights. This thesis aims to present the potential of different theoretical perspectives on Islam and feminism as well as the limitations on suggested strategies for improvement of Muslim women’s rights.

The religious school of thought that is involved in the control of Saudi Arabia is called Wahhabism and is a form of Islam that is usually accused by outsiders of being misogynist. This paper will deal with the founder of this alignment of Islam, Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, and his view of women in marriage. Another movement which in turn goes to work to lift the women's rights is Islamic feminists. Two branches of Islam who belief that Islam is the only right path to take for issues surrounding gender and life. In this essay, I will compare their respective interpretations of three points which concern the role of women in marriage; men's right to polygamy, men's higher status than the woman and the men's right to beat his wife. The purpose of this paper is to ask two different interpretations of the same issues, with the same verses in the Quran against each other to see how they resemble or differ from each other to try to contribute for a greater understanding of the interpretative pluralism in Islam. The paper concludes that these two movements are looking at the three points with different eyes and in different ways as they are originated from two different contexts and have different purposes when their interpreting the verses from the Quran.