Her Voice, Her Faith: Women Speak On World Religions / Edition 1

by Katherine Young, Arvind Sharma

Overview

They say religion is a personal and private affair. But when a woman believes in a tradition, she has a relationship to that faith beyond her sacred space. Religious traditions' historically poor treatment of women has lead many to question why they believe. How has their tradition either embraced and enlightened, or excluded and confined women throughout history? Her Voice, Her Faith presents the personal and historical perspectives of women who not only live their faith day to day, but who also know their religion's history with women in general.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780813342573
Publisher:	Westview Press
Publication date:	07/21/2004
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	336
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Katherine K. Young and Arvind Sharma are professors of religion at McGill University and co-editors of The Annual Review of Women in World Religions. They live in Montreal, Quebec. Katherine K. Young and Arvind Sharma are professors of religion at McGill University and co-editors of The Annual Review of Women in World Religions. They live in Montreal, Quebec.

Table of Contents

* Preface by Arvind Sharma * Introduction by Katherine K. Young * Hinduism, by Vasudha Narayanan * Buddhism, by Rita M. Gross * Confucianism, by Terry Woo * Taoism, by Eva Wong * Judaism, by Susannah Heschel * Christianity, by Mary Gerhart * Islam, by Riffat Hassan * Goddess Spirituality and Wicca, by Wendy Griffin * Chapter Notes and Bibliographies * Notes on the Contributors

Editorial Reviews

This collection of essays is worthwhile in concept. Eight experts with solid scholarly credentials examine the roles played by women in world religions, adding a first-person perspective from their own religious experiences to their essays about women's historically underappreciated and underdocumented participation in religions. This fine idea is, however, unevenly executed, producing essays of mixed quality that suffer from either narrow focus on material from a tradition or underexplained references to a tradition's complex pantheon, teachings or history. Rita Gross's essay on women in Buddhism most successfully mixes discussion of canon, religious teachings, historical practice and contemporary issues. By contrast, Riffat Hassan's essay on women and Islam, with limited scholarly citation and argument about the meaning of pivotal but nonetheless highly selected Qur'anic passages, does not do justice to the vast history of participation by women in this major world religion. Wendy Griffin's piece on goddess spirituality is the most seriously flawed. Its unquantified assertions ("More covens formed"; "More and more women came") about the growth of a minority movement mostly in the past 30 years do not add up to proof of impact on, and reflection of, women's lived experience-96 footnotes notwithstanding. An essay on new religious movements-including modern goddess spirituality-or world indigenous religions would have offered a more capacious and scholarly framework for documenting women's religious practices, beliefs and leadership across the boundaries of time and culture. (Jan.) Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.

Publishers Weekly