The EWIC Project

EWIC is organized into two sections, with an extended introduction at the beginning.

Introduction Volume I, written by the General Editor (with input from the Associate Editors), discusses the history, conceptualizations, organization, and objectives of EWIC. The Introduction outlines how the editors went about the work of EWIC, the rationale behind important decisions, the purpose of the different sections. The contradictions between the ways in which encyclopedia projects tend to stabilize concepts and the editors' efforts to destabilize, complicate, represent the "fuzziness" of reality are discussed. The Introduction addresses problems of essentializing, historicizing, contextualizing. Problems of the "periodization" of scholarship on Islam and implications for the study of women are discussed. The rationale for separating methodological pieces and general entries is explained. The Introduction discusses the rationale for organizing methodological sections by periods, regions, empires (the impact of political projects on research methods and sources). The problem of the "geography of Islam" or "social geographies" is addressed in many of the entries as well as by the Introduction to EWIC. The Introduction challenges the "regionalization" of Islam while explaining the need to organize some of EWIC's work regionally. The differences in the ways in which Islam spread, for example (by conquest, the nature of the conquest, the structure and culture of pre-Islamic communities), had different outcomes for women's issues locally. The Introduction also explains EWIC's effort to avoid the "exceptional women" approach to women's history by not allocating space for separate biographies of women, and opting to integrate brief biographies into appropriate entries.

Volume I: Thematic Entries:

Thematic entries are about methodologies, sources available for research, the constraints and limitations presented by methodologies and sources, and the implications of the above for scholarship on women and Islamic cultures. Authors were asked to evaluate the tools of research (what are the current methods and sources used to study women in that specific period, place, discipline) and identify the challenges and problems for the advancement of scholarship. This section aims to set the agenda for future research rather than answer all the questions. Section One is particularly directed at scholars, graduate students, and for teaching purposes.

A. Historical Thematic Entries

Historical thematic entries in Section One focus on problems in methodologies and sources for each period as relevant for doing research on women and Islamic cultures. They are not reviews of events, the state of Islam, or the conditions of women in the period covered, but rather evaluations of the methodological and epistemological problems in the study of women in the period covered.

B. Disciplinary Thematic Entries

Disciplinary thematic entries focus on the problems of methods and sources specific to their disciplines. Authors were asked to evaluate the epistemological assumptions of their disciplines and how these have affected the field of study, the study of women and Islamic cultures within their disciplines.

Volumes II-VI: General Entries

This section, the bulk of the Encyclopedia, consists of the alphabetized substantive entries, organized by Thematic Volumes.