Feminist Perspectives On Terrorism

This book explores terrorism and security issues from feminist perspectives, putting gender and androcentrism at the heart of its analysis. It argues against traditional research approaches to political violence, and terrorism in particular, that are dominated by the “male-gaze” and individual stereotypes and perspectives, and that feminist approaches offer a fresh perspective on security research. Our current understanding of political violence is primarily based on the experiences of men, and as such, the challenge in terrorism and radicalization research is to demonstrate that women’s studies on security and terrorism satisfy certain universal criteria. The author shows how a post-positivist approach can be useful in gaining insights into terrorism and violent extremism, and how to address these phenomena. The book presents theoretical foundations based on various feminist assumptions, and exposes the essence of feminism, its conceptual grid, gender variabilities and the developments in feminist thinking and theory. Furthermore, it discusses the trends in feminist epistemology, and explains female radicalization to terrorist activity, the specificity of female terrorism, and the roles of women in deradicalization processes, as well as their impact on counterterrorism policy. The book concludes that gender difference as a constitutive variable of social reality is of key importance in studies on terrorism and counterterrorism.

Traditional academic investigations of war seldom link armed conflict to practices of racialization or gendering. War and Terror: Feminist Perspectives provides a deeper understanding of the raced-gendered logics, practices, and effects of war. Consisting of essays originally published in Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society, this volume offers new insights into the complex dynamics of violent conflict and terror by investigating changing racial and gender formations within war zones and the collateral effects of war on race and gender dynamics in the context of two dozen armed struggles. Seldom-studied subjects such as the experiences of girl soldiers in Sierra Leone, female suicide bombers, and Pakistani mothers who recruit their sons for death missions are examined; women's agency even under conditions of dire constraint is highlighted; and the complex interplay of gender, race, nation, culture, and religion is illuminated in this wide-ranging collection.

Rhonda Hammer's Antifeminism and Family Terrorism presents original and provocative critical feminist perspectives on violence against women and children. Hammer provides a clear and insightful analysis of the current rhetoric produced by antifeminists who would deny the seriousness of the problem and thus undercut important feminist concerns. Dr. Hammer documents the tragic dimensions of the brutalization of women and children in the family, and the larger problem of the increasing poverty and oppression of women and children in the global economy.

This book offers a transnational feminist response to the gender politics of torture and terror from the viewpoint of populations of color who have come to be associated with acts of terror. Using the War on Terror in Afghanistan and Iraq, this book revisits other such racialized wars in Palestine, Guatemala, India, Algeria, and South Africa. It draws widely on postcolonial literature, photography, films, music, interdisciplinary arts, media/new media, and activism, joining the larger conversation about human rights by addressing the problem of a pervasive public misunderstanding of terrorism conditioned by a foreign and domestic policy perspective. Deb provides an alternative understanding of terrorism as revolutionary dissent against injustice through a postcolonial/transnational lens. The volume brings counter-terror narratives into dialogue with ideologies of gender, race, ethnicity, nationality, class, and religion, addressing the situation of women as both perpetrators and targets of torture, and the possibilities of a dialogue between feminist and queer politics to confront securitized regimes of torture. This book explores the relationship in which social and cultural texts stand with respect to legacies of colonialism and neo-imperialism in a world of transnational feminist solidarities against postcolonial wars on terror.

When the Twin Towers in New York were hit by planes, the Western world stood in shocked silence. Then came the commentary: the endless news reports and replays. Some women spoke out, some wrote for newspapers, some for e-mail lists and the internet. But in the mass of voices it was hard to find women's perspectives.This collection of writing by women activists worldwide-including Barbara Ehrenreich, Arundhati Roy, Robin Morgan, Ani di Franco, Barbara Kingsolver, Naomi Klein, Rigoberta Menchu Tum, and Canadian president of the NAC, Sunera Thobani-brings together the voices of women to discuss war, terrorism, fundamentalism, racism, global capitalism and violence. From the United States to Afghanistan, from Lebanon to Bangladesh, from Australia to Europe, they have deconstructed the story of September 11 and retold it from a feminist perspective, providing a powerful indictment of current global politics."After Shock represents an essential contribution to the vast literature spawned by the events of that day in New York." -Canadian Woman Studies.

After September 11, feminists around the world spoke out, wrote for newspapers, for email lists and for the Internet. But in the male-dominated media, it was hard to find feminist perspectives. This collection brings together women who discuss the connections between war, terrorism, fundamentalism, racism, global capitalism and male violence.

Analyzing women labeled as terrorists in the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Gender and the Political examines Western cultural constructions of the female terrorist. The chapters argue that the development of the discourse on terrorism evolves in parallel with, and in response to, radical feminism in the US during this time.