Fedwa Malti-Douglas | |
---|---|
Born | 1946 Lebanon |
Nationality | Lebanese-American |
Occupation(s) | professor and writer |
Fedwa Malti-Douglas (born 1946) is a Lebanese-American professor and writer. She is a professor emeritus at Indiana University Bloomington. [1] Malti-Douglas has written several books, including The Starr Report Disrobed (2000). She received a National Humanities Medal in 2015. [2]
Malti-Douglas grew up in Deir el-Qamar, where her father was a physician. [3] Her primary education took place at French Catholic boarding schools and at age 12, she emigrated to the United States. [3] She learned to become fluent in English and when she attended Cornell University, she started taking Semitic languages. [3] Malti-Douglas attended the University of California, Los Angeles and the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales where she did her graduate work in Arabic. [3]
Malti-Douglas received a 1997 Kuwait Prize for Arts and Letters and earned the Distinguished Scholar Award from the Dean of Women's Affairs at Indiana University Bloomington in 1998. [4] In 2004, she was inducted into the American Philosophical Society. [4] Malti-Douglas was awarded a National Humanities Medal in 2015. [5]
Malti-Douglas is a professor emeritus at Indiana University Bloomington and the Martha C. Kraft Professor of Humanities in the College of Arts and Sciences. [4]
Malti-Douglas studied Muslim literary texts from medieval to modern times and wrote about her findings in Women and Gender in Islam (1991). [6] She describes how women's bodies are increasingly seen as a threat in this literature. [6] Malti-Douglas wrote the second English language examination of the work of Nawal El Saadawi in 1995. [7] The work, Men Women and God(s): Nawal El Saadawi and Arab Feminist Poetics is a "penetrating and admiring analysis of El Saadawi's writing," according to Library Journal. [7] Men, Women and God(s) is also about showing that El Saadawi's work is literature, not just "polemics," as it is often labeled. [8]
In The Starr Report Disrobed (2000), Malti-Douglas deconstructs the issues surrounding the Bill Clinton sex scandal from a feminist perspective. [9] The California Law Review called The Starr Report Disrobed an "insightful and peppy book." [10] The journal also felt that the book highlighted another issue: legal document are no longer just for lawyers and jurists, but have become "salable media content and, ultimately, popular cultural artifacts." [10] The New York Times writes that Malti-Douglas deals with the differences between the facts in the case and the conclusions drawn by prosecutor, Kenneth Starr. [11]
In Medicines of the Soul: Female Bodies and Sacred Geographies in a Transnational Islam (2001), Malti-Douglas gives an analysis of three autobiographies belonging to Muslim women who became more religious. [12] Each of the women she studies have rejected the ideas of the "secular West." [13] Her book examines how men impact and guide the daily lives and even spiritual dreams of Muslim women. [12]
In 2008, Malti-Douglas edited the comprehensive reference book, The Encyclopedia of Sex and Gender, which cover topics about sex and gender through the fields of psychology, sociology, biology, religion and history. [14] Booklist wrote that "Bringing together a remarkable array of material, this set, which appears to be without competition, will no doubt succeed in providing information but also in creating dialogue around issues of sex and gender. [15]
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