[A] treasure trove of insightful accounts and research on Arab women who have been voluntarily and involuntarily speaking out after the Arab Spring in 2011. . . . The most exciting portions of this text are the glimpses into the inner workings of Arab culture. This accessible book is a must read.
~CHOICE
The collection derives its discursive strength from diverse testimonies of Arab women ranging across age, class, and education. Bad Girls of the Arab World distinguishes itself through its examination of the political and personal, private and public, intentional and imposed dichotomies that women in the Arab world must operate under as they attempt to reformulate their role in society.
~Middle East Journal
[Bad Girls of the Arab World] stands apart from the edited volume crowd. It includes, not only academic entries, but personal essays and reflections on art by their artists, all centered on the theme of transgression, or to put it in the language of Bad Girls of the Arab World itself, bad girls. And there is no one bad girl. Some bad girls of the Arab world use their linguistic and cultural heritage to empower them, some rail against them. Some ally themselves with the West, some don’t think about the West and the East as binaries, but rather, apply a complicated, nuanced worldview to their universes. However, all are allotted their agency.
~New Books Network
A most welcome contribution to the field of women's studies. It is relevant to courses that examine representations of women, post-colonial and transnational feminisms, and/or gender in Arab-majority countries.
~Resources for Gender and Women's Studies
The chapters in this book are varied in style, including personal experience, academic analysis and artistic contributions; they cover different Arab countries as well as Arab women abroad, different time periods and contexts, but they all converge on disputing, directly or implicitly, Orientalist notions that the oppression of Arab women is rooted in beliefs fundamental to Islam and Arab society.
~Jordan Times
This academic work explores both the symbolic statements and lived experience of Arab women who transgress social norms, whether intentionally or unintentionally…The strongest chapters break free from the bonds of academic jargon and present women in their full flesh-and-blood selves, often suffering greatly for their brave actions, sometimes with bodily manifestations.
~Al Jadid
The chapters [in Bad Girls of the Arab World] consistently demonstrate that the consequences of being labeled bad girls are stigmatization, exclusion, and violence. But often embedded in acts of speaking about oppression are acts of resistance...The strength of Bad Girls is prevalent not only in some of its analytic essays but in its inclusion of more creative styles of writing.
~Journal of Middle East Women's Studies
This will be a lovely, unusual, and energizing book to teach at the undergraduate level in Middle East and women’s studies courses. There is no other book like it or similar to it.
~Frances S. Hasso, Duke University, editor of the Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies and author of Consuming Desires: Family Crisis and the State in the Middle East
