Uncovering feminist views in 19th century Albanian's works | Knoxville Times

Uncovering feminist views in 19th century Albanian's works

Knoxville Times (ANI) Sunday 20th December, 2009

Washington, Dec 20 : An American academic has discovered some radical ideas on women's equality in the works of a Muslim author penned during 1872 to 1900.

The expert has written an article about his findings that will appear in the January 2010 issue of Middle Eastern Studies, a British academic journal published in London.

Dr. George Gawrych, a professor of history professor at Baylor University, reviewed the works of Albanian novelist and playwright Semseddin Sami Frasheri and found that he saw women as "equal but different."

This was a revolutionary point of view in the patriarchal society of the time.

Gawrych, who received a Fulbright Senior Researcher Scholar grant for 2008-2009, was in Turkey to study about Ataturk and the War of Independence waged from 1919 to 1923.

While studying about Albanians under Ottoman rule, Gawrych came across Semseddin Sami's ideas in an 1879 published book titled Women.

Gawrych went on to read Sami's novel on arranged marriages and reviewed entries about women in his six-volume encyclopaedia on the world.

Talking about Sami's thought, Gawrych said: "He was a Muslim who in his novel briefly gave an image of a wife having an education and discussing child-rearing with her husband.

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