Gendered orientalism and the agency of Syrian, Muslim women refugees

Orientalist discourses have long recirculated the idea that Muslim women are oppressed victims of Islam; an idea that has denigrated Muslims and positioned white, Christians as superior. For Muslim women refugees specifically, the gendered orientalist discourse of victimization has reappeared on both sides of the debate on Syrian refugee resettlement in the United States (U.S.) (and other Western states). Within anti-resettlement circles, the narrative of Muslim women as oppressed victims has been leveraged as a reason to stop Syrian refugee resettlement; based on a rationale that their lifestyles and values are incompatible with liberal, Western societies. Pro-resettlement circles, on the other hand, often position Muslim women's victimization as a reason to resettle them, because these women need to be 'saved' from both war and gender oppression. In other words, the same homogenizing essentialism that positions Muslim women as victims has been used to both reject and to support Muslim refugee resettlement. Yet the representations of Muslim women as oppressed victims of Islam exist in stark contrast to the strong, capable, and resilient Syrian Muslim women refugees scattered across Southwest Asian and North African (SWANA), Europe, the U.S., and elsewhere. Building from postcolonial and feminist literature, I illustrate the ways that gendered orientalism has fueled both sides of the Syrian refugee resettlement debate. Then, I review literature on Islamic feminism and Muslim women's agency, noting its divergences from mainstream Western feminism. Lastly, drawing from interviews I conducted with Syrian Muslim women refugees in Jordan, I highlight the disconnect between the discourses on Syrian refugees in the U.S. and the lives of these women who are coping with the traumas of war and displacement with incredible strength and determination; and they have done so in part through their faith.