Visible Women in East Coast Malay Society: On the Reproduction of Gender in Ceremonial, School and Market. By Ingrid Rudie

Abstract

Reviewer: Nor Faridah Abdul Manaf, Department of E.nglish Language and Literature, International Islamic University Malaysia. Norwegian Professor Ingrid Rudie is not a new name in social anthropological research on Malay women. She has researched andpublished extensively on women in Islamic societies, changing roles of Malay village women and Malay female leadership. In the Visible Women in East Coast Malay Society, Rudie describes her research (done over the period of 8 months between visits in 1986 and 1988) as a follow-up study of her earlier research in Kelantan in 1964-5. The second study investigates changes in gender relations especially concerning women who in 1965, were seen as having wider and freer roles as wives, mothers and businesswomen. They owned, inherited, bought and sold land. They dominated the bazaar and had more say on family economy and family politics. As Rudie charts changes and development of Malay women in Kelantan in the 1960s and later 1980s, one is reminded of an assertion brought forth by Malaysian anthropologist, Professor Wazir Jahan Karim in her book Women and Culture: Between Malay Adat and Islam. Karim argues that the Malay ad at (custom/tradition) liberates Malay women and gives them freedom to say and act. Rudie seems to share this belief but observes that the long established customary laws favouring women continue to thrive despite the Islamic revival in the 1980s: