Reading: Infidel

My local library book group read Infidel for its March selection. While the book is not about Kenya, per se, many of the chapters are set in Nairobi and others in its neighboring countries. A memoir written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the book tells her story, that of a Somali woman who comes of age in Nairobi and wrestles – in Kenya, Somalia, and Holland – with the impact the fundamentalist Muslim culture in which she was raised has on the lives of women.

Infidel is a controversial book. Publishers Weekly (253, no. 50, December 18, 2006: 57) is among those that consider it a significant contribution: Hirsi Ali "delivers a powerful feminist critique of Islam informed by a genuine understanding of the religion." However, Ian Buruma in the New York Times Sunday Book Review (March 4, 2007) finds her descriptions of western life so idealized as to resemble "a comic book." And Lorraine Ali in Newsweek (February 26, 2007) states, "Hirsi Ali is more a hero among Islamophobes than Islamic women" and "sounds as "single-minded and reactionary as the zealots she's worked so hard to oppose."

Hirsi Ali describes the limited choices available to women in her culture of origin, illustrated by her own struggle to accept an arranged marriage. Most disquieting were her explanations and anecdotes about shunning, physical abuse of children and women with honor killings the most extreme example, and female circumcision or, more accurately, "excision." In addition to the human rights issues she raises, Ali’s many examples of the Somali’s strong clan identification and lack of tolerance for differences within one’s own ethnic group gave me pause for reflection. There are parallels, certainly, in all cultures, although the societal mores regarding violence vary.

Ali’s contrast of her Somali and Kenyan peers, noting the different attitudes and codes for behavior borne out of Muslim and Christian beliefs, and her references to the significant poverty in areas of Nairobi are interesting to consider as we prepare to travel to the region.

Hirsi Ali spoke about the writing of this book, expanded on the issues addressed, and read passages in a sensitive and provocative On Point National Public Radio interview with Tom Ashbrook recorded on February 12, 2007 (43 minutes).

Claudia Daggett