Discussion aims to put Islam into perspective
Panel shares experiences of being a woman and growing up a Muslim
BY GLORIA STRAVELLI
Staff Writer

CHRIS KELLY staff Sarah Eltantawi (l-r), Mona Elsayed, Atiya Aftab and Zehra Cataltepe spoke at the “Muslim Women’s Perspective” panel discussion, sponsored at the Monmouth Beach Cultural Center April 12.

Growing up as a Arab-American Muslim doesn’t mean having to miss out on the fun and challenges of being a teenager, a high school senior told a panel discussion on the experience of Muslim women last week.

"The most important idea that I’ve adopted as I continue to develop ... is this: Islamic values and American lifestyle are by no means mutually exclusive," Mona Elsayed the panel on "Muslim Women’s Perspectives."

"I can live a life that is by every measure fun, normal and dynamic and still find direction through my religion, and that’s been a huge leap that I’ve had to take to understand that I can have both, I don’t need to choose," Elsayed said.

A first-generation Egyptian-American, Elsayed told those who attended the panel at the Monmouth Beach Cultural Center that her Muslim upbringing has shaped her youth and adolescence and profoundly affected the social arena of her life.

"In every stage of my life I’ve been conscious of my faith and I’ve been trying to find ways to incorporate my faith into my identify," Elsayed said.

The program was sponsored by the Northern Monmouth County Branch of the American Association of University Women and, in addition to Elsayed, the panelists consisted of Zehra Cataltepe, Fair Haven, a computer engineer who spoke on the education of Muslim women; Atiya Aftab, South Brunswick, an attorney who spoke on the concept of motherhood in Islamic culture; and Sarah Eltantawi, communications director for the Muslim Public Affairs Council in New York who spoke on the role of women in United States’ Muslim organizations.

Elsayed, 17, is a New Jersey native and is entering her senior year at Ranney School in Tinton Falls. Her parents immigrated to the United States from Egypt and worked at Bell Labs in Holmdel.

She said she became aware of the diversity of Muslims while attending weekend classes at an Arabic school.

"The diversity of the people I met in religion class each year gave me insight into what being a Muslim made me a part of," she recounted. "I was surrounded by kids from every imaginable Middle Eastern state, and with very different backgrounds came very different approaches to Islam. The older I got, the more evident it became that different cultural values resulted in different Islamic styles."

With help from her parents and other role models, she said she learned to discern true Islamic values. "As a kid, it was up to me … to sort out what were the real core values of Islam, what was at the heart of it, and what was just cultural, or rhetoric, or conservative values," she explained.

Her teachers explained that Islam can mean many things to different people.

"It’s a flexible religion and … I began to understand there were very conservative Muslims and very moderate ones and everything in between, and that was OK," Elsayed said. "It was just up to me to figure out where I fit in.

"Now I’m 17, I’m emerging as an adult, and my parents have made it their job to present to me their values and their religion and their culture and allow me to choose what combination of Islam and ‘vogue’ is right for me," she said.

"It’s taken some time to balance these two forces and welcome the dimension and vibrancy they bring to my life. Whatever I end up doing professionally, I plan to do it as an American, as a Muslim, as an Arab and as a woman, and I know now that these things can be compatible."

Cataltepe, a native of Turkey, is the mother of two and works at Siemens Corporate Research in Princeton. She came to the United States for graduate studies in computer science and earned a doctorate degree from the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, Ca.

The Fair Haven resident said she was relieved when data did not show a direct correlation between religious belief and low educational levels for women in most countries that are predominately Muslim.

"I was afraid I would find a report that would say religion and education are correlated so I went through the statistics and I could not find one ," she said.

Cataltepe based her findings on a report on gender parity in education — equal enrollment of boys and girls. The 2000 report funded by UNESCO is titled "The Education for All Global Monitoring Report."

According to the report, girls in 54 countries face discrimination in getting an education, with girls in sub-Saharan Africa, Pakistan, India and China particularly affected. The report said 57 percent of the estimated 104 million primary-age children out of school worldwide are girls.

But the study said girls outnumber boys in schools in some countries, including the United Arab Emirates.

Picking up on the data, Cataltepe said in Arab states like Iran, Iraq, Palestine, Algeria, Syria, Egypt, Tunisia and Saudi Arabia, which are 94 percent to 100 percent Muslim, statistics show that "women are getting as much education as men.

"I was surprised," she admitted. "What I’m trying to say is, an audit finds no direct correlation [between religion and gender disparity in education] and I’m very happy.

"I tried to see a pattern in the data. If you just look at religion you can’t deduce what the level of education will be for the men versus women." she said.

Other factors not mentioned in the report are more important influences on literacy, she said. These include whether the country is rural or urban, poor or wealthy, at peace and whether schooling is free, she explained.

"In rural countries, girls more need to know homemaking and agricultural skills rather than how to read," Cataltepe explained. "Maybe they don’t need to be as educated for survival. So in a rural country the chance that girls will be educated will be less than men.

"In a poor country, it’s a question of allocation of resources," she continued. "In most countries men take care of the family so more resources are devoted to educating boys.

"Peace is another factor," she noted. "If you have peace in a country, the people have a school to send their children to. Another factor is free education. If education in a country is not free, only a few with money can send their children to school."

Cataltepe also cited statistics on wage disparity for different Muslim countries. In Turkey, for men and women with the same educational level, women earn 97 percent of the salary earned by men. In Iran, the gender parity index is 78 percent. In the United States, Cataltepe noted, the index is at 68 percent.

"That tells you a lot," she said. "We think this is the most advanced country in the world but our women make only about 70 percent of what men make. It really affects the future of female children. If you know your daughter will make only 70 percent of what a man makes, do you want her to get a Ph.D or not?"