Background

Nimat Hafez Barazangi was born on November 19, 1943 in Damascus, Syrian Arab Republic. She is a daughter of Husni Al-Hafez, a lawyer, and Thanya Al-Hafez, a teacher.

Education

Nimat Barazangi received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy and Sociology at Damascus University, Damascus, Syria in 1967.

She attended the Teachers College, Columbia University, Upper Manhattan, New York City which she graduated from with a Master of Arts degree in Educational Psychology & Cognitive Development in 1972.

In 1988, Barazangi added to her degrees a Doctor of Philosophy in Curriculum Development, Islamic and Arabic Studies, and Adult/Community Education which she received at Cornell University, in Ithaca, New York.

Career

The main Nimat Barazangi’s activity is teaching: she was a teacher in many educational institutions, including public and private high schools in Damascus, Syria. From 1969 to 1986, she taught Arabic in New York City and Ithaca, New York. In 1975, she became a teacher-in-training at Tompkins Cortland Community College, Dryden, New York, United States and had held this post for one year. After, Nimat became a teacher intern. In 1977, she occupied the post of assistant teacher at Human Development and Family Studies Laboratory Nursery School in Cornell University, New York, United States and the same post in library at Cornell University libraries from 1972 till 1978.

In 1990, Nimat Barazangi had worked for five years as a guest lecturer: of religious studies (1990), at the Adult University in 1991, of Women’s Studies, of Gender and Global Change and of modern languages and linguistics in 1994-1995. From 1991, she works as a visiting fellow of Women’s Studies.

Barazangi was as well a lecturer of different disciplines: at King Ab-dulaziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia (1979-1980), of psychology in Ithaca College, Ithaca, New York (1990), of humanities and sciences in 1991 at Oxford University, Oxford, England.

In 1982, Nimat was a special skills teacher at Board of Cooperative Educational Services in Ithaca, New York and a consultant for youth camp at Muslim Student Association in Plainfield, Indiana, United States. A year later, she designed a program and was a chair of youth camp.

From 1986 to 1989, Barazangi had worked as a fundraiser and coordinator for A1 Faruqi’s Islamic and Arabic Book Collection Cornell Libraries at CRESP Alternative Library and Ithaca High School Library, all Ithaca, New York.

She started to work as a visiting scholar at Higher Institute of Applied Sciences and Technology in Damascus, Syria in 1995.

A year later, Barazangi organized the Arab American women’s lecture series in U.S. American Cultural Center, Damascus, Syria.

Except teaching, Nimat Barazangi worked as a guest speaker and contributor to academic panels and workshops, as volunteer for political and community organizations.

From 1995, she works as mentor of Arab American University Graduate Faculty Mentor Program.

On July 17, 2010, Nimat Barazangi was Invited at the California Commonwealth Club, San Francisco with the lecture "Why Muslim Women Must Reinterpret the Qur’an. Two years after, she accepted the invitation to teach at the University of Vienna (Christian-Islamic Summer University).

Nimat Barazangi was an editor and contributor to many books about Muslim womens' rigths, gender problems and Islamic Identity, including The Muslim Family in North America (1991), The Muslims of America, edited by Yvonne Haddad (1991), Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World, Volume 1 (Oxford University Press, 1995), Family and Gender Among American Muslims: Issues Facing Middle Eastern Immigrants and Their Descendants (Temple University Press, 1996), The Politics of Participation: Muslim Women and the Beijing Platform (Syracuse University Press, 1997), Women and Family in Islamic and Judaic Societies, edited by Seth Ward (1997), Windows of Faith: Muslim Women’s Scholarship-Activism in the United States (Syracuse University Press, 1999). She also contributed to different periodicals, such as Al-Ittihad Journal of Islamic Studies, American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences, Arab Studies Quarterly, Asso-ciation for Middle East Women’s Studies Newsletter, Islamic Horizons, Journal of the Institute of Muslim Minority Affairs, Muslim Education Quarterly, and Religion and Public Education.

Barazangis' latest publications are Why Muslim Women are Re-interpreting the Qur’an and Hadith: A Transformative Scholarship-Activism (2013, editions Feminism, Law and Religion, Ashgate Publishing series, Gender in Law, Culture and Society), The Absence of Muslim Women in Shaping and Developing Islamic Thought (2009, Theological Review), The Absence of Muslim Women in Shaping Islamic Thought: Foundations of Muslims’ Peaceful and Just Co-existence (2008-2009, Journal of Law and Religion).

Achievements

• Nimat Barazangi published over 50 research articles, book reviews, edited journals and three monographs both in Arabic and English: Woman's Identity and Rethinking the Hadith (2015), Woman's Identity and the Qur'an: A New Reading (2004), the edited Arabic translation, Qira'a Jadidah lil Qur'an: al Huwiyah al Dhatiyah lil Mara'a (2007).
  
  During his career, Barazangi received several grants, including two grants from International Council for Adult Education (1993-1996), one of which was for Collaborative Research with Pakistan Association of Continuing and Adult Education (1993), and from the Consortium for Language Teaching and Learning (1995).

Works

More photos

• book

  • Woman's Identity and the Qur'an: A New Reading

    (An original study of the Qur'anic foundations of women’s ...)

    2004
  • Woman’s Identity and Rethinking the Hadith (Islamic Law in Context) 2017
  • Islamic Identity and the Struggle for Justice 1996

Membership

Nimat Barazangi was a chairperson of Early Childhood Education Committee and a member of such organisations as Islamic Society of North America, Association of Muslim Social Scientists of the United States and Canada, North American Council of Muslim Women, Georgetown Muslim Women Study Group.

She also occupied the post of vice-president of different associations, including American Association of Teachers of Arabic, American Association for Teaching and Curriculum, American Association of Educational Research, American Association for Adult and Continuing Education, Association for Middle East Women’s Studies, Association for Religion and Intellectual Life, Middle East Studies Association of North America, Association of Arab American University Graduates, New England Child Language Association, Ithaca School District Curriculum Council, Ithaca High School Parent-Teacher Association.

She was a visiting fellow of Centre for Islamic Studies at Oxfrod University in 1994.

• at Oxfrod University

  Centre for Islamic Studies , United Kingdom

  1994

• International Women’s Rights Action

  1982 - 1984

• chairperson of Early Childhood Education Committee

  Islamic Society of North America

  1982 - 1984

• member of Education Committee

  Islamic Society of North America

  1988 - 1991

• member of executive committee

  Association of Muslim Social Scientists of the United States and Canada

  1989 - 1991

• founding member

  North American Council of Muslim Women

  1992

• advisory board member

  Georgetown Muslim Women Study Group

  1997

Interests

• reading, travel, activism

Connections

In 1967, Nimat Barazangi married Muawia Barazangi. They have one child whose name is Nobl.

Father:

Hushi Al-Hafez

Mother:

Thanya Al-Hafez

husband:

Muawia Barazangi

Son:

Nobl Barazangi

colleague:

M. Raquibuz Zaman

He was one of the editors of Islamic Identity and the Struggle for Justice.

colleague:

Omar Afzal

He was one of the editors of Islamic Identity and the Struggle for Justice.