In Body and Spirit: Redefining Gender Complementarity in Muslim Southeast Asia

Abstract

This chapter examines ideas of sexual complementarity in formal Islamic discourses, and compares them to cultural perspectives of sexual equality in the Malay world of Southeast Asia based on adat or custom. It argues that Islam does not advocate sexual equality, since it highlights differences of biology, sex and function between men and women. In other words, Islam advocates gender complementarity more than equality, with differences in status and function based in political, jural and domestic leadership. However, the extent to which ideas of complementarity negate or promote women’s empowerment is a more important issue. A predominant indigenous view in Malay society, based on adat, is that the complementarity of sex and gender renders women their own sphere of influence and dominance, which can be as empowering as the public and political roles granted to men through both adat and Islam. This indigenous view opposes mainstream Western feminist theory which advocates gender equality as a necessary universal in modern society. Rather, the argument supports an alternative view that women are significantly empowered as long as they are able to interpret these differences to their advantage by continuing to innovate and take on greater roles in leadership, the economy, their communities and social life.