The project’s contribution of the project to the field are visible in the following aspects. First, this project has extended the state-of-the-art by covering an area little addressed, namely religiously-inspired judicial activism in the field of Muslim family law. In particular, little scholarly attention has been devoted to how contemporary judges use uncodified Islamic doctrines in areas where legislation is silent. Instead, scholarly literature tends to posit that fiqh as compiled in the traditional legal manuals is still applied in these areas of law. Hence, the project filled a gap in scholarly literature by looking at how judges with civil law training invoke Quran, hadith, and uncodified fiqh with a view to legitimate their decisions. Second, another major trend in scholarship is to focus on women’s rights in Muslim family law, as opposed to the more encompassing concept of gender. Using gender as an analytical lens, the project sheds light on the gender implication of judicial activism within the context of the 2011 uprising. Third, another focal point is the issue is the question of gender and judicial authority. While adjudication in Muslim courts has long been a predominantly male exercise, the last decades have seen a significant increase in the appointment of women to the bench in Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East and South (East) Asia. Hence, women are an increasingly significant voice among the judiciary. The project enriched and added new aspects to a growing literature on women in the judiciary in the context of the Middle East and North-Africa. Fourth, in addition to offering thick description of working styles and individual decisions, the project innovated by venturing beyond the rule-governed and processual paradigm which has influenced much scholarship on shari‘a in practice by looking at Egyptian male and female judges’ relations with power and comparison with other Muslim jurisdictions such as Indonesia, Kuwait, Malaysia, Morocco, Palestine, Syria, and Tunisia. Through dissemination and public outreach, the work carried out has contributed to raising to improve understanding of Islamic law by emphasizing how contemporary judges on Muslim courts invoke the language of Islam in novel ways with a view to legitimate judicial decisions. Results emerging from the project also be of interest to scholars working in the field of gender, history of religions, and sociology of law, as well as students. Additional journal articles which are currently under development using data collected during this fellowship will continue to achieve impact in coming years
