This book is unique in several ways. It is the product of unprecedented research collaboration
between a Muslim feminist female anthropologist (Ziba Mir-Hosseini), based and educated in the
West, and a Muslim feminist male cleric (Hujjat al-Islam Sayyid Muhsin Sa[ayin]id Zadih),
based and educated in Islamic seminaries in Iran. For the first time, the Qom seminary
(Hawzih)—the center of religious and political power of Shi[ayin]i
clerics—opened its doors to a feminist female scholar, letting her engage in a face-to-face
encounter on gender issues with several prominent Islamic ulema (clerical scholars). Much of the
book is a transcription of dialogues between Mir-Hosseini and eminent clerics in the Iranian
religious seminaries in the city of Qom. The central concern of these dialogues is the way religious
knowledge is produced in Shi[ayin]i Islam and the complex relationship among the believer,
religious authority, and political action.