From Power to Pleasure: Homosexuality in the Arab-Muslim World from Lakhi’a to al-mukhannathun

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

It is really an excellent rigorous and original paper. It is a well-written and cogently argued article. Its sources are diverse and its citations are skillfully woven into the fabric of the arguments. The analysis of the interplay between the philological reading of Islamic corpus and pre-Islam one concerning homosexuality and an anthropological reading of a text is done with subtlety and sophistication. I am so impressed with the translation from classical Arabic into English and how accurate and eloquent it is. Despite its rigor, the work needs the following:

- A section in the conclusion where the main findings are summarized with some extrapolations. Extrapolation has been done but in a few sentences. I recommend to be extended.

- As the debate is interdisciplinary, scholars should be qualified for their academic background. For instance, on page 5, the author wrote “Conservative scholar Mobeen Vaid”, they should say a “public intellectual who comes, specialized in Islamic studies”

- All historical figures should have their date of birth and death (in Hejeer and/or CE). (Eg. Ibn Hazm (994 –1064))

- Page 5: Replace Islamic religion with Islam.

 

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

here you will find in attachment our point by point response to the reviewers' comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

I appreciated the opportunity to review the manuscript and read the manuscript with a lot of interest. The subject of the article, i.e., homosexuality in the Arab-Muslim world, is important and absolutely warrants greater scholarly attention and consideration. Referring to Muslim scriptural texts, the authors attempt to reveal the prevalence of, and the meanings associated with homosexuality in the pre-Islamic and early Islamic periods. A strength of the manuscript is that the authors refer to some significant examples that demonstrate the prevalence of male same-sexual sexual behaviors and practices. The various interpretations of the story of Lot and the analysis of mukhannathun are important and the authors explore these topics in much detail.

Despite the importance of the topic and the above mentioned strengths of the manuscript, there are some issues with the manuscript. The manuscript needs to be revised before it can be published in a peer-reviewed scholarly journal.

Below, I provide some feedback that I hope will be useful to the author as he/she/they further develop/revise the manuscript.

 

Writing: There are significant issues with the writing. Some of the sentences are awkwardly worded and grammatically incorrect and need to be reworded for greater clarity. I also recommend the use of a professional editor who can go over and do a careful line-by-line edit of the manuscript.

I appreciated the use of sub-headings in the manuscript, as these sub-headings are useful in orienting the reader to the larger issue being discussed in a specific section. It might also be useful for the authors to end each section of the manuscript with a short paragraph summarizing the main points made in the section.

The authors should also explicitly state how each subsequent section demonstrates a progression in the argument that they are making.

 

Language of male same-sex sexual identities and practices

The authors, quite problematically, persist in using western and modern categories of same-sex sexual identities, practices and intimacies to interpret and analyze classic texts. For example, the authors use the terms such as “coming out” on page 2, “sexual orientation” on page 5, or the “theology of liberation of homosexuals” also on page 5. Equally, framing homosexual practices in terms of identity represent a western framework to consider same-sex sexual subjectivities and practices.

As noted in the literature the authors cite in the Introduction, it is problematic to transpose western categories onto non-western and historical contexts. I would ask the authors to consider using a different language, one that is not rooted in genealogies of same-sex sexual identities and practices but speaks to indigenous and local classifications of sexuality.

The authors’ analysis of mukhannathun through the lens of Arab-Muslim cultures and histories is notable and more compelling because the authors here use local vocabularies rather than western categories.

 

Situating the research within particular bodies of scholarship: It would appear that authors are situating their work within the scholarship on male same-sex sexualities during the pre-Islamic and early Islamic periods, notably Kugle (2010) and Vaid (2017). I am not sure if this is enough.

The authors refer to some studies of male same-sex sexual identities and practices in contemporary Arab-Muslim world to note the continuities between the historical and the contemporary periods. It would strengthen and also add greater depth and complexity to the analysis if the authors were to engage more fully with the scholarship on contemporary male same-sex sexual identities and practices in the Arab-Muslim world.  

Relatedly, the authors state that they will not engage with postcolonial debates around the imposition of western categories of sexuality to interpret homosexuality in Islamic scriptural texts, or the literature on cultural constructions of sexuality in the social sciences such as anthropology and sociology. It is a mistake on the part of the authors to not engage with this interdisciplinary scholarship if only because it would allow the authors to situate their work and their intervention within specific and important bodies of scholarship.

Finally, the authors should push their analysis a bit further to more fully illuminate the significance of their research. 

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

here you will find in attachment our point by point response to the reviewers' comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Beyond the feedback shared previously, I do not have any comments on the manuscript or further suggestions for the authors.