Beginning in Fall 2004, noted scholar of Islamic law Asifa Quraishi has become a member of the University of Wisconsin Law School faculty. Quraishi brings expertise ranging from U.S. law on federal court practice to constitutional legal theory, with a comparative focus in Islamic law.
At the UW Law School, Quraishi will teach a combination of core law school classes and other classes focused particularly on the topic of Islamic law, comparative legal systems and related subjects.
Quraishi received her B.A. in Legal Studies from the University of California-Berkeley in 1988. In 1992, she received her law degree from the University of California-Davis, where she served as Senior Research Editor for the UC-Davis Law Review. She subsequently earned an LL.M. degree from Columbia Law School , and a Doctor of Juridical Studies degree at Harvard Law School is nearing completion. Her professional experience includes serving as a Judicial Law Clerk with Judge Edward Dean Price on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California and as the death penalty law clerk for the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Quraishi made news in 2001 when she drafted a clemency appeal brief in the case of Bariya Ibrahim Magazu, who was sentenced to flogging for fornication in Zamfara, Nigeria. Quraishi is a founding member of the National Association of Muslim Lawyers (NAML) and the California group American Muslims Intent on Learning and Activism (AMILA). She is a member of the Muslim Women's League, and has served as president and board member of Karamah: Muslim Women Lawyers for Human Rights.
Quraishi's Harvard dissertation is titled "Relativity: A Comparison of American and Islamic Law and Legal Theory." She co-edited with Frank Vogel the forthcoming book The Islamic Marriage Contract: Case Studies in Islamic Family Law, and she is the author of the article "No Altars: An Introduction to Islamic Family Law in U.S. Courts" for the volume Islamic Family Law, published in 2003 by Zed Books.
Quraishi also served as an Islamic law and culture consultant for the JAG episode "The Princess and the Petty Officer."
For more information about Professor Quraishi, see the following Web sites:
http://www.crescentlife.com/articles/rape_laws.htm
http://www.amila.org/comments.php?id=40_0_1_0_C
http://www.islamfortoday.com/americanmuslimwomenopportunities.htm
http://www.karamah.org/news_landmark_whitehouse.htm
Submitted by on July 7, 2004
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