Women of Science, Medicine and Management, Istanbul

by Ayshah Ismail The Foundation for Science Technology and Civilisation (FSTC), launched a new course in Istanbul, Turkey. Entitled "Women of Science Medicine and Management in Muslim Heritage", the course was in collaboration with Insan Gelisimi Ve Toplumsal Egitim Vakfi (iGETEV). The course aimed to focus attention on women who excelled in science, medicine and management within the Muslim Heritage.

FSTC launched a new course last week in Istanbul, Turkey. Entitled “Women of Science Medicine and Management in Muslim Heritage”, the course was in collaboration with Insan Gelisimi Ve Toplumsal Egitim Vakfi (iGETEV).

The course was organised by Zeynep Jane Louise Kandur, Necla Koytak and Tugba Ercan of iGETEV and was delivered by Professor Salim Al-Hassani, President of FSTC, over two separate workshops. The course aimed to focus attention on women who excelled in science, medicine and management within the Muslim Heritage. Over thousands of years, many women have left a mark on their societies, changing the course of history at times and influencing small but significant spheres of life at others, but unfortunately are omitted from school books

There is little known about this subject and it is hoped that in revealing some of the facts about these great women, there will be an opportunity for modern young ladies to re-perceive history and discover new female role models from Muslim civilisation. The course is hoped to commence a campaign to attract the attention of sponsors and researchers to the need for identifying and editing manuscripts related to this topic. It is said that there are 5 million Arabic manuscripts available worldwide, only around 50,000 of them are edited and only a small number of those relate to women.

One of the outcomes of the course would be to demonstrate that women living in earlier Muslim societies had better social status than in latter societies and were not the passive, oppressed, deprived and highly sexualised as painted by 19th century Western Orientalists.

Some of the course attendees with their Certificates of Completion

The course was attended by 18 ladies from a range of professional backgrounds who all spoke excellent English. Seven of them gave well-prepared presentations on women of their choice.

The course closed with a Certificate Ceremony where Professor Al-Hassani commented “We look forward with great anticipation to continue to work with iGETEV to deliver this and other courses”

(Middle Right to Left) Professor Salim Al-Hassani, President of FSTC and Professor Rafet Bozdogan, President of iGETEV with some of the course attendees at the Certificate Ceremony