ABSTRACT
This chapter examines how discourses of intensive motherhood are experienced by Muslim women in the Arab world and in the United States. It looks at how mothers of young children in Qatar and immigrant Muslim mothers of young children in the United States navigate the challenges associated with motherhood. The chapter suggests that for Muslim women, the task of negotiating these discourses is particularly complex, as they often have to also negotiate the confines of identities prescribed for them through the media and other popular culture sources and combat oppressive ideologies imposed upon them. In order to better understand Islamic influence on Muslim mothering, it is helpful to see how the Holy Quran and both Sunni and Shia religious texts address the role of the mother. Some research on mothering in Muslim cultures focused on how motherhood is part of the larger family dynamic.
