ABSTRACT
Author’s narrative As a Muslim woman growing up in pre-and post-apartheid South Africa, my main interest in, and contribution to, Muslim affairs, especially in relation to health, were as a member of school and community health committees and, eventually, through my professional life as a nurse and nurse educator. I come from a family where living Islamic values (for example, in trusting and compassionate relations with others and constant striving for excellence) was first in every context whether at home, school, on the sports field, at university or in the workplace. Only later in my professional life did I realise that I was classified as a South African coloured (although my great-grandparents came from India and the Netherlands). It was this combination of identity and professional interest that prompted me to ascertain more about the significance of identity groups by exploring why young girls in my chosen faith community do not seemingly embrace a healthy lifestyle (Phillips 2006; Walseth 2006: 85). In my own schooling experiences, I remember several Muslim girls in my class and other classes participating reluctantly in physical-education activities at school. Community provision in my area for young girls in sporting activities is poor, making
the school arena particularly important. In Phillips’ 2006 study into activity patterns of adolescent girls, including Muslim girls, in four high schools in the Strand area where I live, the results indicated inadequate activity levels to influence health in a positive way, but few reasons for this were explored. I became interested, consequently, in the factors that encourage or constrain South African Muslim girls’ participation in physical activities. The purpose of the study reported in this chapter was to identify and explore the opportunities and challenges of Muslim girls’ experiences of physical education and school sport in relation to religious and cultural influences in their lives. The case study, conducted in two schools in the Western Cape Province, was based on the following three research questions:
• What are the opportunities and constraints that Muslim girls encounter in performing physical education?
