Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Fatima Seedat (Islamic scholar)


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep. Liz Read! Talk! 06:54, 15 October 2022 (UTC)

Fatima Seedat (Islamic scholar)

 * – ( View AfD View log | edits since nomination)

F ails WP:NACADEMICS, they have not won a major award, are not highly cited, are not a named chair, are not the editor of a major journal, and are not elected to a major socalry society.  Dr vulpes  (💬 • 📝) 07:37, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Withdrawn by nominator Article has massively improved and I withdraw my nomination. Good work everyone glad we were able to make some really great improvements here.  Dr vulpes  (💬 • 📝) 02:48, 14 October 2022 (UTC)


 * Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Academics and educators, Women, Islam,  and South Africa.  Spiderone (Talk to Spider) 08:22, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Delete Is she an Islamic scholar or a feminist-Islamic studies scholar? She doesn't seem to meet WP:GNG, and subjective criteria fails as Dr vulpes mentions. I wasn't able to find anything good on Google. ─ The Aafī   (talk)  09:52, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
 * I put (Islamic scholar) after her name because there is a South African Desi communist activist with the exact same name spelled the same way. Zaynab1418 (talk) 21:20, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep: The subject likely passes both WP:GNG and WP:ACADEMIC. The subject is a senior lecturer, a tenured position equivalent to an associate professor in the US system, she has a number of news mentions, a very considerable number of book mentions in relation to her expertise in the intersection of Islam and gender studies, including 14 separate mentions in the The Routledge Handbook of Islam and Gender, 4 mentions in the The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Law and 3 mentions in Women and Gender in the Qur'an and a great number of published academic papers and scholarly mentions/citations (180 total works). In The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Law (p.86), her "scholarly investigation of gendered legal subjecthood" is mentioned alongside the work of Judith E. Tucker, Kecia Ali and Marion Katz - all highly influential professors in Islam/gender and company that Fatima Seedat would not be numbered among unless she was a serious scholar in the field whose views on the topic stand toe-to-toe with those of more senior peers. Iskandar323 (talk) 19:17, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
 * @Dr vulpes: Particularly in light of your nomination for the arbitration committee, and in the spirit of admitting your mistakes, I would like you to reconsider this nomination based on the information that I have collated above. I think it is now clear that the subject is very frequently referenced in her field. Iskandar323 (talk) 09:29, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Full disclosure I am not running for ArbCom, I'm running to help aid the election for the next round of ArbCom members.
 * I have often and proudly admitted my mistakes here. There are AfDs (Bloody Elbow) where I've shifted from delete to keep. Let's compromise and work to improve this project. Add those sources to the article and if it passes WP:NACADEMICS I'll vote keep as I have before. This isn't a demand on you or anything. If the article isn't improved someone else will come along later and AfD it. I'm an academic but not an expect in South African, Islamic, Feminist studies. Does that sound fair @Iskandar323?  Dr vulpes  (💬 • 📝) 09:47, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
 * @Dr vulpes: I will certainly look to improve it when I find time, but notability should be based on the sourcing and information available, not solely the information as presented in an article. I am fully aware that this article is sub-par and I can certainly appreciate how a fairly casual inspection might tend some editors towards deletion. I am myself a bit of a deletionist, but in this instance, I wonder if a fully appreciative WP:BEFORE sweep was performed. Iskandar323 (talk) 09:57, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
 * @Iskandar323 Would you be ok with sending it to draft until these issues are fixed? I have AfC privileges and am willing to review it if it's improved and then sent to AfC. Just ping me when it's ready and I'll take care of it. Thanks for being cool and accommodating about this whole process  Dr vulpes  (💬 • 📝) 10:06, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
 * @Dr vulpes: I don't mind if it is drafted, though it's a fairly inoffensive stub + bibliography at present, so I don't really see what harm it is doing in mainspace where other potential contributors can find it. But either way, don't we procedurally first need this AfD to be closed? Iskandar323 (talk) 12:48, 9 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Keep at minimum per WP:BASIC - my initial research at the WP Library and additions to the article indicate that she is cited and discussed as a scholar and activist, and WP:AUTHOR notability may also have support with additional research. I object to draftification per the available sources and WP:NEXIST. While it may take some time to sort through and add sources, this is due to the volume of apparent support for notability, not because her notability appears to be WP:TOOSOON. Beccaynr (talk) 17:18, 9 October 2022 (UTC)


 * Keep - I don't know if I can vote because I'm the creator of the article. Fatima Seedat is one of the most well known South African Muslim feminist academics along with Sa'diyya Shaikh, and one of the three most famous South African Muslim feminists with Sa'diyya Shaikh and Shamima Shaikh (who both have Wiki articles). She has a new edited volume coming out this year, The Women's Khutbah Book: Contemporary Sermons on Spirituality and Justice from Around the World (2022). She has two khutbahs in this book. She and Sa'diyya are heading a new masters in Islam, Gender, and Sexuality at the University of Cape Town. Seedats work is discussed in The Oxford Handbook of Islamic law (2018), Queer Muslim diasporas in contemporary literature and film (2019), Women and Gender in the Qur'an (2020), Peaceful Families: American Muslim Efforts against Domestic Violence (2019), Muslim Women and Gender Justice: Concepts, Sources, and Histories (2019), Routledge Handbook of Islam in the West (2022), and The Routledge Global History of Feminism (2022). Her work must be reasonably influential to be cited in Routledge and Oxford reference texts on Islam or feminism. These are major books by famous academic publishers and well-known Islamic studies academics such as Celene Ibrahim and Juliane Hammer. These are all recent citations.
 * She is cited in Veiled Superheroes: Islam, Feminism, and Popular Culture (2017) by Sophia Rose Arjana, Divine Words, Female Voices: Muslima Explorations in Comparative Feminist Theology (2018) by Jerusha Lamptey, and Islamic Feminism and the Discourse of Post-Liberation: The Cultural Turn in Algeria (2020) by Marnia Lazreg. Again, well-known Islamic studies scholars.
 * She has a chapter in Surfacing: On Being Black and Feminist in South Africa (2021). She is one of two non-Black/coloured women featured along with Sa'diyya, which must indicate some importance given how many other women could have been featured. The other contributors include Panashe Chigumadzi, Sisonke Msimang, Zoë Wicomb, Yewande Omotoso, Gertrude Fester, Zethu Matebeni, Zukiswa Wanner, Makhosazana Xaba,Yvette Abrahams, and Patricia McFadden. Almost all the women in this volume have Wiki articles. They are major SA feminists indicating Sadat is considered one as well, so she's logically worthy then of a Wiki entry.
 * The book Complexities of Spiritual Care in Plural Societies discusses her work as an imam. It's extremely rare for a woman to act as an imam or give a khutbah. I don't know of any other book that has collected women's khutbahs. It is literally the first of its kind. Other women who have acted as imams like amina wadud, Edina Leković, Raheel Reza, Halima Krausen, and Sherin Khankan have Wiki entries.
 * It's the nature of her being from a non-Western nation and working in a subset of an already small field that she just won't have as many citations as, say, an American economist. However, her article "Islam, feminism, and Islamic feminism: Between inadequacy and inevitability" has 112 citations on Google scholar. When Islam and Feminism Converge has 77 on Google Scholar. Zaynab1418 (talk) 20:22, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Her article "Islam, feminism, and Islamic feminism" is also translated into Indonesian published as a book, Islam Feminisme dan Islam Feminis translated by Dhika Marcendy. Zaynab1418 (talk) 21:00, 10 October 2022 (UTC)


 * keep per explanations i read above, and references present in the article the subject is notable. —— 🌸 Sakura emad 💖 (talk) 20:40, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Comment I'm not convinced about her notability based on the sources. I've consulted an academic in a closely related field for a "gut feel" on this one before I consider the sources and vote, but I doubt she meets WP:GNG. We may need to look to WP:ACADEMIC and look for better sources. Another thing to keep in mind is WP:OTHER and WP:INN: we can't justify the existence of this article based on the fact that other similar articles exist. Park3r (talk) 02:56, 12 October 2022 (UTC)
 * As the creator of the article, if it's ultimately decided she is not notable, then I want to ask for it to be moved into the draft space. She has a new book coming out, she is fairly young, and her citations are very recent. Zaynab1418 (talk) 19:28, 13 October 2022 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.