This reading-intensive seminar examines shifts in gender roles and expectations in the Middle East during the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The course begins with the importance of harem within Middle Eastern society, and traces Middle Eastern women's increasingly public presence in national movements, feminist activism, and peace protests as well as the impact of Western standards of marriage, child-rearing, beauty, and sexuality on gender roles. The course uses primary and secondary sources to analyze how gender identity is informed by religion and culture and grounded in specific historical moments.