The Caged Virgin

The Caged Virgin

The Caged Virgin: A Muslim Woman's Cry for Reason, also published as The Caged Virgin: An Emancipation Proclamation for Women and Islam (first issued 2006) is the English translation of a book by the former Dutch parliamentarian Ayaan Hirsi Ali, De maagdenkooi (2004). In this book Hirsi Ali discusses her own struggle with Islam, intended as a model how other Muslim women may achieve their own emancipation. In advising women how to address the divide between Western and Islamic thought, she draws on her firsthand knowledge of the Islamic world and the philosophical tradition originating in the Enlightenment.

Hirsi Ali contends that in Islamic regions Muslim women who seek solace and escape from Islam are typically threatened with death, and those Muslim women who do escape the "virgins' cage" are branded whores. The author discusses Islamic views on the role of women, the rights of individuals, the roots of Islamic fanaticism, and proposes Western policies toward Islamic countries and immigrant communities.