Sakdiyah Ma'ruf: Comedy Jihad Part D'eux
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Sakdiyah Ma'ruf: Comedy Jihad Part D'eux
Recognized with the BBC 100 Women award for her use of comedy to soften Islamic extremism and lessen violence against women
Winner of Václav Havel Prize for Creative Dissent 2015
“..has started what could be considered a comedy revolution”(Jakarta Post)
Much of Sakdiyah's comedy is about Islamic extremism; she has complained for nearly a decade after the introduction of democracy, “Indonesia has witnessed a significant growth of turban-wearing, beard-growing, loud-screaming Muslims encouraging the Islam that does not tolerate women and minorities to speak up.”[She has said that despite her upbringing, she enjoys American sitcoms more than televised da'wah.
I don't speak Arabic like most of my cousins, and I firmly think that ethnic purity that my community claims is nothing but hallucination as we are all actually mixed-blood having been living in Indonesia since the Colonial Era. In fact, it may also hurt our religiosity as I believe Allah created us free and equal and will not judge us, except for our obedience and devotion to Him.
Still, she wears a veil because she considers it liberating: it “counters impossible beauty standards. It asserts ownership over her own body.
Her use of the veil is also a way she resists the gravitational pull of the fashion industry, allowing her to focus on issues of justice, violence and equality
COMEDY JIHAD! is the title of her thesis (Master degree, UGM)