Challenging Patriarchal Norms: A Critical Documentary Analysis of Gender Discourse in ‘Aisyiyah

Abstract

This article examines how 'Aisyiyah's official gender discourse has challenged, revised, and selectively retained patriarchal norms across four authoritative texts: Adabul Mar'ah fil Islam (1982), Pokok Pikiran 'Aisyiyah Abad Kedua (2015), Tuntunan Menuju Keluarga Sakinah (2016), and Risalah Perempuan Berkemajuan (2022). Rather than reviewing secondary literature, the study treats these documents as primary qualitative data. It combines qualitative document analysis with feminist critical discourse analysis to trace changes in the construction of women's dignity, religious agency, family authority, public leadership, economic autonomy, and exposure to structural violence. The findings reveal a clear diachronic movement. The 1982 text combines theological equality with biological essentialism, wife-centered obedience, and a strongly maternal allocation of domestic responsibility, even while opening education, politics, and judicial authority to women. The 2015 and 2016 texts recast equality as the absence of superiority and subordination, define women as khalifah and transformative leaders, and normalize participation in public institutions. The 2022 Risalah explicitly names misogyny, patriarchy, discrimination, violence, unequal wages, and barriers to political participation, while grounding reform in tajdid and interconnected bayani, burhani, and irfani reasoning. Nevertheless, gender-differentiated family scripts remain: the husband is still described as the principal bearer of qiwamah and economic responsibility, and women's care obligations retain exceptional weight. The article conceptualizes this pattern as negotiated progressive egalitarianism: an Islamic gender-reform project that expands substantive equality and institutional agency while continuing to negotiate inherited hierarchies within the family. The study demonstrates that official religious texts can function as original empirical material and provides a reproducible model for textual research in Islamic studies.