To speak of women in Al-Andalus inevitably means speaking about the domestic realm. At this session, we will be delving deep into that little-known private world, and how it was shaped by women in particular. Cultural transmission by women and the way this knowledge was handed down will serve as the cornerstone around which the information and micro-stories of women in Al-Andalus will be discussed. With this goal in mind, a narrative will be woven about some of the activities which took place in their homes, along with the emotions felt in those places.

Dolores Serrano-Niza is a professor of Arabic Studies at the University of La Laguna, with an extensive career as a teacher, public informer and researcher, work which has been acknowledged in the form of several awards, including the fourth Ibn Al-Abbar Research Prize for her work The Lexicographical Project of Ibn Sidah (Onda, 1999) and a runner-up prize for the best popular science work at the 2009 Canary Islands Women’s Institute Awards for Women and Religions: Tensions and equilibriums in a historical relationship. She has served as director of the University Institute for Women’s Studies, and she helped promote the creation of Clepsydra: A Journal on Gender. She is the founder and coordinator of the “Gender and Humanities” (GENyHUM) Research Group at the University of La Laguna. At present, she is the deputy director of the Andrés Bello Institute for Linguistic Research at the University of La Laguna.

Image: Manuscript of “Hadith or Qissat Bayad wa Riyad,” thirteenth century, Apostolic Library of the Vatican City, Vat. ar.368. Scene from the musical evening presided over by the Sayyida, seated on a polychrome wooden platform with geometric patterns; Riyad plays the lute, surrounded by the other slave girls. The elderly woman appears with her head covered, beside Bayad, wearing a turban.