Islamic school for women aiming to transform thewomen who absorb its message into "pious" subjects. Established in theearly 1990s, Al-Huda is unique in its ability to attract a following amongthese women, a feat other religious groups have been unsuccessful inaccomplishing.In Transforming Faith, Sadaf Ahmad deftly explores how Al-Huda isfostering a new generation of educated, urban, middle-class women tobecome veiled conservatives. She offers an engrossing and sensitive accountof how the school's aggressive recruiting methods through informalreligious study groups and a one-year degree program combined with theschool's techniques of persuasive teaching methods have turned Al-Hudainto a social movement. As a woman of Pakistani origin, Ahmad offersan in-depth look at the students and members of Al-Huda in ways that acultural outsider would be excluded from doing. She reveals that althoughPakistani women are better educated than ever before they still face socialbarriers that limit them from working or pursuing further education.Ahmad's groundbreaking work demonstrates Al-Huda's ever-wideningteachings and influence in Pakistan and in its recent global extensions.More broadly, this book illuminates how Al-Huda uses the trappings ofmodernity to engage educated women in a kind of religious study thattransforms their ideology, behavior, and lifestyle within a particular Islamicframework. Because of Al-Huda's teachings, Pakistani society is changing,as is the rest of the Muslim world.

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