Nilüfer Göle is Director of Studies at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) in Paris, and formerly Professor of Sociology at Bogazici (Bosphorous) University in Istanbul. A prominent Turkish scholar, Professor Göle is a leading authority on the political movement of today's educated, urbanized, religious Muslim women. She is the author of The Forbidden Modern: Civilization and Veiling, which examines the complex relationships among modernity, religion, and gender relations in the Middle East. Her sociological approach, employing a number of personal interviews, allows for both a detailed case study of young Turkish women who are turning to the tenets of fundamental Islamist gender codes, and for a broader critique of Eurocentrism and the academic literature regarding the construction of meaning. Both perspectives serve as a springboard for the launching of theoretical innovations into feminist, religious, cultural, and area studies.