Dr Rehana Parveen

Dr Rehana Parveen

Birmingham Law School
Associate Professor
Assessment and Progress Lead

Contact details

Address
Birmingham Law School
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Rehana Parveen is a former solicitor and a former senior tutor at The University of Law. Rehana joined the University of Birmingham Law School in 2012 and completed her doctoral thesis exploring Muslim women’s experiences of using religious tribunals (shari’a councils) and comparing this to their experiences of using state law. Rehana currently works as a Senior Lecturer in the Law School, teaching on a wide range of undergraduate and post graduate modules. Rehana is particularly interested in the developing relationship between English Family Law and Islamic Family Law and how women navigate these interacting frameworks. More recently Rehana has been exploring how legal concepts and structures may be decolonised to place them within their social, historical, political and postcolonial context.

Qualifications

  • LLB (Law)
  • LLM (Islamic Law) SOAS
  • Phd (University of Birmingham) ‘Do Shariah Councils Meet the Needs of Muslim Women?’
  • Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

Biography

Rehana  qualified as a solicitor in 1995 and has worked in both Birmingham and London. As a solicitor Rehana specialised in family law, criminal law and general litigation. In 1999 Rehana  became a partner in her own firm which she set up with another solicitor, in Tooting, London. Rehana continued to work as a partner until 2002, when she joined The University of Law teaching on a range of courses including the GDL, LPC and BPTC and also teaching a range of skills such as advocacy, client interviewing and drafting of court documents. Rehana joined the University of Birmingham Law School in 2012 and is currently employed as a Lecturer. Rehana teaches and leads on a range of modules including Legal Skills & Methods, Family Law, Equity & Trusts, Decolonising Legal Concepts & Islamic Family Law.

Teaching


  • Equity and Trusts (LLB)
  • Family Law 1: Adult Relationships
  • Legal Skills & Methods
  • Decolonising Legal Concepts
  • Islamic Family Law

Research

Rehana's research interests lie in exploring plurality of laws with particular emphasis on the development between English Family Law and Islamic Family Law. Rehana's doctoral thesis explored Muslim women's experiences of using shari'a councils when it came to matrimonial and family disputes and compared it to their experiences of civil courts in order to assess whether sharia'a councils meet the needs of Muslim women. Rehana uses her research to inform her teaching especially when thinking about the ways in which marginalised communities interact with state law and how state law and religious frameworks interact and shape one another. Rehana's research has been at the heart of her research-lead teaching and informs her approaches to understanding how law can be both transformative and exclusionary. 

Publications

Recent publications

Article

Parveen, R 2018, 'Religious-only Marriages in the UK: Legal Positionings and Muslim Women's Experiences', Sociology of Islam , vol. 6, no. 3, pp. 316.

Chapter

Parveen, R 2020, From Regulating Marriage Ceremonies to Regulating Marriage Ceremonies. in R Akhtar (ed.), Cohabitation and Religious Marriage: Status, Similarities and Solutions. Bristol University Press.

Parveen, R 2017, Do Sharia Councils Meet the Needs of Muslim Women. in S Bano (ed.), Gender and Justice in Family Law Disputes: Women, Mediation, and Religious Arbitration. Brandeis Series on Gender, Culture, Religion, and Law, Brandeis, pp. 1-37.

View all publications in research portal

Expertise

  • Islamic/Sharia law and its place in English law, particularly with regards to matrimonial and family disputes