Al-Shabaab: why women join the Islamist militant group

The Conversation Weekly podcast is taking a short break in August. For the next few weeks we'll be bringing you extended versions of a few of our favourite interviews from the past few months.

This week, we speak to Fathima Azmiya Badurdeen, lecturer in the department of social sciences at the Technical University of Mombasa, who interviewed Kenyan women about why they joined the militant Islamist group Al-Shabaab. She explains how she gained the trust of these women and their families, and what her findings mean for their rehabilitation.

This episode of The Conversation Weekly features an extended version of an interview first published on April 22. The Conversation Weekly is produced by Mend Mariwany and Gemma Ware, with sound design by Eloise Stevens. Our theme music is by Neeta Sarl. You can sign up to The Conversation’s free daily email here. Full credits for this episode available here.

Further reading:

• Why we did it: the Kenyan women and girls who joined Al-Shabaab, by Fathima Azmiya Badurdeen, Technical University of Mombasa
• Why Somali clan elders could hold the key to opening dialogue with Al-Shabaab, by Mohammed Ibrahim Shire, University of Portsmouth
• Somalia’s toxic political and security order: the death knell of democracy, by Abdi Ismail Samatar, University of Pretoria