GOOD MUSLIMS AND BAD MUSLIMS, GOOD WOMEN AND FEMINISTS - NEGOTIATING IDENTITIES IN NORTHERN CYPRUS (OR, THE CONDOM STORY)

This article examines the intersection of a ''good/bad Muslim'' identi ty with national, cultural, and gender categories in northern. Cyprus. It analyzes rite cultural and historical articulation of a modern, We stern ''bad Muslim'' identity, and describes ''the condom story, '' an event where some Turkish Cypriot women attempted to transgress the so cial boundaries around gender roles. It is argued that the complex neg otiations over a national identity (Cypriot and/or Turkish), a modem. identity (Eastern and/or Western), and a religious identity (Muslim an d/or secular) result in contradictory messages about gender and sexual ity for Turkish Cypriot women. This examination of identity negotiatio ns-principally a bad Muslim identity, and of women's various attempts to subvert societal pressures-ultimately reveals some of the cultural controls over women's gender identity, particularly their sexuality, i n Turkish Cypriot society.