Gridlock draws on four years of Mahdavi's ethnographic research in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to look at the disconnections between policies on human trafficking and the realities of gendered labor and migration in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

Women throughout the world are working towards viable democracies but not without challenges. NPR Journalist Jacki Lynden and Secretary General of the Jordanian National Commission for Women Asma Khader joined other women leaders from the Arab and Islamic regions to address these challenges and examine the influences of the Arab Spring on women.

Gender and Islam in Africa examines ways in which women in Africa are interpreting traditional Islamic concepts in order to empower themselves and their societies. African women, it argues, have promoted the ideals and practices of equality, human rights, and democracy within the framework of Islamic thought, challenging conventional conceptualizations of the religion as gender-constricted and patriarchal.

Former New York Times Istanbul Bureau Chief Stephen Kinzer ties together the events of the 1953 Iranian Coup, the evolution of present-day Iran and Turkey and the upheaval of today's "Arab Spring."