From arid deserts to lush green valleys to rugged mountain peaks, Pakistan's 796,095 square kilometers of territory encompass a wide variety of landscapes and stretch along both sides of the historic Indus River. Landing towards India, Afghanistan and Iran, it is strategically located along the ancient trade routes between Asia and Europe. Pakistan is a developing country with 23% of the population below the international poverty line. Many Pakistanis do not receive the basic education they need to succeed in later life, and only 54.9% are literate out of a population of 196,174,000. According to EFA reports (2008) 6.5 million Pakistani children do not have access to schools, of which 4 million are girls. They are all under nine years old, underscoring the gender disparity in access to early education. In this assignment I aim to identify how Islamic culture influences the way Pakistani women are viewed by their society and their ability to access education. Context: Today, poor and uneducated Pakistani women struggle for basic human rights, recognition and respect. The country is rooted in inequality and the mental belief that men are more capable than women is deeply ingrained in the strictly male-run society. According to a 2011 expert poll conducted by the Thomson Reuters Foundation Poll, Pakistan is the third most dangerous country in the world for a woman (in 2011). Most likely due to the fact that 90% of women in the country suffer from domestic violence and that more than 1,000 girls and women are killed in "honor killings" every year. These women, even though they are sometimes the breadwinners of their families, live in a culture that defines them through the male figures in their lives.......center of card......and strongly encourages equality in Pakistan. Works Cited http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/04/to-be-a-woman-in-pakistan-six-stories-of-abuse-shame-and-survival/255585/ http: //www. .islamswomen.com/articles/status_of_women_in_islam.php http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/20846947?uid=3737536&uid=2&uid=4&sid=21104067289777 http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Quran/010-women -worth-less.htm http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,185647,00.html http://www.pakistanoday.com.pk/2014/05/26/comment /educating-women-in-pakistan/ http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/pakistan_pakistan_statistics.html http://www.csw.ucla.edu/publications/newsletters/academic-year-2006-07/article- pdfs/May07_simons.pdf http://www.cgdev.org/doc/books/lewis-lockheed-eduCaseStudies/lewis-lockheed-chapter4.pdfhttp://www.jica.go.jp/english/news/press/2013 /140212_01.html